Critical Thinking About Media Messages:

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Critical Thinking About Media Messages Media
Literacy for 21st Century Learning
Frank Baker media educatorfbaker1346_at_aol.com M
edia Literacy Clearinghouse www.frankwbaker.com
February 16, 2007
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Critical Thinking About Media Messages Media
Literacy for 21st Century Learning
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Multitasking digital natives
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Predicted Media Use 2007(hours per person)

• 2007
  2000Watching TV 1,555
  1,467Listening radio 974
  942Using Internet 195
  104Reading newspapers 175 201Reading
  magazines 122 135Reading books
  106 105Playing videogames 86
  64

"Media Usage and Consumer Spending 2000 to
2009."
US Census Bureau
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Critical Thinking About Media Messages Media
Literacy for 21st Century Learning
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Critical Thinking About Media Messages Media
Literacy for 21st Century Learning

• RecommendationBecoming smarter about new
  sources of information. In an age of
  overflowing information and proliferating media,
  kids need to rapidly process what's coming at
  them and distinguish between whats reliable and
  what isn't.

Dec. 10, 2006
December 10, 2006
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Critical Thinking About Media Messages Media
Literacy for 21st Century Learning

• "In school, we spend 13 years on reading and
  writing. That's great, but how many years do we
  spend on media literacy? It's virtually zero. It
  seems like a missed opportunity."

Dr. David Thornburg, Senior fellow of the
Congressional Institute for the Future
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Critical Thinking About Media Messages Media
Literacy for 21st Century Learning

• Movies, advertisements, and all other visual
  media are tools teachers need to use and media we
  must master if we are to maintain our credibility
  in the coming years.Jim Burke, fromThe
  English Teachers Companion

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Critical Thinking About Media Messages Media
Literacy for 21st Century Learning

• It would be a breach of our duties as
• teachers for us to ignore the rhetorical
• power of visual forms of media in
• combination with text and sound..the
• critical media literacy we need to teach
• must include evaluation of these media,
• lest our students fail to see, understand, and
• learn to harness the persuasive power of
• visual media.

NTCE Resolution on Visual Literacy
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Critical Thinking About Media Messages Media
Literacy for 21st Century Learning
Principles of Adolescent Literacy Reform
Research shows, for example, that a
media-literacy curriculum can lead students to
read with higher comprehension scores, write
longer paragraphs, and identify more features of
purpose and audience in reading selections.
(Hobbs Frost, 2003)
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Critical Thinking About Media Messages Media
Literacy for 21st Century Learning

•   Media education seeks to develop awareness of
  the ways in which meaning is made in media texts,
  and developing skills of textual analysis.
  (Source Media Education An Introduction
  Alvardo Barrett, 1992)

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Six Key Areas ofMedia literacy education

• 1. Who made this text and why? (Agency)
• 2. What sort of text is this? (Category)
• 3. How was this text produced? (Technology)
• 4. How do I make sense of this text? (Language)
• 5. Who is the intended audience of this text?
  (Audience)
• 6. What does this text say about its subject?
  (Representation)

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Critical Thinking About Media Messages Media
Literacy for 21st Century Learning

• Revised ELA Standards
  Guiding Principle 8
• An effective English language arts curriculum
  provides for literacy in all forms of media.

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Critical Thinking About Media Messages Media
Literacy for 21st Century Learning

• Current ELA Communication Viewing Grades 6-8
• analyze print nonprint sources for accuracy,
  bias, intent or purpose
• evaluate the ways that the use of language, the
  medium, and the presentation contribute to the
  meaning/impact
• evaluate how different nonprint sources influence
  and inform
• evaluate the use of details, character, setting,
  sequence, cause and effect, imagery and sound in
  nonprint sources

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Media literacy ideas for ELA

• Non-print texts (TV, film, music)
• Understanding bias stereotypes
• Analyzing techniques of persuasion
• (for example in advertising)
• The language of TV/film (camera work, lighting,
  music)
• Visual literacy (photography)
• Blogging graphic novels

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Media literacy-critical inquiry

• Who created produced the message?
• What was the producers purpose?
• For whose eyeballs is this intended?
• What techniques are used both to
• a) attract attention b) increase believability
• Who or what might be omitted and why?
• Where can I go to verify the message?

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Editorial cartoons
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Print advertisements

• Who created it?
• For what purpose?
• For which audience?
• Using what techniques?
• What lifestyle is promoted?
• Where (what publication) might you find this
  why?
• How does it make you feel?
• How might I change the message?

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Print advertisements
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Moving images TV Film

• The languages of TV film include
• CAMERA
• LIGHTS
• SOUND
• EDITING
• SET DESIGN

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Moving images TV

• TV Commercial Cell Phones
  (audio and video)Everyone listens (with their
  eyes closed)
• At the conclusion, open your eyes and
• write down everything you HEARD

Script
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Moving images TV

• VISA commercial
• Critical analysis deconstruction
• Setting Time of day
• Role of music
• Facial expressions as customer meets cashier
• Implied message intended by VISA

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Moving images film

• Docu-drama Novel AdaptationOpening
  techniques Opening

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Process of film making

• Would your students know the process of film
  making?Script or screenplayStoryboardProductio
  nPost production

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"If video is how we are communicating and
persuading in this new century, why aren't more
students writing screenplays as part of their
schoolwork?"
Heidi Hayes JacobEd Consultant
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Movies are a door to knowledge knowledge of
society, knowledge of history, knowledge of
art..movies (taught to) students (makes
them)think critically about film and it provides
them with a deeper understanding of this uniquely
influential art form.
Martin ScorseseFilm director
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Activity
POV Scene
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Student media production

• Animaction Anti tobacco PSA messages
• One camera video production Vermont

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Workshops

• Invite Frank Baker to be a part of your next
• professional development opportunity.fbaker1346_at_
  aol.com
• [phone]Media Literacy Clearinghouse
• www.frankwbaker.com