Places – Action 4 Media Education

People, Places, Politics, Resources, Take Action, Technology

What is media literacy?

March 25, 2021January 25, 2022 hinashaahid

Media literacy is the practice of critically evaluating, creating, and or using media. To be media literate, one must be aware of the influence media has on them and apply this knowledge by taking an active stance towards consuming and creating media.

About media literacy:

What is Media Literacy Education? Media Literacy is defined as the ability to access, analyze, evaluate, and produce communication in a variety of forms.

So does media literacy mean just TV and music, or does it include the internet and social media? Yes, absolutely. It applies to social media and user-generated content. When students log on to send messages or post photos and videos, they are becoming producers of media, not just consumers. By actively participating online, they are essentially joining a global conversation. Critical thinking skills must be applied to both the messages they are sending out to the world as well as those they receive back . An understanding of the Key Questions for Producers and Consumers will enable them to make wise choices and engage more fully as online citizens.

Does media literacy include online safety? Yes, media literacy is an umbrella term for teaching children the skills to be active and safe participants with media of all types. The critical thinking skills required to become media literate can be applied to any message from any medium. In other words, it does not make a difference if the message comes from social media, television, websites, videogames, radio, print or cell phone, the same skills are needed to interpret and make wise choices about what is seen and heard. Online safety is of particular concern which is why we advocate for media literacy education for all school children K-12.

Is Digital Citizenship the same as Media Literacy? The term Digital Citizenship is often used interchangeably with media literacy, and indeed, media literacy skills are necessary for being a responsible online citizen. Media Literacy, however, is larger than the internet — it involves a new way to see and interpret the world through all forms of media. The critical thinking skills of media literacy are applicable to all aspects of life, and media literacy is an established academic discipline internationally, with a pedagogy and structure necessary for teaching and transferring knowledge and skills.

Is there a difference between media literacy and media education? Yes. Media literacy refers to a set of skills whereas media education involves the process through which one learns these skills. There is no limit to how “media literate” one can become!

Corona Showcase, Education, Media Literacy, News, People, Places, Social Media

Action for Media Education Announces a New Initiative: The Corona Multimedia Showcase

June 4, 2020July 4, 2020 Sue D. Cook

Action for Media Education Announces a New Initiative: The Corona Multimedia Showcase

For Immediate Release
Date: 6/3/2020

If we could ask kids around the world what they’re thinking and feeling right now, what would they say? Action for Media Education (AME) https://action4mediaeducation.org is inviting young people from ages 3-19 and their families to participate in an international online exhibit of creative work that reflects their lives in this time of COVID-19.

More than 40 countries are participating in the Corona Multimedia Showcase initiative. Now AME seeks entries from young people across the United States.

The Showcase provides a platform for children, youth and their families to create and display media projects in a variety of formats. These projects will be digitally published on our Showcase website.

The Showcase is intended to provide young people around the world with the opportunity to:

Express their thoughts, feelings and ideas
Engage them in reflecting critically on their work and support their best efforts
Help them share their experiences with other young people and their families around the world
Provide a place for them to display their creative work and express their own unique voices
Inspire hope and demonstrate that we will persevere, with our courage and creativity, during this crisis and into a new future

Please help us spread the word to your family, your community and those with whom you work.

Submissions and participation are free.
This is NOT a competition but a festival celebrating the creativity of children and youth throughout the world.
The deadline for submissions is October 9, 2020. All projects (reviewed by a large group of experts) will be posted on the Showcase website by the end of October.

To submit an entry, find ideas and resources, and join the conversation:

Corona Multimedia Showcase https://coronashowcase.org/

Twitter @coronashowcase

Instagram #coronashowcase

Facebook Corona Multimedia Showcase

For more information, please contact: Marilyn Cohen, macohen@uw.edu

Net Neutrality, News, Places, Take Action

FCC should listen to tech-savvy Seattle and preserve open Internet

November 29, 2017November 29, 2017 Sue D. Cook

This article is relevant now as the FCC considers repealing Net Neutrality laws. It first appeared in the last big discussion on Net Neutrality, back in August 2014.

Well, Seattle residents have spoken. Many of them, anyway, in favor of preserving net neutrality and against creating a two-lane Internet highway in which Internet providers could charge some users more for faster access and connectivity.

The Federal Communications Commission recently released about 1.1 million comments from its first comment period. TechCrunch’s initial analysis found the most-used word by citizens was “Comcast” followed by “Verizon” — and the bulk of what they had to say was not very nice. A second comment period ends on Sept. 10, so go to this FCC link to make your voice heard.

As The Seattle Times editorial board wrote on July 19, May 16, May 11, April 27 and Jan. 15, the open Internet should be preserved and providers should be reclassified as “common carriers” like most other public telecommunication services.

On Wednesday, Reuters reported U.S. Sen. Patrick Leahy called on the FCC to leave its echo chamber in the Beltway and hold public meetings around the country. “Most of (those who had commented on the proposed rules online) will not be able to come to Washington to participate in the roundtables that have been scheduled, but their voices are more important than industry lobbyists and members of Congress,” Leahy reportedly wrote in a letter to FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler.

Great idea. FCC, please come to Seattle.

Read more in this great piece at The Seattle Times, a big supporter of keeping net neutrality and a strong voice about this issue.

Take action! We can save net neutrality. Contact Congress today to keep the internet available to all!

Visit www.battleforthenet.com to make your voice heard.

Events, News, Places

AME gets a refresh

November 2, 2017November 7, 2017 Sue D. Cook

We have decided after many years to begin a needed refresh on our logo and overall design elements. We’d like to debut our new logo then to kickoff this process.

Below is the newest face of AME. A beautiful nod to cameras and photography, this logo will now be on all our materials going forward, and will replace our older logos, also below.

Thank you to everyone for your continued support. We look forward to this refresh of logos and colors while continuing to unify all of you in efforts to promote, educate and advocate for media literacy in Washington State.

Education, News, Places

Global Media and Information Literacy Week 2017, Oct 25 – Nov 1

October 11, 2017October 6, 2017 Sue D. Cook

UNESCO is hosting its sixth annual Global Media and Information Literacy Week October 25 through November 1. Activities and the feature conference are important opportunities for stakeholders globally to celebrate the progress achieved towards the process of “MIL for all”. Global MIL Week also enables connections and sharing of creative projects, the latest research, new ideas, and information across countries and stakeholders involved in MIL, and in print, screen-based and digital media.

The Global MIL Week 2017 highlights include local and regional activities around the world as well as its feature event, namely the Seventh Media and Information Literacy and Intercultural Dialogue (MILID) Conference. The feature conference will be hosted by the University of the West Indies, and will take place from 24 to 27 October, 2017 in Kingston, Jamaica.

Learn more at the UNESCO MIL website.

Image courtesy of UNESCO.

Fake News, News, Places

Fake news fills information void in Las Vegas shooting

October 2, 2017 Sue D. Cook

As law enforcement and news organizations raced to piece together what happened during the worst mass shooting in modern U.S. history Sunday night in Las Vegas, web denizens less wedded to the truth rushed in to provide details of their own—which quickly went viral.

Links to the 4chan website that falsely identified the shooter and called him a leftist and Democratic supporter were showing up on the top of Google search results, according to tweets by Buzzfeed News reporter Ryan Broderick.

Google extends digital literacy training to teachers

September 29, 2017September 20, 2017 Sue D. Cook

Digital citizenship has stepped into the forefront of a modern-day education. Experts indicate that as schools roll out tech, they also need to be rolling out digital citizenship education.

Tech giant Google heeded that call and partnered with experts to launch Be Internet Awesome, an interactive campaign that educates students on how best to act on the internet.

One part of this Google campaign is Interland, a game that has students travel an imaginary world where they need to fight hackers, phishers, oversharers and bullies with digital citizenship skills. While game-based learning can be effective, educators also need to be armed with skills to teach their students to be citizens of the web.

This month, Google extended its Be Internet Awesome program to include a free online training course to help educators establish foundational skills needed to teach their students to have a safe and positive experience online.

Tracey the robot helps passengers through Sea-Tac Airport security

August 1, 2017July 25, 2017 Sue D. Cook

A robot named Tracey is greeting passengers at the Seattle-Tacoma International Airport, providing tips to get them smoothly through security checkpoints.

The red-and-white human-sized robot carries a large electronic sign and can speak to passengers in six different languages.

Airport officials say the robot isn’t designed to replace human workers, but to allow them to spend more time on critical security work.

Tracey was created by Advanced Robot Solutions. CEO Paul McManus says it is a demonstration model, but future versions could recognize when a traveler is wearing sunglasses or a hat and ask them to take it off before the security checkpoint.

The robot is temporarily on duty at the Seattle airport as it hosts a meeting of airport executives from around the country.

Article courtesy of KOMO News.

Image courtesy of KOMO News.

tracy

Education, Health, News, Places

Can a MediaWise campaign help kids see through the advertising world?

July 20, 2017September 17, 2018 Sue D. Cook

Saying that your eight-year-old knows more about technology than you do is one of those humblebrags that’s rarely true – but it at least reflects the reality that children are growing up in a media-saturated world. And while they have no cash, they have something nearly as valuable – pester power – which is why they’ve been in the crosshairs of marketing budgets for decades.

The Irish Heart Foundation pulls no punches in its current “Stop Junk Brands Targeting Kids” campaign, saying that brands “use underhand and unregulated marketing tactics. Their influence has spread into children’s homes, digital devices and even their schools.”

It urges visitors to its site – where cleverly engaging content explains how advertisers sell to children – to sign a petition. The campaign, set against a backdrop of one-in-four Irish children being overweight or obese, is hoping to get 30,000 sign-ups to back its call for Government intervention to protect children’s health through strict controls on digital marketing.

“It is really worrying that seven- to 16-year-olds are spending about three hours a day online, vulnerable to slick marketing that’s pushing foods and drinks that are causing obesity,” said the Irish Heart Foundation’s head of advocacy Chris Macey.

An agoraphobic photographer’s virtual travels, on Google Street View

July 11, 2017July 5, 2017 Sue D. Cook

Last year, amid the stress of shutting down a company she’d co-founded nearly ten years before, Jacqui Kenny, a New Zealander living in London, began exploring the world on Google Street View. At first, she would pick locales more or less at random, poking around the streets of faraway towns and taking screenshots whenever she stumbled upon a striking image. After a while, she began seeking out certain kinds of views: arid regions with clear horizons; latitudes where she found that the sunlight fell at a dramatic slant. She was soon spending many hours on the project, which became a kind of retreat.

“I really didn’t know what I was going to do with my life,” she told me. “I wasn’t in the mood to face the world yet, and this absorbed a lot of my focus.” When she looked back after a year of taking screenshots, she had accumulated an archive of around twenty-six thousand photos.

Kenny now posts photos from the collection on an Instagram account called Agoraphobic Traveller, a reference to another impetus behind the project: Kenny, who is friendly and witty in conversation, suffers from anxiety that, on a bad day, can make it difficult to leave the house. Contrary to a common misconception, agoraphobia is often less a fear of open spaces than it is a fear of losing control.

Shoutout to our media literacy partners down under! Australian updates

July 4, 2017June 26, 2017 Sue D. Cook

Australian updates Here are just a few of the programs being held by our media literacy partners down in Australia, the Australian Children’s Television Foundation.

New Education Package: Indigenous Perspectives Ahead of 2017 NAIDOC Week, the ACTF has compiled a range of engaging educational content and support materials which represent the diverse experiences of Indigenous Australian children. Read more.

Jeffrey Walker Webinar: Child Actor to International Director In our latest webinar for upper primary and secondary schools, students had the opportunity to ask Australian director Jeffrey Walker about his inspirational career. Read more.

Comedy Scriptwriting Workshops Update Presented in partnership with the Australian Centre for the Moving Image (ACMI), our entertaining series of virtual comedy scriptwriting workshops for Year 5 and 6 students wrapped up this week. Read more.

Little Lunch App Competition: Start Planning for Term 3! Following the success of last year’s competition, we will be running our Little Lunch App Competition again in Term 3 this year. Entries can be submitted between 4 September – 27 October 2017. Read more.

Visit the ACTF website for more information, or sign up for their newsletter!

Education, News, Places

Come for the computers, stay for the books

June 26, 2017June 22, 2017 Sue D. Cook

Traci Chun, a teacher-librarian at Skyview High School in Vancouver, Washington, is all done with shushing. “When my library is quiet, that’s a red flag,” said Chun. In fact, the busier it is, the better—whether it’s kids experimenting with the Makey Makey circuitry or uploading designs to a 3-D printer, or a class learning media literacy, or a student seeking advice on a video she’s editing at one of the computer workstations.

Chun’s district is at the forefront of a national movement to turn K–12 librarians into indispensable digital mavens who can help classroom teachers craft tech-savvy lesson plans, teach kids to think critically about online research, and remake libraries into lively, high-tech hubs of collaborative learning—while still helping kids get books.

The stereotypical library can seem like a vestige, making it an easy target when budgets are tight, according to Mark Ray, Vancouver’s director of innovation and library services, “but we want libraries to be the lynchpin of education transformation.” Ray heads up Future Ready Librarians, part of Future Ready Schools—a network for sharing education technology solutions, which is sponsored by the Alliance for Excellent Education, a Washington, D.C.–based education advocacy group.

Crinkling News lives: Crowdfunding and Senate appearance save kids’ paper

June 1, 2017June 22, 2017 Sue D. Cook

Australia’s only children’s newspaper attracts the $200,000 it needs to survive after its editor warns of need to ‘develop media literacy in Australia’

An 11th-hour appearance at a Senate select committee into public interest journalism and a whirlwind of publicity have helped the children’s newspaper Crinkling News to stay in print after a fundraising goal of $200,000 was reached.

Crinkling News’s editor, Saffron Howden – along with a bigger player in the media industry, the Fairfax Media chief executive, Greg Hywood – was invited to give evidence at the Senate committee’s first public hearing in Sydney on Wednesday.

“To address the creeping influence of fake news, so-called alternative facts, clickbait and the selection by social media platforms of the information to which we are exposed, we need to start educating children at a young age,” Howden told the senators. “In short, we need to develop media literacy in Australia.

Newseum ED pilots fake news class at Palo Alto High School

May 25, 2017May 16, 2017 Sue D. Cook

NewseumED curriculum developers will be at Palo Alto High School in California on Tuesay, May 16, to pilot their newest media literacy class, “Fighting Fake News: How to Outsmart Trolls and Troublemakers.” The class was launched at the Newseum in March in response to the “fake news” phenomenon that garnered national attention during the 2016 presidential election, and continues to be a major global concern.

Students of Esther Wojcicki, a journalism teacher at Palo Alto, provided input to NewseumED staff as they developed the class as well as a flow chart helping students determine whether a story is worth sharing by text, tweet or email.

Local librarians to lead workshop on media literacy

May 17, 2017May 17, 2017 Sue D. Cook

Media Literacy, a free two-hour workshop, is set at the Port Angeles Library at 6 p.m. Thursday.

Librarians Danielle Gayman and Sarah Morrison at the Port Angeles Library of the North Olympic Library System will present the workshop at the library at 2210 S. Peabody St.

“Today’s media landscape and technologies mean that misinformation or disinformation can be widely shared and disseminated, accidentally or purposefully, regardless of the facts,” according to a news release issued by the library system.

House Bill 2200: A bill to create internet privacy protections

April 26, 2017May 11, 2017 Sue D. Cook

Washington State is trying to pass a bill that would create internet privacy protections.

Check out this bill here!

The bill would create new internet privacy protections enforceable under the Washington Consumer Protection Act, including:

Compelling transparency by making ISP privacy policies available to customers so they know what to expect.
Protecting privacy by prohibiting ISPs from selling or using private information (such as a person’s browsing history) without consent.
Requiring ISPs to report to customers when they have been hacked and personal data has been breached so customers can protect themselves.

Please consider supporting this bill. It is important that consumers should have the option to keep their personal browser history private!

Fake News, News, Places, Politics

California fake news bill

April 12, 2017April 6, 2017 Sue D. Cook

A legislative proposal aimed at outlawing “fake news” websites was sidelined in the California State Legislature at the eleventh hour Tuesday upon drawing fire from free speech advocates over its certain implications on the First Amendment.

California Assemblyman Ed Chau, Monterey Park Democrat, abruptly canceled plans Tuesday to hold a hearing dedicated to A.B. 1104, a bill that would have made it illegal to publish false or deceptive statements on the internet about a political candidate or ballot measure.

Also known as the California Political Cyberfraud Abatement Act, Mr. Chau’s office previously called the proposal “an important step forward in the fight against ‘fake news’ and deceptive campaign tactics.”

Students taking on new skills, challenging authority

April 7, 2017April 6, 2017 Sue D. Cook

Here are two pieces from local and national papers highlighting students using media literacy tools to impact their communities.

This piece from the Kitsap Sun features elementary school students here in Washington tackling a popular advertising campaign.

Students in Heather Wilson’s library class frowned as they watched the time-lapse video of an ordinary woman transformed into a super-model. Bad enough the layering on of make-up, the teasing of hair. A few of the kids made gross-out faces, as the video showed the woman’s neck in a photo digitally lengthened before her image was slapped on a billboard.

The video, part of Dove’s “Real Beauty” campaign, has been around for a decade, but it was new to these fourth-graders, and it had the desired effect. The students learned — or had reinforced — the fact that images on the Internet can be digitally altered. Wilson asked them to think about an advertiser’s purpose in taking such liberties.

Cyborgs at work: Employees getting implanted with microchips

April 3, 2017June 22, 2017 Sue D. Cook

The syringe slides in between the thumb and index finger. Then, with a click, a microchip is injected in the employee’s hand. Another “cyborg” is created.

What could pass for a dystopian vision of the workplace is almost routine at the Swedish startup hub Epicenter. The company offers to implant its workers and startup members with microchips the size of grains of rice that function as swipe cards: to open doors, operate printers, or buy smoothies with a wave of the hand.

The injections have become so popular that workers at Epicenter hold parties for those willing to get implanted.

“The biggest benefit I think is convenience,” said Patrick Mesterton, co-founder and CEO of Epicenter. As a demonstration, he unlocks a door by merely waving near it. “It basically replaces a lot of things you have, other communication devices, whether it be credit cards or keys.”

“America First” causing concern and comedy amongst European countries

February 9, 2017March 30, 2017 Sue D. Cook

U.S. President Donald Trump said it loud and clear in his inauguration speech: “From this day forward, it’s going to be only America first.”

This has raised the question on the European scene, then who’s going to be second?

Comedians in Europe are having a field day with the notion of America First. Watch a few of the videos they’ve been creating here at Eugene Weekly. Another more in-depth article can be found here at Market Watch.

The video “The Netherlands welcomes Trump in his own words” has been one of the most noticeable so far. Watch it below.

News, Places

Success story for Seattle-based domain registry company

December 5, 2016April 27, 2017 Sue D. Cook

Local small-time company Donuts was recently featured in the Seattle Times. Bellevue-based Donuts has bought almost 200 of the new top-level domains that have been put up for bid over the past few years.