By understanding media, students gain a better understanding of the world around them. Promoting media literacy makes a difference. John Pungente tells us why.

By the time the average North American graduates from high school he or she will have spent twice as much time in front of the television set as in the classroom. Television has become what Marshall McLuhan and Neil Postman have described as the "first curriculum", a medium that influences every aspect of children’s lives - from basic values, to the clothes they wear, to the way they talk to their friends.

With such a huge amount of time invested in television, it is important for children to understand exactly what the medium is and how it affects them. It is important that children are media literate - that they have the ability to look carefully at media messages and think critically about them. In today’s world this has become a basic literacy - one that is as important as reading or writing.

Media has the ability to take specific messages and subtly shape them to appear as objective reality. Television news, for example, is a carefully crafted media "construct" that has become the most trusted source of information for the public. Yet news, like any other media presentation, is shaped by political, social, economic or cultural factors that are far from neutral or objective.

There is strong agreement among educators across Canada and - increasingly - in the USA of the importance on media literacy. The province of Ontario has mandated media literacy as part of the Language Arts curriculum since 1987 for secondary students and since 1995 for elementary grades. By September 2000 all Canadian provinces had in place a mandated element of media literacy either as a cross curricular subject or within the Language Arts curriculum.

While there are a number of definitions of media literacy, the one generally accepted in Canada was developed for the Ontario Ministry of Education in 1987. According to this definition the media literate person is one who has an informed and critical understanding of the nature, the techniques and the impact of the mass media as well as the ability to create media products.

One focus of media literacy is on understanding how media messages are constructed and how they influence values, beliefs and behaviors. Students are encouraged to dissect media messages to reveal the variance between media misrepresentations and reality. The use of violence to resolve conflicts, and gender and racial stereotyping are common themes for discussion. Students also look at the financial base for media and popular entertainment. Who owns and profits from the entertainment industry? Who decides what is made, and how do these decisions shape entertainment products? There are also examinations of the role of popular culture in the lives of the students and the impact students themselves - as audience - have on the media.

We are all concerned about the impact the media has on the young. Most recently there has been much debate around violence in the media. Media violence is one of many factors - including abuse, poverty, real-life violence and neglect - which can make children violent. However, researchers have found that developing media literacy skills reduces the impact of television on children. The more that children think and talk about television and the other media - the more they become media literate - the less influence it has on them.

Media literacy programs also encourage students to produce their own media products - newspapers, storyboards, cartoons and videos. This hands-on activity is intended to give students practical insights into the process of "constructing" media realities and how those realities compare with their everyday life and experiences. A proactive approach to media at an early age will help young people not only to be more thoughtful about the media messages they consume but to be more active as adults in producing or advocating better quality media products.

In Respecting Children: A Canadian Approach to Helping Families Deal With Television Violence, the CRTC has made clear that media literacy is "an indispensable underpinning" to the "industry codes, program classification and parent-empowering technology [that] are extremely valuable in dealing with television violence." [page 5]

How can you tell if the media literacy is working successfully in your school board or district or state or province? As a result of studies over the past years, it has become clear that are nine factors which appear to be crucial to the successful development of media literacy in elementary, middle and secondary schools. Take a look at the following and see how many are present where you work.

1: Media literacy, like other innovative programs, must be a grassroots movement and teachers need to take a major initiative in lobbying for this.

2: Educational authorities must give clear support to such programs by mandating the teaching of Media Studies within the curriculum, establishing guidelines and resource books, and by making certain that curricula are developed and that materials are available.

3: Faculties of Education must hire staff capable of training future teachers in this area. There should also be academic support from tertiary institutions in the writing of curricula and in sustained consultation.

4: In-service training at the school district level must be an integral part of program implementation.

5: School districts need consultants who have expertise in media literacy and who will establish communication networks.

6: Suitable textbooks and audio-visual material which are relevant to the country/area must be available.

7: A support organization must be established for the purposes of workshops, conferences, dissemination of newsletters and the development of curriculum units. Such a professional organization must cut across school boards and districts to involve a cross section of people interested in media literacy.

8: There must be appropriate evaluation instruments which are suitable for the unique quality of Media Studies.

9: Because media literacy involves such a diversity of skills and expertise, there must be a collaboration between teachers, parents, researchers and media professionals.

The programming available through Cable in the Classroom has an important role to play in integrating media literacy into the school curriculum. News, science. Geography, music, art and history programs provide teachers with excellent opportunities to introduce or to integrate media literacy. But Cable in the Classroom provides much more than video resources for the classroom. Lesson plans are available, often on the Internet, and more and more of these are specifically developed as media literacy materials. MuchMusic's lesson plans are a good example of these materials, which are excellent resources for teachers.

Statements about media literacy from educational authorities at all levels across Canadian stress that media literacy is recognized as an essential outcome of education today. Teachers, librarians, and school boards in partnership with parents and the media industry families can play a powerful role in helping children talk about what they watch and question what they see. Our role is to help them look carefully and think critically - to be media literate.

John J. Pungente, SJ, is Director of the Jesuit Communication Project, a Canadian resource center for media literacy located in Toronto, and President of the Canadian Association for Media Education Organizations. He has given numerous presentations on media literacy across North American and throughout Australia, and in Japan, Spain, England, and France. He is the author of MORE THAN MEETS THE EYE: WATCHING TELEVISION WATCHING US, and creator and host of Canada's BRAVO show SCANNING THE MOVIES.