Media and the Most Vulnerable Population

Reflection

1. What is media literacy and why is it so important? After watching the videos and reading the articles how has your definition of media literacy changed since the beginning of the course?

   Media Literacy is the critical evaluation of the many aspects of media, including who published it and why they published it. Through analysis, it is possible to identify the intended audience and the meaning it may have intended to convey to them. We can also interpret, who wasn't included as audience and how the same message may be perceived by them. Understanding media helps to better understand and interpret the world we live in.

   At this early point in the course, I find the 5 Essential questions as a new stepping stone to helping students understand media. As for my understanding, I entered the course with some background understanding of Media Literacy, both personally and professionally.

2. Share your thoughts about last weeks media deconstruction activity. Which questions are the hardest to answer and why?

   I think questions 3 & 4 from the 5 Key Questions of Media Literacy are the most difficult and yet most helpful.

3. How might different people interpret this message? Which lifestyles, values, and points of view are represented -- or missing?

   Both of these questions ask the viewer to step back from self and apply understanding from others' points of view. When removing self from the interpretation, the options of interpretation become endless - as people are complex beings. When removing self, we are also opening ourselves up to misidentify others' experiences and observations of the media - apply stereotypes or other falsehoods. So perhaps, question 3 is the most challenging because it is the vaguest and ambiguous.

4. Which questions are the most helpful and why?

   As stated in the last question, the most difficult questions to answer are the most important. However, I now arrive at perhaps question 4 being most helpful. In that, when identifying the group being targeted (lifestyles, values, and points of view) it becomes easier to see who is missing. This may also lead to a greater understanding of how those not included may view the media, the most difficult question to answer.

5. In Kellner and Share's Media Literacy is Not an Option, the authors state the following in their conclusion;

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   The task for educators and researchers is to engage in a new type of literacy education, from pre-school to higher education that incorporates new information communication technologies, media, and popular culture with critical pedagogy. This work must challenge dominant ideologies and empower youth to unveil the myths through creating their own alternative representations that empower their own voices and struggles for social justice.

   What do you think of this statement? Is it the job of educators to challenge dominant ideologies? What role should educators play, if any, in the institution of media literacy education?

   In 2021, this sounds like a loaded question. But, Yes, education should challenge the status quo - dominant idealogy. It is the role of education to expand students' knowledge, and this means building an understanding of multicultural experiences.

   Repeated throughout Keller & Share article was the idea of examining power, and empowering students to have a voice in their learning. To build Active Learning and Participatory Learning communities.

6. As educators, how do you feel about Kellner and Share's following recommendation about the institution of media literacy education from pre-school to university?

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   We recommend that media education programs be instituted from preschool to university and that linking media literacy with production become a regular practice. Standards for media literacy programs should include criticizing the ways that media reproduce racism, sexism, homophobia, and other prejudices and encouraging students to find their own voices in critiquing media culture and producing alternative representations."

   Through my instructive experience utilizing the College & Career Readiness Standards (CCRS) - the highest level of the Common Core State Standards (CCSS) - I recall having students understand, analyze, and interpret several points of view in a variety of media. We even produced various types of media, including infographics, advertisements, and other simple types of media. This naturally found its way into discussing racism, sexism, homophobia, and other prejudices, as the projects were based on Active Learning principles - creating a Participatory environment. As the instructor, I was also including media that intentionally exposed varying points of view.

   Having less experience in Elementary Education than I do with Middle & High School students, with the most experience in Adult Basic Education, I would be at a disadvantage to speak to what this might look like in younger students. I do think it is important for the discussion to take place and it would also be helpful for parents to engage in the conversations too.

   I would note, that Colorado adopted the CCSS in 2010, and the Kellner & Shares article was published in 2007 (n.d., CDE).

7. After reading HOUSE BILL 21-1103 CONCERNING IMPLEMENTING THE RECOMMENDATIONS OF THE MEDIA LITERACY ADVISORY COMMITTEE IN ELEMENTARY AND SECONDARY EDUCATION what do you think it means for Colorado Students? Is it enough? Is it too much? Why or why not? What would you add or eliminate, if anything?

   I read it as an intentional act, to reinforce the Common Core State Standards. Kellner and Share stated, "While media education is now expected to be taught since it is listed in almost all the state standards, unfortunately, little has been done to train teachers, provide resources or create curriculum" (2008, p. 9.). I think Colorado's Bill is moving towards filling the professional learning gap in teacher education. With the other standards, Colorado has outlined resources and furthered those standards, to my knowledge. This bill is seeking to do the same for Media Literacy. Is it enough? It's a start... I think like all the standards parents also need to be involved, otherwise, we might hear phrases that sound like, "and now we have these new media standards, what are they doing?" Having parents and children involved might also help achieve the Participatory approach that Dewey envisioned a century ago, as well (Kellner & Share, 2008).

8. What does the Feb 2020 Atlantic article describe as the "sneaky ways" advertisers are finding to reach kids other that TV ads? How is this different or the same from your childhood experience?

   I believe two distinct methods were described in the article. The first, creating media with the intent of selling merchandise aligned to it. The second, utilizing influencers to reach audiences. And as I have been reflecting, I can't help but wonder if reality television made way for the influencer phenomenon?

   My childhood experience is so far removed from this discussion, in that I do not recall having a television until late elementary school. This also includes seeing movies. While today's parents are putting media devices in their children's hands from birth onward...! I was very late to the smartphone revolution, so I am sure, many people's children were fully immersed in the technology before it even made it to my hands. I think that says a lot about the differences in how people can be raised.

   However, I would note, that I was learning to code the applications that run on the smartphone before owning one... and in late elementary school, I was learning basic coding on the early Macintosh in after-school programs. But in my earliest years, advertising media was nonexistent.

9. When and how did advertisers reach you as a child? Are there other ways, not mentioned in the Atlantic article, that you have noticed in your own lives that advertisers gain access to children?

   As noted above, advertising was absent from my earliest years. Advertising didn't reach me until I took interest in activities that were in magazines.

   In thinking of ways advertisers reach children, did anyone mention product placement? I guess this is the form of media being created with the intent of selling merchandise - hello Disney - and just about every child actor coming out of their studios - Hannah Montana AKA Miley Cyrus, to name one of many. What about the many facets of reality television - American Idol?

10. We may hit upon topics that may feel uncomfortable for some in this course. Discussion is not always easy but it is so important at times like these. This includes topics such as media portrayals of violence, opposing political agendas, sexual violence, discrimination and social injustices of all kinds. What can we do as fellow learners to ensure a civil environment for dialogue in this learning space?

    I think the keyword here is dialogue, the give and take of information. When entering into dialogue it is a two-way street of sharing ideas to build a new common ground of understanding. We are imperfect human beings, and as such we are neither right nor wrong, but building towards a greater understanding. Knowing this furthers the dialogue and builds awareness to new ideas; however, coming at someone with a pitchfork and an eraser is a sure way not to further dialogue.

11. How are you doing? You don't have to answer this question directly in a public thread - you can simply know that as your instructor I am cognizant and aware that the closing few months have been a struggle for many. I will not lose sight of that in this course. Please reach out if there is anything I can do (or not do) that would make this experience better for you. Within reason, of course. We have learning to do, and that isn't always stress-free. I have been a graduate student and I commend your commitment to learning during an uneasy time.

    Thanks, I am doing well.