PSA Literacy Feud

My PSA focuses on the classroom teacher being a role-model for Critical Media Literacy.  My Instructional Technology students (pre-service teachers) helped me create this video. (They had a lot of fun!)  What better way to promote teaching media literacy skills?  I believe that if I'm modeling media literacy skills, and requiring my students to participate, then these future teachers will implement Critical Media Literacy skills in their classrooms.  All students in the video gave permission for this video to be public.

Literacy Feud

PSA Annotated Bibliography

1.    Abilock, D. (2010, November). Seven Power Lens on 21st Century Literacy. Mulitmedia Schools, 10(6), 30.  (DEJ 2)

"The tools of visual, media, and information literacy must be taught in school because they will

(or won’t) be used at home."   This article focuses on teaching students to use the "seven powers" (senses, inference, research, contexts, evaluation, synthesis, and teaching) to ask questions and participate in discussions that are relevant to a democratic society.

2.  Semali, L. (2001, November). Defining new literacies in curricular practice. Reading Online, 5(4). Available: http://www.readingonline.org/newliteracies/lit_index.asp?HREF=semali1/index.html    (DEJ 4)

"A reconceptualized vision of new literacies education would include an explicit effort to enable students to acquire the ability to understand how visual media work to produce meanings. This effort would strive to develop literate people who are able to read, write, listen, talk, analyze, evaluate, and produce communications in a variety of media, including print, television, music, video, film, radio, hypertext, and the arts."  This article is about students being literate in not only print text, but also moving images and graphics.  We need to develop literate students in reading, listening, speaking, analyzing, evaluating and producing multimedia messages. In addition, the expansion of communication technologies have exceeded the curriculum.  So, teachers need to ask themselves, what role new literacies will play in the classroom.

3.  Learn Critical Thinking through Media Literacy Education. (2010, October). In Medialiteracycolloquium'sblog: A Study in Media Literacy. Retrieved September 27, 2011, from http://medialiteracycolloquium.wordpress.com/2010/10/25/learn-critical-thinking-through-media-literacy-education (DEJ 6)

“Teachers who recognize the goal of teaching thinking rather than just imparting knowledge help students make connections beyond the content of the coursework” (2005, pp. 2) She suggests teaching critical thinking by applying it to the study of media literacy. This practice gives students the skills and knowledge needed to “access, analyze, evaluate and communicate” (NAMLE) media messages."  In short, this article focuses on teaching students to use critical media literacy skills to develop critical thinking skills that will assist in achieving higher scores on standardized testing.

4.  Hobbs, Renee, and Richard Frost. "Measuring the Acquisition of Media Literacy Skills." Reading Research Quarterly 39.3 July (2003): 330-55. Web. 7 Oct. 2011. (DEJ 7)

Why did the authors do this study?  The researchers examined " the impact of media literacy instruction in  a secondary language arts curriculum, which was developed in one district, to determine its effects on students’ reading, listening and viewing comprehension, writing, and skills of message analysis" (Hobbs and Frost 335).   In summary, after reading and analyzing the data from this article, an instructor that correlates media literacy skills with  critical thinking skills will be able to design authentic instruction for students without the burden of worry that he/she is not meeting the necessary requirements of literacy.

5.  Hobbs, R. (n.d.). Teaching Media Literacy: Yo! Are you hip to this?. In www.medialit.org. Retrieved October 14, 2011, from http://www.medialit.org/reading-room/teaching-media-literacy-yo-are-you-hip  (DEJ 8)

  "Now that the culture is almost totally transformed by the compelling electronic and visual experiences that enter our living rooms each day, the ostrich stance seems more and more ridiculous. It's time to face up to the media culture we have created and the media culture we have consumed. It's time to help ourselves and our children to embrace and celebrate the messages worth treasuring, to analyze and understand the economic and political forces which sustain it, and to develop the skills and new habits we need to think carefully and wisely about the messages we create ourselves and the abundant messages we receive ."

This article provides information to help students acquire the necessary skills to manage in a media saturated world.  Also, the article suggests the need to think carefully about the messages that we create and receive.