During election season, the U.S. public is barraged with carefully orchestrated commercials and bite-sized news stories about political candidates. Political advertising often plays fast and loose with the facts, while in news coverage, complex ideas are often reduced to simplistic stories, especially on television and radio.
Today's news has "very little to do with democracy, issues, and knowledge," asserts Bob McCannon, coordinator of the New Mexico Literacy Project. This trend is troubling, because "the heart of a democracy is an informed citizenry," he says.
To enable young people to analyze media messages, rather than accepting them at face value, some educators are helping their students develop media literacy. Media-literacy techniques offer students new critical lenses through which to evaluate the myriad messages they receive. In this information age, these skills are vital, advocates of media literacy contend.
"We live in media space," says Jay Dover, project director of the Los Angeles-based Center for Media Literacy. In a society saturated with broadcast, print, and electronic messages, the ability to interpret communications becomes essential.
Dover suggests a classroom activity that teachers can use to drive the point home for students. Teachers should videotape election-oriented newscasts for one week, he recommends. Then, "have your students grab a stopwatch and time how long the announcer talks. Usually, the commentator speaks more than the candidates." Dover then offers some critical questions for the class to consider: "Is the news story covered like a racehorse event? How much time is spent on nonissues? Who is represented in the coverage and who isn't?"
The ability to analyze election coverage is just one fact of media literacy, which equips learners with tools to analyze and evaluate all media, McCannon explains. "Anyone who knows those things about different media enjoys greater freedom in our culture," because one will be more aware of the ways one's thinking can be influenced by media messages. "Media literacy is an unbiased, nonpartisan process," Dover adds.
Becoming Critical Consumers
The New Mexico Media Literacy Project, a statewide, state-supported media literacy initiative, has connected educators, business-people, other professionals, and families. Tricia Blackedge, a project participant and 1st grade teacher at Zuni Elementary Magnet School in Albuquerque, begins media literacy work each year by addressing the media her students know best: their favorite Saturday morning television programs.
"My first step is getting the children to realize that commercials sell things. Most of my kids think the commercials are there because the actors need to take a rest," Blackedge explains. "We basically ask, `What do they do to get you to buy the product?'"
Blackedge helps her students evaluate their interactions with the media. "They really pick up on the visual imagery, but they don't have the vocabulary for it," she notes. "My goal is to get them to articulate what they are discovering."
Blackedge, who indicates she has received high marks from families for her efforts, believes her yearlong integration of media literacy supports her student's development of literacy and higher-order thinking skills. "I'm seeing results," she affirms. "They're becoming more critical consumers of media. They're becoming more aware that the system is based on profits. They understand that TV is not free. You have to pay for it."
As they develop media literacy, Blackedge's savvy six-year-olds explore serious questions, but older students can delve into even deeper issues, such as the ways in which race, gender, violence, economics, and religion are represented in the media. Exploring the ways women are portrayed, for example, can help learners to understand how the media can perpetuate sexism.
In one simple but illuminating activity, Dover asks students to take the front page of a newspaper and highlight the names of women in red and those of men in blue. "When the students see how much more blue is on the front page, I then have them turn to the newspaper's editorial staff list and highlight that," he says. When students see a similar proportion of blue to red, "the realizations spark powerful discussions."
Involving Communities
Teachers can't help students develop media literacy alone. "One of the big things educators can do is pass this information on to parents," McCannon says. Significant media exposure occurs in the many hours outside classroom life, he points out. "I don't think you have to ban TV," Blackedge adds, "you just have to know how to use it."
Efforts to develop media literacy can unite parents and educators in the common goal of critical consumption, experts say. For the children benefiting from media literacy efforts across schools, families, and communities, control of the messages they receive becomes anything but remote.
Resources
Resources
These nonprofit organizations offer media literacy materials for educators and families:
Center for Media Literacy, 4727 Wilshire Blvd., Ste. 403, Los Angeles, CA 90010; Phone: 1-800-226-9494 or 213-931-4177; Fax: 213-931-4474 (http://websites.earthlink.net/~cml)
Media Education Foundation, 26 Center St., Northampton, MA 01060; Phone: 413-586-4170; Fax: 413-586-8398; (http://www.igc.apc.org/mef/)
New Mexico Media Literacy Project, 6400 Wyoming Blvd., Albuquerque, NM 87109; Phone: 505-828-3264; (http://www.aa.edu/media/nmmlp.html)