Thanks, Alec, for doing my lesson for me today:
Media Literacy Presentation
Tonight I presented “Popular Issues in (Digital) Media Literacy” to my EC&I 831 students. The presentation covered various topics such as: offensive content (bad taste, sexuality), viral videos & memes, misinformation (satire, hoaxes, scams, phishing), safety & cyberbullying, hate (racism & violence), social networks & privacy. It was very much a survey approach to the topic in hopes that my students will understand the broad scope of related issues.
Class? Do you have Alec Couros in your ‘gators? You should. This is why.
February 11th, 2009 at 10:25 AM
And thanks for your video on 21st century learners. For some reason, I just ran into that video yesterday and really enjoyed the point it makes (others did as well).
The gift economy just keeps on giving …
February 11th, 2009 at 9:24 PM
Well this slide show has many of the “evils” on the Interent that so many people are afraid of. While all of this information is out there, you almost have to be looking for it to find it. All of the categories in the video are issues within digital media. I know parents who refuse to let their kids on their Interent and yet let them play whatever video game and watch whatever movie they want. It just doesn’t make much sense to me. You can’t believe everything you see on the Internet, just like you can’t believe everything that you hear. People just need to be aware of the scams, monitor what their kids are doing, and ignore any of the other issues on the Interent unless they are what you want to see.
February 12th, 2009 at 9:33 AM
I agree with Elizabeth. This presentation did inform us of things that most of us are already aware of. The key is to educate our children about the dangers of the internet. Just as we teach our children not to talk to strangers, not to believe everything they hear, etc. we should also teach them the dangers of the internet (especially that everything on the internet is not true and the dangers of chatting with strangers). I think that when children see things online they automatically think it is true. It is up to us to educate them about the internet.
February 12th, 2009 at 9:45 AM
I agree with Elizabeth. I think that this presentation definitely shows us the dangers of the internet and how our times have changed. It is up to us, as educators, to make sure that our children understand that everything they see on the internet isn’t true. Just as we teach our children not to talk to strangers they see, not to cheat off of classmates, etc. we also need to teach them of these dangers associated with the internet.
February 12th, 2009 at 2:13 PM
I think this is a major issue, just as we teach our students about the dangers about drugs, tobacco and alcohol, we should teach them about the internet. The thing that most students don’t realize is who can see the material they post and what kind of effects that can have on them in their lives. I would love to see some research on how they view the internet and their safety. Did anyone see the statistics and how many registered sex offenders were removed from Myspace? I wonder how many of the students actually realize the dangers with that, I hear myspace discussed very often in our hallways. With the internet it is next to impossible to prevent these things from happening, so we need to educate them as to what they need to do to protect their safety. I anticipate this being a major issue in the future that we will be faced to deal with.
February 12th, 2009 at 4:35 PM
Good point about parents not allowing their children on the internet, but allow them to play inappropriate video games or watch suggestive or violent movies. Do you think this is because parents don’t know how to censor the internet for their kids, so that are afraid of the unknown that lurks on the internet? It is so easy to accidently stumble upon inappropriate items on the internet. It may be difficult to find specific things, but I have had two scares while teaching where students go onto a site that they shouldn’t. One was during student teaching. All I will say is that my students we searching for slavery and found bondage. Another involved an FMD student finding some penis pictures on the internet. I ended up in the principal’s offices for both incident to explain my side of the story.
I think that Kim is correct, too. We need to train our own children and students on internet safety, how to identify appropriate websites, how to filter false information on the internet, and how to use the internet for education and entertainment.
Does U-Tube scare anyone else? Girl fights and beating the homeless videos creep me out and worry me because some kids don’t need any ideas about how to be mean to others. I think, like Jason, that we need to teach our children about the dangers on the internet just like the dangers of tobacco, drugs, and alcohol.
By the way, what is Skpe?
Nice video on being a 21st Century Learner. It is funny when you compare all of the numbers like that. The two hours of T.V. is funny, too. It seems that most people who enjoy doing things on the internet do not spend a signigicant amount of time on-line. With the busy lives of Americans today, it seems that you have to make this choice: T.V. or Internet?
February 12th, 2009 at 7:06 PM
I like the point made about the You-Tube reaction videos. Recording reactions as an enticement to people to watch a “rather sick video.” It makes one think about what is accessible to children on TV, movies, internet, etc and then they are enticed to seek more. It is not necessarily a good thing when dealing with things like in the two girls one cup video. I think it is very important to teach our students about the dangers on internet and to speak openly about sex, drugs, alcohol…
The David after the Dentist clip amazed me. First that a parent would put this on the web—was it really necessary to post this to the web? Second the number of hits on the video and the remixes.
The hacking of historical pictures was another thing that made me think. I look at the Onion and while I think it is funning—I never thought about individual pictures being misconstrued by uninformed individuals. The Onion is good for a laugh, but for people to think the stories are true? Not so funny!
Media can and does influence individuals and especially our children, who live in a digitally rich world. We need to: 1. be very careful as to what we show children 2. Be involved in their digital lives 3. Talk to them about difficult/controversial issues.