If you teach students who come from minority or low-income families, their deficits in news literacy are almost sure to be magnified. In a 2015 study of 503 teenagers ages 14 to 17, researchers Maksl, Ashley, and Craft found that 172 white teens (out of 297 total) were in the High News Media Literacy group, while only 81 non-white teens (out of 206 total) could be classified in the High News Media Literacy group. Parental education level is also a factor: Students whose parents didn't attend college are less likely to engage in news consumption or even see its importance. The same study found 63 students (children of parents who didn't attend college) were in the Low News Media Literacy group while only 29 were in the High News Media Literacy group.
The stakes are high not just for individual students but for all of us: As any social studies teacher out there can tell you, an informed citizenry is the key to a properly functioning democracy. And how does a citizenry become informed? News literacy can help with that!
While traditional journalism classes can address some knowledge and skill gaps, they can't fill the entire void, which is why it's up to all teachers in all subject areas to pitch in and do their part to promote news literacy in their classrooms. Just one more thing to do, right?
Probably only a relatively small percentage of a school's population ever takes a journalism elective or civics course, so we need teachers of other content areas to help "spread the news" about news literacy, even if only in small doses, even if only periodically. Believe it or not, that periodic exposure through various content area courses can make a difference, enticing apathetic students to become more aware of news and current events and strengthening the news literacy skills of students who already possess them.
Once our students gain a better understanding of how professional journalists work—how they are trained to source information and verify it and distill it for easier consumption—they will be able to better assess news sources and form opinions about news material before acting on it.
And thanks to social media, our students are also now producers and distributors of their own content, which makes it even more vital that they understand the responsibilities behind such actions. News literacy again!
So what exactly is news literacy? Let's get technical for a moment. Dr. Jennifer Fleming of California State University, Long Beach, has this to say about news literacy:
"News literacy as a skill is defined an an 'ability to use critical thinking skills to judge the reliability and credibility of news reports, whether they come via print, TV, or the internet.' The ultimate goal of...news literacy...is for students to become more regular and more skeptical news readers, watchers, and listeners who are able to determine if information is reliable enough for them to 'reach a conclusion, make a judgment, or take an action.'" (p. 150)
Sounds easy, doesn't it?
Until we remember to factor back in students producing and distributing their own content and social media use and fake news and journalism of affirmation and satirical news commentary and sponsored content and bias and civic engagement and...
So this is where it gets complicated.
This handbook may not have all of the answers, but it may have many of them. Use what you can, adapt what you can, and most importantly, integrate what you can into your own course content. Feel free to explore the handbook for ideas, tips, and strategies.
Good luck making news literacy a part of your curriculum!
Reference
Fleming, J. (2014). Media literacy, news literacy, or news appreciation? A case study of the news literacy program at Stony Brook University.
Journalism & Mass Communication Educator, Vol. 69(2), 146-165. doi: 10.1177/1077695813517885
Adapted from
Edgerly, S. (2017). Seeking out and avoiding the news media: Young adults proposed strategies for obtaining current events information.
Mass Communication and Society, 20:3, 358-377. doi: 10.1080/15205436.2016.1262424
Maksl, A., Ashley, S., & Craft, S. (2015). Measuring news media literacy. Journal of Media Literacy Education, 6(3), 29-45.
http://digitalcommons.uri.edu/jmle/vol6/iss3/3
Vraga. E.K. & Tully, M. (2016). Effectiveness of a non-classroom news media literacy intervention among different undergraduate
populations. Journalism & Mass Communication Educator, Vol. 71(4), 440-452. doi: 10.1177/1077695815623399
