How to Teach Media Literacy to High School Students

Teaching students to identify reliable sources, spot a fake image or video, think critically about advertising, or identify the steps in the newspaper production process are just some of the many facets of media literacy education. Since today’s teenagers are growing up in a world where information travels incredibly quickly, it is imperative to teach them the skills they need to be thoughtful media consumers. Here are a few good reasons to incorporate media literacy into your lessons:

• It prepares students to grow up in a constantly evolving technological world where media are omnipresent.

• It builds on the interests and knowledge that students already possess. Students are generally enthusiastic about media literacy education.

• It teaches them to become active and involved media consumers and users by engaging with “real world” issues.

• It is essential for students to learn how to navigate the world of online information, assess claims and sources, spot falsehoods and bad-faith arguments, find reliable information, and understand plagiarism and copyright issues.

• It opens a window on the world in the classroom, putting school subjects into context. It also helps to draw connections between different school subjects.

• It supports the implementation of new pedagogical methods centered on cooperative learning and differentiated instruction.

• It helps young people view themselves as active citizens and potential contributors to public discourse. It also helps them deepen their understanding of diversity, identity, and difference, and the influence that media representations can have on our perception of the world.

• Etc.

Whatever subject you teach, there are ways you can integrate media literacy into your lessons. While media are ubiquitous, digital media occupy a special place in the lives of young people. Here are the nine most important media literacy skills to develop in high school:

1. Interpreting Media
   Learning to interpret media is arguably the most fundamental digital media literacy skill. This includes understanding the different ways media messages are constructed, that is, how they tell stories and communicate meaning, such as through camera angles and editing in movies, composition and transitions in comics, and the aesthetic choices of social media creators. Here are four key questions to ask yourself to help you interpret media:
   - Who is the target audience for this piece of media?
   - Whose point of view is presented?
   - How might different audiences interpret the same piece of media?
   - What are the potential social and political repercussions of this digital tool?

2. Media Representation
   Media can shape our perception of reality, no matter who the source of the message is (e.g., a journalist or our aunt). It’s important to think about how the media represent reality, and how different audiences respond to these representations. This can be done by tackling topics such as stereotypes, how our view of the world (and ourselves) is shaped by media and algorithms, how advertising messages manipulate us, and how we represent ourselves on social media.

3. Research and fact-checking
   Students must learn to efficiently locate the information they need, then evaluate, authenticate, question, and analyze the sources and information they use for academic or personal reasons. Of course, it is important to make a distinction between being critical about the information we consume and questioning everything. If the main message students take away from media literacy lessons is that no media sources can be trusted, they may develop an attitude that is more cynical than skeptical.

4. Ethics and Empathy
   Interactivity is one of the main characteristics of digital media. We have an ethical responsibility to show kindness and respect to others in online interactions. To do this, students need to learn to feel empathy despite the absence of elements such as body language, tone of voice, and facial expression. They also have to learn to manage their own emotions. These skills are essential to combat cyberbullying.

5. Privacy and Security
   In the world of digital media, we are both producers and consumers. This is why students need to be taught to take steps to manage their online privacy by deciding what they share and with whom, while keeping in mind that we can never fully control who will see the content we post. Getting the Toothpaste Back into the Tube: A Lesson on Online Information is a great activity that demonstrates how online information becomes permanent.

6. Health in the Media
   Topics related to health in the media include media messages about health, diet, managing screen use, balancing online and offline life, online identity issues, access to physical and mental health information, managing gender representations, diversity and body image, and healthy sexuality and relationships.

7. Consumer Awareness
   Online advertising targeted at young people is very powerful. It urges them to spend money to access the “best content” and to support influencers. Young people are frequently exposed to brands, advertising games, and so on. As a result, it is important to teach students to exercise their power and rights as informed consumers.

8. Community Involvement
   Digital media offer young people unique opportunities to take action, express themselves, and bring about change, both online and offline. It is important to remind young people that being a netizen comes with certain rights and responsibilities. Helping them to understand their rights as consumers, community members, citizens, and human beings, is essential to enable them to take full advantage of digital media.

9. Creating and remixing
   Both of these skills enable students to create media and use existing content for their own purposes, while respecting legal and ethical considerations (such as copyright), and use digital platforms to collaborate with others.

Media literacy can be integrated into every area of the school curriculum. Whether participating in media creation or analysis, or using digital tools, students make intensive use of language, research, planning, and communication skills. Here are a few examples of activities to explore media literacy with your students:

• French:

  • Ask students to analyze and create journalistic products. Over the course of several class periods, students produce reports, news articles, photo essays, posters, comic strips, podcasts, videos, interviews, debates, commercials, and more.

  • Complete the “Créez votre propre publicité!” LES (link in French), which addresses the role of advertising agencies and the phenomenon of consumerism.

  • Use our poster on how to spot fake news to remind students of the differences between fact and opinion.

• Social Sciences:

  • Ask students to create a mock social media profile for a historical figure of their choice. Then, have them analyze the possibilities, shortcomings, and potential uses of social networks and think about how the historical figure would use them differently.

  • In geography class, you can have students practice their research and fact-checking skills using search engines, travel websites, and other online resources. As a practical fact-checking activity, you could suggest that they research the fictional country of Listenbourg (link in French).

  • Students can also explore how their perception of history and historical events has been shaped by the media. For example, students can search for old historical documents, posters, newspapers, movies, and advertisements, and analyze them in the light of the culture of the era.

  • In geography class, students can analyze how media coverage influences the way they perceive different parts of the world and the people who live there. Even maps can be studied as pieces of media.

• Science and Technology:

  • The media’s role in science education and popularization is steadily gaining in importance. Exploring and analyzing this type of media is a great way to teach media literacy skills while exploring the way science impacts our daily lives. Here are a few sources to explore: Sexual health education and authenticating online information, Deconstructing Web Pages, and Break the Fake Lesson Plan: Hoax? Scholarly research? Personal opinion? You decide!

  • Some very interesting French sources to explore include: Le Pharmachien, content from Agence Science-Presse (especially the section Le détecteur de rumeurs), Scilabus, Moteur de recherche, Les années lumière, Brief.science, Curium, and Science et vie Junior.

  • Students need to learn to critically read information that purports to be scientific by learning to spot fake news. Share Science Up First’s post about Misinformation Red Flags. This poster will help them separate myth from fact (link in French). When it comes to scientific news, this poster from Agence Science-Presse (link in French) is another excellent resource. Finally, this poster (link in French) is a good way of reminding students that social networks are not news media (link in French).

  • This educational activity from Agence Science-Presse (link in French) helps students learn to assess the validity of scientific information, using concrete examples.

  • This game from the Montreal Science Centre lets students test their critical thinking skills by determining whether the information presented is a hoax or fact.

• English:

  • These two websites are good resources for fact-checking information shared online: Snopes.com and FactCheck.org. You can ask your students to draw conclusions about information that has turned out to be a hoax or a conspiracy theory.

  • Have your students visit this site, which has published a fake article about tree octopuses, and ask them to follow the steps on the fake news poster to determine whether the article is reliable.

• Math:

  • Students can learn how concepts such as statistics and probability are represented in the media and how they affect our understanding of current events.

  • You can discuss algorithms (sequences of operations and calculations that govern the way a system works) and the role they play in personalizing the content we consume online.

  • For an activity related to proportions and ratios, ask students to bring in educational magazines such as National Geographic, Curium or Science et vie and cut out (or circle) the ads, then do the same with the informational content. Then, ask them to compare the amount of ads to the amount of informational content, calculating the differences in terms of percentages.

• Quebec Culture and Citizenship:

  • Have your students analyze mockumentaries (fake documentaries) to practise distinguishing truth from fiction, as well as share their impressions of this type of work. An interesting option is the 8-minute short Le complot chat, made by students at a high school in Bondy, France, available on YouTube (in French).

  • On the Télé-Québec en classe website, you’ll find a number of documentary webseries that address media literacy and critical thinking, such as Vérifié! and Pense fort (links in French). Watch and discuss an episode with your class.