“You wont be walking around all the time with a calculator
in your pocket!”, is what my grade school math teacher would yell after he/she caught
me using the manipulative when I was not permitted to do so. A lot has changed
in regards to the use of manipulatives in school, especially the ones of the
electronic variety. I now have much more than a calculator in my pocket, I have
access to an infinite amount of information via my smart phone. Once I entered
secondary school, more and more tech had made its way into the classroom, but
most of the interest that the teachers had in regards to the growing number of
smart phones in their classroom was how will they eliminate their use in the
school. After all, school is no place for such devices, right? Wrong.
Not
only have tablets and smart phones made their way into our schools, there has
been an overall renaissance of some sort when it comes to Media and Media literacy in the educational setting.
“Media Class” was characterized as a way to educate students about advertising,
different paper sources of writing and eventually creation of different types
of media like TV commercials. These were the basics, but we now live in a time
where being media literate is just as important as any other kind of literacy.
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Greig, T., (2006,
October 29).Media Literacy. Retrieved from http://bit.ly/2dsTn7R
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Media Literacy is defined by The Ontario Curriculum, Grades 1-8: Language, 2006, as “an informed and critical understanding of the nature of the media, the techniques used by them, and the impact of these techniques. Also, the ability to understand and use the mass media in an active, critical way.” What this means is that educators now have the responsibility to educate their students about the various different forms of media that they are exposed to. Because there is so much content out there, and so many pathways using many devices to get there, media literacy is not only teaching students about how to use it, we must teach them to think critically when being exposed to all the types of media they face on a day-to-day basis.
It is safe to say that some students may be able to use technology and explore various types of media better than their teachers. What I must do as a future educator is not become more tech savvy than all of my students (although it may help), but instead, understand that my goal is to educate students in a way that they develop skills to adopt a critical stance when they are exposed to the vast amount of media messages in our world.
One of the best sites I have found that serves a great resource for teachers to not only promote media literacy in their classrooms, but can teach them more about the different aspects of teaching media in this day and age is Edutopia.org. The website serves as an unbelievable one-stop-shop for educators, parents and students for a vast amount of subjects. Specifically, the site has an outstanding directory to a vast amount of blog entries, videos and articles that center around Media. A great example of this is this blog entry about educating teachers and students about the risk behind violence in video games and movies. The article is a great read, and exemplifies the need for educators to focus not on the practicality of various types of media, but what effect they have on students and what we as educators can do to teach students about actively thinking about what they are being exposed to.
In reality, my grade school math teacher was wrong and I have a calculator in my pocket at all times. If he or she had known that smart phones would take pockets by storm in 10 short years, was forcing me to work mentally or on paper worth it? I would strongly argue that he or she did do the right thing. I can relate her efforts to what I as a future educators must do when it comes to media literacy in the 21st century. Just as I was taught how to use a calculator and when it is okay to use a calculator, I must focus not only on teaching our students how to navigate all the media they encounter. I must show them that how to critically think and assess what is good media, what bad media is, how it is used effectively and when it should be used.
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