Gloomy Sunday afternoons seem the perfect opportunity for: a) catching up on much-needed rest, b) simmering delicious crock pot meals, c) discussing tech tools with teachers, or d) all of the above.  If you happen to be as fortunate as I, the answer is d) all of the above … and the questions are awaiting your listening ear.  While cozy in my most comfy sweats slow-cooking a great chicken alfredo and following doctors’ orders to take it easy, I just happened to create my very first podcast while enjoying a great conversation with my friend and former colleague Ms. Lauren Smith.

Lauren teaches secondary English for Commonwealth Cyber Academy, an online Pennsylvania public charter school.  About five years ago, I served as Lauren’s faculty mentor as she arrived at LCCC as a brand-new English instructor.  A great friendship blossomed between us, as did a beautiful start to a rewarding career for Lauren as an educator. And while she outgrew her environment at the small college satellite center where we first met, Lauren will never outgrow her love of teaching and learning. (That has always been our most fundamental bond.)  She transitioned into some long-term substitute teaching about three years ago, and from there was presented a unique opportunity to teach in a way she’d never expected: online.  Initially, the cyber environment proved uncomfortable for Lauren – but the more she got her feet wet, the more she was willing to get her hands dirty … and to learn as much as possible about her new teaching space.  Now, two years later, Lauren thrives in a learning ecosystem where she never expected to find herself – and both she and her students are better for it.

Lauren utilizes an abundance of online and embedded resources that I would consider exploring in my own practice.  She ranks Google applications high on her list of facilitation tools, and her comfort with the breadth of that particular suite encourages me to learn more about how I too might incorporate these aspects into my instructional “toolbox.”  She also mentioned Zoom and Skype, both of which I have used as a student but not as a teacher; I would welcome incorporating more self-generated audio and video into my teaching, as I am often providing remote instruction due to the hybrid nature of my courses.  Overall, I think the big take-away from this interview is not to shy away from experimentation with different platforms, and not to forget to utilize our human resources as well as our technological tools.

My favorite aspect of this interview is the love of teaching and learning that Lauren and I share.  I also must acknowledge the empowering support we provide to each other, as evidenced in our mutual positive regard both in this podcast and in real life.  I feel this is an important aspect to note because professional women can often become highly competitive in the workplace, and by doing so can stifle and alienate their colleagues. (Both Lauren and I have experienced that kind of negativity in the past.)  When we adopt a collaborative mindset in which we nurture and respect our unique gifts and talents while also learning to embrace a shared mission – we can accomplish truly great things.

Reflection:  Podcasting presents challenges I did not expect!  I produced 28 minutes of content and had to edit judiciously in order to yield a final product somewhere close to the target length of 10 minutes.  Sound editing is a meticulous process and proved somewhat time consuming for me (I acknowledge this could be attributable in part to my own recent health setbacks). Another challenge I experienced was my great feeling of urgency to keep the interview moving while simultaneously enunciating with precision, trying to relax, and proceeding primarily unscripted.  With the exception of providing Lauren a short list of questions to anticipate, I performed absolutely no advance preparation for the interview – there was no coaching my interviewee nor compelling her to respond in any certain manner.  We spoke briefly and generally about my LDT courses and why I’d decided to pursue another advanced degree, and then I simply began recording with Audacity.  While I appreciate the authenticity of the approach I took, in retrospect I would slow down and deal with dead air space in order to create content a bit more easily editable.  However, all things considered – as a first experience with podcasting this assignment proved itself awesome, and I am looking forward to doing it again!

Check out these articles for more information on educational podcasting:

Past, Present, and Future of Podcasting in Higher Education

The Use of Podcasting in University Education

Why Should We Podcast with Students?

Our collective theme for blogging this week resounded in the challenges media literacy instruction presents to both teachers and learners, and in constructing interventions to address those difficulties.  Interestingly, while we all opted to work with the Buckingham article, it resonated with each of us a little differently.  In general, however, the issue of source credibility and its relationship to prerequisite critical thinking skills ranked high on our collective problem-solving agenda.

In his piece, “Media Literacy and When to Get Critical,” Daniel Justice provides readers an interesting graphic entitled ‘Periodic Table of the Internet.’  “Similar to this graphic organization of web resources,” Justice proposes, “the periodic table is associated with ordering known elements into a system. In the future, I hope media literacy can be taught in such a way that people will immediately associate media elements with the instantly recognizable periodic chart. Imagine your digital literacy as it conforms with these organized columns. Are there elements missing, resources that you think are essential which deserve being petitioned to join?”  

Justice’s ambitious scenario of compartmentalizing sources of information is matched by Siyuan Luo’s assertion that even for digital natives “…it [is] still difficult to survive … fake and trash information.”  Luo proposes that “…an information session or workshop” may “help audiences increase their ability to analyze and evaluate the Internet contents;” this type of programmatic initiative could “…be conducted continuously during each school semester … not only … [for] students, but also [for] the teachers and parents.”

Empowering learners by encouraging critical thinking comprises an important interventional role.  “An important piece to address when teaching digital media literacy,” Kerry Clancy writes in her blog entry this week, “is to analyze who the intended audience is. What is the creator of that digital media trying to accomplish? Who are they trying to reach? Rather than becoming one of the audience, we should teach students to analyze the work in front of them.”

Crystal Donlan echoes this enterprise in “Real Problems with Fake News,” acknowledging “… emphasis on the incorporation of more interactive media literacy initiatives available to students through my course LMS.  In rethinking my own practices and providing more growth opportunities within our existing learning ecology, both I and my students gain new insight.” 

Group 2’s inherent focus on problem-solving bolsters a scaffolding approach targeted at critical thinking.  In citing NAMLE’s definition of media literacy, Luo contends that of “…the ability to access, analyze, evaluate, create, and act using all forms of communication…. I think … access, analysis, and evaluation are [the] three most important parts.” 

Continuing along that vein, Justice resolves “Deciphering good sources of educational stock from opinion editorial information may be the most important skill today. It is so because of the journalism industrial revolution and the ability of any emboldened citizen to take up cause and steer narratives based on self, or selfish, interests rather than objective news ethics.”  

In addressing the unique challenges of her teaching and learning context, Clancy also emphasizes invested decoding “… through digital citizenship and personal branding. Personal branding puts forth that a person should ‘brand’ themselves early on BEFORE Google decides how to brand them. For theatre technicians, this can be done by being the FIRST to interpret their work. Before their work is ever critiqued, they should share their own view with the world to tackle critique before it begins.” 

Donlan summarizes, “As problematic as the quest for media literacy may prove…, I am fully aware that the battle will rage on.  While there are no quick fixes, I think it is important to remember that ultimately the victory lies in promoting the development of learners who think critically and evaluate discerningly all the information they encounter. Empowering that skillset remains our best defense in the war on fake news.” 

As an educator I have spent nearly two-thirds of my career teaching English.  I have taught English to foreign language learners, to delinquent secondary students, and – for the majority of the time – to college-composition freshmen. With a hopeful combination of patience and zeal, I have tried to ignite my passion for writing and research in the hearts of those I teach.  But one particular gauntlet – the duel with “fake news” – has been thrown time and again.  In the age of information, providing writing instruction requires much more than a process-to-product approach; developing writers must be challenged to think critically, to seek selectively, and to evaluate carefully the sources upon which they base their scholarly assertions.

In a 2017 essay, The Chronicle of Higher Education noted that “in recent years, the burden of teaching information literacy to undergraduates has fallen disproportionately on freshman-composition instructors” (Gooblar 2018).  This not-so-fake news falls on the ears of exasperated English professors with collective responses of raised hands and shaking heads.  The battle in teaching information and media literacy is not one of merit but rather one of multitude. Heavy the head that wears the crown of those tasked perpetually with touting the tenets of grammar and usage, grading rounds of standards-dictated essays, serving honorably as the unofficial plagiarism police, and directing the paths of every learner onto the high road of scholarly inquiry (a noble route, albeit one that begins through the acquisition of information literacy). These duties weigh as heavily upon us as the weight of the world hung ‘round the shoulders of Atlas, and while I recognize their necessity, I also admit that I am … alas … outnumbered.  And I’m worried.

“Media literacy asks people to raise questions and be wary of information that they’re receiving. People are. Unfortunately, that’s exactly why we’re talking past one another.” – Boyd (2017) Did Media Literacy Backfire? 

Buckingham (2007) identifies a new digital divide wherein “a new and widening gap between young people’s out-of-school experiences of technology and their experience in the classroom” (p. 112) contributes to a disconnect between knowing how to find information and knowing how to discern credibility of said information.  This has become a problematic theme in my courses.  For example: When I ask my students to utilize “peer-reviewed sources,” what I mean is that I want them to find, read, and evaluate scholarly journal articles … what I do not mean is that a source should be considered reliable if at least two of their Facebook friends re-tweeted the same post.  (I’ve come to accept that we are not always speaking the same language.) According to Buckingham, strategies for seeking deeper media literacy include “applying and extending existing conceptual approaches, … addressing the creative possibilities of digital technologies, … and exploring the potential of emerging forms of participatory media culture” (p. 112).  This validates my current emphasis on the incorporation of more interactive media literacy initiatives available to students through my course LMS.  In rethinking my own practices and providing more growth opportunities within our existing learning ecology, both I and my students gain new insight.

“Many assume that because young people are fluent in social media they are equally savvy about what they find there….Our work shows the opposite.”

    – Domonoske (2016) Students Have ‘Dismaying’ Inability to Tell Fake News from Real, Study Finds

The studies Domonoske cites are consistent with what I frequently experience in the classroom: digital natives who are unable to discriminate real from “fake” information.  My learners often have trouble determining the validity of sources, the authenticity of websites, and – most alarmingly – the potential media bias of  any given information. This phenomenon extends far beyond the simple (and clichéd) teacher caveat: “No Wikipedia!” Compromised media literacy exists as pervasively as information itself.

“Challenging one’s own beliefs and information habits can be a daunting task already; feeding the need to defend instead of inspect can lead participants to become further entrenched in their beliefs or preconceptions. Educators should encourage compassion and listening, while still allowing for dissent, retreat, and anonymity.” – Baer & Cook (2019)  Teaching News Literacy in Politically Polarized Times

“The path forward is hazy. We need to enable people to hear different perspectives and make sense of a very complicated  —  and in many ways, overwhelming  —  information landscape. We cannot fall back on standard educational approaches because the societal context has shifted.”– Boyd (2017) Did Media Literacy Backfire? 

As problematic as the quest for media literacy may prove within the context of teaching college writing, I am fully aware that the battle will rage on.  While there are no quick fixes, I think it is important to remember that ultimately the victory lies in promoting the development of learners who think critically and evaluate discerningly all the information they encounter. Empowering that skillset remains our best defense in the war on fake news.

“Information literacy and media literacy have the same objective – training people to access, understand, evaluate, communicate, use, and create media messages and information. Both highlight the importance of the ethical use of information, the critical analysis of content, the use of multimedia platforms, and knowledge production.” – Lee & So (2014) Media Literacy and Information Literacy: Similarities and Differences

Check out these interactives on media literacy:

Can You Navigate the Information Universe?

Crash Course Media Literacy (Playlist)

Reality Check: The Game

Why Do Our Brains Love Fake News?

References

Baer, A. & Cook, J. (2019). Teaching news literacy in politically polarized times. https://www.facultyfocus.com/articles/effective-classroom-management/teaching-news-literacy-in-politically-polarized-times

Boyd, D. (2017).  Did media literacy backfire?  https://clalliance.org/blog/media-literacy-backfire/

Buckingham, D. (2007).  Media education goes digital: an introduction. https://doi.org/10.1080/17439880701343006

Domonoske, C. (2016).  Students have ‘dismaying’ inability to tell fake news from real, study finds.  https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2016/11/23/503129818/study-finds-students-have-dismaying-inability-to-tell-fake-news-from-real

Gooblar, D. (2018). How to teach information literacy in an era of lies. https://www.chronicle.com/article/How-to-Teach-Information/243973

Lee, A. & So, C. (2014).  Media literacy and information literacy: Similarities and differences. https://www.revistacomunicar.com/indice-en/articulo.php?numero=42-2014-13

Miller, A. (2008).  How the news distorts our worldview.  https://www.ted.com/talks/alisa_miller_shares_the_news_about_the_news

What resonates most with me about the concept of connected learning are four key tenets that echo throughout the literature.  I have identified those essential components as abundance, resilience, connection, and productivity, and have attempted here to outline the meaning I attach to each aspect.  While connected learning (CL) transcends education in the traditional sense, its intrinsic value as a perpetually evolving network through which the learner voluntarily seeks enrichment, fulfillment, and meaning contributes to a deeper experience not only of content-specific material but with the global community.  The learner’s striving and thriving through the genuine pursuit of affinity-based involvement renders teachers both facilitators of process and curators of resources through which significant and lasting associations may occur, blurring the lines between formal and informal contexts.

ABUNDANCE:  Perhaps the most compelling aspect CL presents is its richness of both breadth and depth. The interactive web is a veritably limitless source of accessible knowledge, largely due to the ubiquitous nature of mobile devices.  Through social media, MOOCs, online and networked gaming, virtual museums, and a vast array of special interest organizations (not to mention the standard Google search), learners may explore any topic and with a few clicks delve more deeply into its strata.  Due to this boundless reserve of resources available to learners, a CL environment lends itself to the expansion and evolution of learning.

RESILIENCE:  The ability to overcome adversity and move forward with strength comes into play in CL environments by the sheer vulnerability the learner exhibits in participation and by the (often unconscious) pliability he or she demonstrates through trial and error in a supportive and nurturing environment. Often veiled by screen and keyboard outside of the real-life social roles they may play, learners become free to experiment with their own sense of identity and to articulate those developing characteristics in safe spaces with like-minded peers.  Learners of “non-dominant” (Ito, p. 7) or under-represented sociocultural groups may discover deep, transformative opportunities for expression, growth, and continued involvement that surpasses limiting real-life environments.

CONNECTION:  Not only are learners able to connect with like-minded peers in CL contexts, they are able to network with SMEs, educators, and caring leaders who are willing to share their passion.  With this vast array of expertise literally at the learner’s fingertips, the potential for creating lasting, meaningful connections serves as an impetus for growth beyond the traditional classroom.  Further, the facilitation of these associations by a proactive teacher-facilitator who may serve as a resource reinforces seamlessness in experience. The networking possibilities within the framework of a CL environment are as unique as the individual learner, and these networks promote both a capacity for learning in the present as well as a proclivity for lifelong learning engagement.

PRODUCTIVITY:  The aspect of creation exists as an integral component of the CL experience.  However, this sense of productivity does not exist as superfluous busy-work or question-and-answer assessments.  CL should yield relevant and authentic artifacts borne of both content and community. Growth and engagement should inspire an outreach wherein the student – through individual and collaborative effort – extends his or her learning into career, civic, and/or academic realms (Ito, p. 12). Within this context, the individual learner produces evidence reflective of his or her connected learning.

In the context of connected learning the role of the learner shifts from the traditional model of static pupil to the contemporary idea of dynamic citizen.  Learners who are connected embrace interactive learning opportunities not simply as a means of academic progress but in order to engage in personal enrichment and meaningful experiences beyond the self; students pursue content knowledge within interest-driven networks and endeavor to produce significant work upon which to build future growth.  Embracing abundance, harnessing resilience, encouraging connection, and gauging productivity serve as scaffolds upon which the learning environment is built.

Additional Resources: (Click on pictures for linked material.)

George Couros,: Why Schools Should Focus More On “Innovation” Than “EdTech” The Principal Of Change Blog

Michael Fullan: Technology, the New Pedagogy and Flipped Teaching

Mimi Ito: Connected Learning

Henry Jenkins: The Influence of Participatory Culture on Education

REFERENCES:

Garcia, A. et al (2014). Teaching in the connected learning classroom.

Ito, M. et al (2011). Connected learning.

“It’s really, really become difficult in this day and age … (to hold) the expectation that you can somehow limit the circulation of knowledge and information, … and … problems only arise when learning is disconnected from meaningful inquiry.” – Mimi Ito