Every day, kids take in a huge amount of information from a whole variety of sources that is so much bigger than their parents' media options of traditional TV, radio, newspapers and magazines.
Now there are texts, viral videos, social media, advertising, influencers and more.
What's true and what's false or even what's accurate and what's misleading?
It's getting harder and harder to tell the difference, but it's also getting more and more important to be able to do so.
The question is how.
And we're in luck because this upcoming week is Media Literacy Week.
And today on Kid News Compose, I'm having a conversation with Michelle Lipkin, the executive director of the National Association for Media Literacy Education or NAMLI.
Thank you for being here, Michelle.
It's great to talk with you.
Well, thank you so much for having me.
I love talking about media literacy, so I appreciate every opportunity to do so.
Excellent. Well, let's just start with a really basic question.
Can you tell kids what is media literacy?
Yes. So my organization defines media literacy as the ability to access, analyze, evaluate, create and act using all forms of communication.
An easier way to think about it is that media literacy is kind of an advanced thinking around literacy, like what does it mean to be a literate person?
Like, what do we need to understand about authoring and consuming and reading and writing?
We need to be able to do that across all of our technology, all of our devices.
So I always think about, like, what are the skills you need to read the Internet, you know, and create on the Internet?
And so you think about media literacy as just an expanded definition of literacy.
And so, you know, because we are obviously for Kid News, we're concerned about news.
So I think media literacy, if I'm correct, is kind of a broad term and then news literacy would be a certain part of that.
Is that correct? Yes, exactly.
So we see media literacy as the umbrella term, right, in the umbrella concept.
And then underneath it, there's all of these different literacies that we see, whether it's news literacy or visual literacy, digital literacy.
And so news literacy obviously is very focused on that type of information.
But media literacy expands beyond that, entertainment, games, all of the things that we we do with media.
But news is obviously focused on the news and how we how we get that and create that in our lives.
So for kids, you know, I mean, you know, they were like, well, I'm literate, you know, I can read, I can write.
So so why should they care about media or news literacy?
Why would it be important for for a young person to to have that skill?
Well, I think what's most important to know, and I think young people get this already probably better than some older folks, is that we're kind of swimming in media messages, right?
And we're swimming in information.
And so on a daily basis, we have so much information coming to us from our social media feeds, from our you know, YouTube playlist, from the information we gather at school, from what we hear from our friends.
There's just information that is really pouring, pouring out at us.
Right. And so media literacy skill building allows us to better understand all of that.
Also helps us process it, think about it, reflect on it.
And it helps us really participate more effectively and productively in society.
Right. To be a really active citizen in today's world, you need to understand like the media ecosystem.
I think what's really important, though, is that there's so many different types of media messages that come at us on a daily basis.
And so if young people just thought for one second, if you're on social media and you're kind of just looking at your feed as you kind of scroll through your feed, you're going to see a lot of different types of posts and some video and some visual and some photos and all of that.
And to be able to decipher what is meant to be entertainment, what is meant to be informative, what is legitimately news, that's really important to understand how to weigh the information that we read and consume.
I think most people, and I don't know how you'll feel about this statement, but I don't think most people understand what news actually is because most people are not consuming a lot of news.
They're consuming a lot of content, but that's not necessarily news.
And it's certainly not necessarily strong quality journalism.
And so one of the most important things for young people is to really understand those distinctions.
What is actual journalism that is run with a set of principles and there's a process and there's, you know, everything from, you know, editorial review and corrections and right principles, journalistic principles?
Yeah. And we are so passionate here at Kid News about quality journalism.
That is exactly one of our primary missions.
So you're such a perfect person to talk to.
So how can people tell the difference then about quality journalism versus simply content or opinion?
Well, I think the first step is to understand like from the get -go that most of what we consume on a daily basis is not journalism.
Like most of what we're seeing is not journalism.
So first start there, start knowing that most of what we're seeing is within the kind of the frame of commentary or opinion.
And that, again, it's not necessarily a bad thing if we understand what we're watching and consuming.
Right. So I think we start from there.
And this is why sometimes I get frustrated with the framing of like, we need to determine what is, you know, fact and what is fiction.
Because most of what we look at and can consume is in between both of those, right?
Like it's not one or the other.
It's like in between both of those.
So the first thing we have to know is that a lot of the content that's coming at us is not journalism.
It's media messages.
It's information. It's opinion.
It's commentary. And then we need to understand what journalism is.
Right. And, you know, most journalism has some expertise behind it and some principles behind it.
So it's the just the you know, there is a process that has to happen before something gets into our feed from, you know, journalistic outlists that doesn't exist for for those that are just posting on their own account.
So I think we have to look at the process in which it gets to us.
And and the truth is it does take a little bit of time.
Like so when you said, how to how to how do young people know?
Like it does take a little bit of time and a little bit of thinking about what the source is and, you know, who created it and why was it created and what is it trying to get me to think about?
Like that does take more reflection than right now.
Our systems kind of support.
Right. So it's our individual patterns and behaviors that need to shift so that people can kind of recognize the distinction between quality journalism and other commentary that's out there.
Yeah. That's the number one thing I usually tell people when, you know, to try and see if something is legitimate is check the sources.
OK, let's take a quick break.
And when we come back, my guest Michelle Lipkin with the National Association for Media Literacy Education will explain some simple ways that we can find out if the information in front of us is accurate and how we can help prevent the problem of spreading inaccurate information from getting worse.
Plus a question from a kid news listener.
We'll be right back with more of Kid News Convos after this short message.
Today's Kid News Convos episode is brought to you in part by a generous donation from the Nicholas B.
Ottoway Foundation, committed to improving communities and impacting lives through three unique philanthropic efforts focused on education, journalism and community impact.
We are grateful for their support and the support of all our generous donors.
And we're back. I'm Tori with Kid News Convos having a conversation with Michelle Lipkin, executive director of Namly.
So, Michelle, we're we're talking about being skeptical of information.
What is a good way to find out if it's accurate?
Well, I think there's a couple of things and we're a big proponent of the skill of lateral reading, you know, which is essentially, you know, if you're reading an article on one source to, you know, click the links to to to go other places to see if other places are reporting on that.
Look at the people that are being quoted in the article and find out more about them, like really doing that lateral reading is key.
Because I do have to say, like, I tend to hesitate to say, you know, go to this particular source or go here because we all we have to recognize that there is there's bias and agenda, no matter like what we're consuming, which is why skepticism is such an important part of our process.
Now, I say skepticism as a distinction from cynicism because I think the concern is young people will grow to not believe anything.
And that to me is the probably the most dangerous future that we have in which people really don't believe anything.
And so part of what we have to encourage young people to do and all of us to do is to slow down as much as we can, which is a very difficult ask.
In a ecosystem that moves so quickly, you know, we're basically like it's a fire hose of information coming at us and for us to be the ones responsible for pushing it back can be difficult.
But this is why I always say, like, one of the easiest things to do as you're navigating your information is to reflect on whether or not you have enough information to share something.
Right. So you might not have the time to, like, fact check everything.
It's very difficult to do that, right?
But you do have the power not to share something you don't know enough about.
And I think that if I were to, like, hone in on one behavior change, I'd like to see is just asking that pausing and just asking a question.
Did I have enough time to find out what I needed to know about this to be able to confidently share it?
And if the answer is no, or even maybe don't share it or share it with some context of why you're sharing it, right?
I had a question kind of related to that from from a young listener, Ronald from Oakland, California.
He wanted to know why would someone write something that's not true or why would you post or share something that's not true?
Are they just trying to start a rumor?
I think that some people are.
I think some people are just trying to see what happens when they put information out there.
See what happens. I think most people are misinformed, meaning that they are being like accidentally misled by something.
And usually that's usually people are sharing false information because it's about something that they care deeply about.
But then there's, you know, the other end of it, which is deliberately trying to disinform people.
And and that's that's where a lot of the danger happens.
And so I would suggest anyone that's concerned about this to like try to check their emotion before they share.
The more emotional you get about information, the more likely it's somehow manipulating you to feel that.
And that's kind of a red flag.
Yeah. And I mean, I think you mentioned another red flag earlier is, you know, why are they telling me this?
What's their motive?
You know, what what what are what's the purpose here?
Why are they trying to do this?
And so getting kind of along the lines of this, you know, we have the election coming up and there I just read an article in the Washington Post.
I feel like I need to get my sources very carefully.
Yeah, I love that. That's from journalistic practice.
Right about these deep fakes, these audio recordings that sound so much like the both presidential candidates.
So with this election coming up, but, you know, just kind of in general with AI becoming so sophisticated, are you concerned about, you know, where things are going?
I would say, of course, I mean, I'd be silly to say I'm not concerned about where things are going.
I mean, AI technology and other emerging technologies do make the process of determining reliability and authenticity.
More difficult. There's no doubt about that.
What I'm positive about is that there's a lot of efforts underway already for education in these spaces and to to kind of heighten and increase media literacy education around the country in the world.
And that's just becoming more and more important.
I think what I'm most concerned about is a world in which people don't believe or trust anything.
And that's where I think real skill, like media literacy skill building comes into play because it is a skill, right?
You know, not believing anything is relatively lazy, if I can say that.
Like that's the easy thing to do is just not believe anything.
The harder part is learning how to decipher and learning how to understand and learning how to be thoughtful and reflective participants in these media environments.
And that takes time and that takes, you know, education and it takes resources.
Yeah. So so this is a big week coming up Media Literacy Week.
Is it the 10th year?
It is our 10th anniversary of US Media Literacy Week, which is so mind blowing.
How, you know, and I have to say that when we launched this initiative in 2015, you know, we had a logo and a web page and we're like, let's see what happened.
And our dream was that Media Literacy Week would be a moment during the year where people in our community would really work to highlight and call attention to the work that's being done.
And there's so many things happening next week and launches and new reports coming out and new resources that it's kind of like the vision has has come to fruition.
And so there's lots and lots of things happening in the US and it's also part of global media and information literacy week.
So events are happening and activities are happening all over the world.
And there's just never been a more important time, especially given, you know, how what a huge year this is for global elections, but certainly from the US perspective that the election is coming up really, you know, dedicating our efforts to advancing media literacy.
Education has just been always important, but it feels much more vital right now.
Is there a website that people can go to to get more information?
Okay. Yes, it's medialiteracyweek .us and you can sign up to, you know, be just a part of it.
And part of it means, you know, you'll share a post or you'll come to an event and there's a lot of online events and there's just a lot of resource.
Like, once you sign up to be a part of Media Literacy Week, which is free, you get like access to our toolkit and you get to just be part of the entire event.
And then, you know, hopefully we'll see you at some, you know, events online.
That'd be great. Yeah.
So just final takeaway, if there were like three simple steps that kids could take to improve their, let's say, news literacy, what would it be?
Well, okay. At first, I would say to pause before you share and really ask the question, do I know enough about this to be able to share responsibly and make sure I'm continuing a productive conversation?
So that's really all in the category of reflect before you share.
Two is lateral reading.
Don't just stay on what you're reading or looking at.
Try to find more information by going to links in that original article or looking at people that are mentioned in the video.
Like, do your homework, you know, like really dive in a little deeper.
And then third is kind of, you know, this might be an odd one, but like admit that you, that one article is not going to make you an expert on anything.
I think that we often feel like, oh, I read this online and now I know what's going on in the election or I know what's going on in the Ukraine or I know what's going on anywhere in the world.
It's just like kind of be humble in what it is that we know and don't know and be open to learning more.
So I would say, you know, lateral reading, deeper dive, be humble that there is more to know and don't share unless you have the information.
I think that's such good advice for everybody, not certainly not just kids.
So, well, thank you so much, Michelle, I really, really appreciate your time.
This has been great.
Thank you for having me.
Thanks again to Michelle Lipkin, the executive director of NAMLE, the National Association for Media Literacy Education.
And thank you as always for listening to Kid News Convos, an in -depth conversation on a single topic in the news that's relevant for kids.
If you have any comments on this episode, or if you have suggestions for future convos topics, please ask your parent or teacher to drop us a line at wehearyouatkidnews .org.
Have a great day.
