Group items tagged

"Perceptions of people and events are very much dependent upon who you are and what your experience has been. Events in Ferguson and Baltimore, among others, highlight our misunderstandings of each other, and how the same facts can be interpreted entirely differently. What's worse, people of color and underrepresented groups are defined by journalists covering these events, who themselves don't reflect the ethnic composition of our country as a whole. Recent studies have proven that stories can change perceptions and even make people more tolerant. Rather than wait to be defined by others, it's important that students learn to create understanding by sharing their story, their worldview, their concerns, and their triumphs with others. Groups like Youth Radio and Cause Beautiful are empowering teens in poor and minority-majority neighborhoods to become multimedia journalists. Kids in these programs learn how to tell and share their own stories with a local or national audience. No matter your class demographics or grade level, ELA and social studies teachers should integrate similar projects in their own classrooms, because every student will benefit from learning to craft a compelling visual story backed by persuasive facts and ideas."

Twitter is increasingly being used by journalists to make contacts and track news events, but the Twitter user-interface (UI) itself is pretty limited making it difficult to track conversations. Fortunately its open API structure and the ability to subscribe to various types of RSS feeds from Twitter means there are a number of ways to track a 'buzz' around an event or specific conversations

The Importance and Challenges of Universal Media Literacy Education

The Millennial generation has tools at its disposal that empower its members to become citizen journalists and create and experience media in ways previous generations couldn't imagine."

"I used to teach a class called photojournalism. I usually referred to it as "digital journalism," because people assumed we were a photography class. Students created videos, podcasts, documentaries, and blogs with the goal of sharing their work with an authentic audience. On the surface, this might not seem all that practical. After all, newspapers are slashing their budgets and laying off staff. Why teach an elective class in a subject that doesn't connect to a decent job market? But here's the thing: whether we feel like it or not, we are all citizen journalists. We are all researchers. We are all sharing information online and publishing it on social media. We are all curating and producing content even if only a fragment of the population creates videos, podcasts, or blog posts. Social media is a fusion of space (social) and publishing (medium). Although it can simply feel like a place to hang out, every social media platform uses elements of traditional media. Just look at the terms: subscribers, news feed, followers, publish."

Audrey Watters has an interesting article on early results from an assessment of iPads deployed in kindergardens in Auburn, ME. It's a perfect place for me to get to one of the core purposes of this blog- to look at educational research results and critique them from the perspective of a fellow researcher. The goal is to help readers be more saavy consumers of educational research. My take is pretty different from Audrey's (who I think is a brilliant ed tech journalist). I also want to start the post by applauding the team of researchers for tackling this important study, even though I disagree with their interpretation of the data.

"Our students are not the only ones struggling with verifying credibility. Journalists, especially those dealing with the crunch of deadlines and the flood of social media during a crisis, fall prey to hoaxes, phoney tweets and image fakery as well."

"It's not easy being a teacher today. National, state and local politicians, philanthropists, researchers, journalists and many other people who have never actually taught a K-12 student are deciding how and what teachers should teach, and how their effectiveness should be assessed. Sadly, I've met many veteran teachers who are seriously considering retirement. Worse, I've encountered many promising young teachers who are wondering if they chose the wrong profession. How do I counsel teachers who share these thoughts with me? I remind them of two simple words: you matter. Indeed, teachers matter more now than ever."

"Schools in the Netherlands have shunned textbooks and only use Apple tablets for teaching and learning. A year in, journalist Sarah Marsh investigates how pupils and teachers are faring"

"I read Fareed Zakaria's work often. He's a great journalist for the Washington Post and a TV news anchor with his own show on CNN. I dug into a piece yesterday he wrote titled "Why America's Obsession with STEM Education is Dangerous". Unlike Zakaria's articles on foreign policy, which are insightful, thought-provoking, and in-depth, this article paints an innacurate and overly-simplified picture of what STEM education is and should be. Worse yet, his argument injects dangerously reductive rhetoric into the public debate on education, where we already see heightened emotion and political division. Maybe this type of reaction is what Zakaria is aiming for. He releases a new book today on this same topic called "In Defense of a Liberal Education". "

"Coding is having it's 15 minutes of fame. Journalists regularly quote facts about the shortage of computer programmers in the US, entrepreneurs fund coding camps for low opportunity kids and even the President has given learning to code a thumbs up. For many parents and teachers this new focus on learning to code feels like an overhyped fad that will be replaced any day now by "learning particle physics" or "learning solar energy storage." And does anyone really believe that turning a whole generation of kids into programmers would be a good outcome for society? What about artists, doctors, musicians and mechanics? What about chefs, writers, electricians and plumbers? Why exactly do kids need to learn to code?"

Publish2's Editorial Director Tammi Marcoullier reflects on her own experience with being plagiarized while blogging for The Washington Post and wonders whether placing more value on link journalism could help with the problem of plagiarism among journalists. Check it out at the Publish2 Blog.

"Man, it's a great time to be a note-taker. For a couple of decades-first as a student, then as a professional journalist-I filled notebook after notebook with notes, covering classes, press conferences, interviews, and more. When I was done, I'd have to find someplace to store them until (most likely) I'd throw them out. The notes I did keep? Useless. My on-the-fly handwriting is a horrible thing. The result: A lot of personal and professional history gone to waste."

"To cover the coronavirus is a challenge. Journalists should inform the public, but also don't want to create a panic with harmful consequences. We're trying to help. Here are 17 charts, maps and tables that show the latest numbers about the coronavirus:"

"When students are learning about research topics and current events, they must also learn about how perspective and bias may affect the information they are reading. Teaching these lessons explicitly is critical in this era of "fake" news. The following tips and activities are designed to help students understand the choices that journalists make that may affect how readers interpret a story."