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MEDIA LITERACY Media literacy. DTRT (Do The Right Thing) Teens and pre-teens receive almost zero media literacy training, an essential facet of education in a modern world. DEAN McCOUBREY reports on a project trying to rectify this. D MySociaLife teaches digital citizenship, online safety and media literacy to almost 4 000 students a year and we teach them eight modules online or in person, term-after-term, over a year (i.e. resulting in 32 000 learners or ‘seats’). We also teach their parents, their teachers, mental health professionals and GPs in South Africa, now in the thousands. o you know what LMIRL stands for in a WhatsApp or text? How about WTTP? Or PIR? The answers are ‘Let’s Meet In Real Life’, ‘Want To Trade Pictures?’ and ‘Parent in Room’. Smartphones, tablets, gaming consoles, PCs and laptops, LTE, 5G, and Wi-Fi have meant explosive access to the internet, especially for kids, who just a decade or so earlier wouldn’t have enjoyed such exposure or reach. But as each one stepped into the World Wide Web, who provided them with a guide, or an understanding of the vast landscape of media, influence, opportunity and risk that comes with consuming stories? Dependent on household income, teens and pre-teens will access devices at different ages, but I would hazard that only a tiny minority are educated at ‘inception’ about what it means to be media literate and online savvy. We have started teaching large corporates simply because business leaders are concerned their vast workforce may not be media- literate digital citizens and could cause their brand reputational harm. What happens when our kids are not taught about life online and so do not even have the basic information and tools to manage the complexity of privacy, security, identity, sexuality, mental health and reputation on this high-speed train of transient content? We have the answer to this question. We are frequently dumbfounded by what we hear around South Africa from teenagers who reveal the extent of the challenges within social media and other aspects of their dynamic and exciting lives online. We hear of ‘sextortion’ rackets in which teens are persuaded to share naked images and then bribed for money or more pictures; we see We have a long way to go. Government’s mindset is to provide tablets to reach 4IR goals, and not provide foundational education in how to use the tablets for good, for change, for success identity theft in which a Grade 10 loses her entire account of 1 450 friends, with the cybercriminal casually approaching and later threatening the student’s sister and mother. We see incidents of ‘catfishing’ in which adults pretend to be to kids to approach them, or boys pretend to be attractive young girls to try and get sexts from them. Our work in schools offers a privileged vantage point and our unique differentiator is that we are good listeners. Armed with this knowledge, how should we help them? In a world of comparison on social media, we would see a different society if we were taught to employ empathy and choose our words wisely. Digital citizenship is a multidimensional curriculum guiding learners to be responsible online. Media literacy has been defined as “being able to access, analyse, and evaluate information, which we receive through media. Being media literate means being able to create media messages and to use the technology tools available to us. It means being able to think critically and speak confidently”. Time means ad placements If you have seen any of the wellknown movies like The Great Hack or The Social Dilemma on Netflix, these reveal an important truth about where we find ourselves – we are mere pawns in the attention economy, where monolithic social and technology platforms fight for our time online because time means ad placements, and that results in income and happy shareholder value. These media masters have worked out what humans want – photos, moving images, bold headlines, sensationalism – which is not that new, but the novelty lies in the algorithms that collect our data and serve us more of what we like and want, or what outrages us, to keep us online. The movies’ failing was that they fail to delve deep enough into the impact on impressionable kids. The Social Dilemma worked so well because it used the senior product developers of these platforms to admit to the fact that social media is not what they had hoped it would be, and reveal the darker side of corporate greed and competition. However, it failed to show how the tentacles that stem from this reach out and touch our kids in many ways, eroding self-esteem, exacerbating mental health challenges, and putting teenagers at risk. I have to say that MySociaLife has been surprised by the dynamic activism of this generation possessing an unapologetic, vocal unwillingness to tolerate some of the irresponsible behaviour of the generations before them – climate change, #MeToo and #BLM. These adolescents believe that they have a right to impart their perspective and (often naive) wisdom because this planet and this multicultural diversity will indeed be theirs, and their children’s, to manage. In that event, it appears that South Africa should have done a much better job in educating our 12 million school-going learners to prepare and ready them for the Fourth Industrial Revolution. These kids are the future of work. They are our future workers. But education hasn’t happened for a number of reasons. In some parts of the country, we cannot even get basic literacy right. We have a long way to go. Government’s mindset is to provide tablets to reach 4IR goals, and not provide foundational education in how to use the tablets for good, for change, for success. So, there is only one solution and that is to get the ball rolling. Education leaders need to do a much better job of intervention. There is so much to gain through digital citizenship, media literacy, and critical-thinking training simply because of the sheer volume of screen time and the diversity of touchpoints and devices, which will not abate – teenagers are consuming one hour more media every year. Digital identity, critical thinking, media literacy and fake news, privacy and cybersecurity, digital footprint and reputation, sexuality online, empathy, mind health and resilience – these are what we teach, and the students love it. We reveal the corners they haven’t visited – the dark and the light, and share skills that may last them a lifetime and change the way they see technology, the internet, devices and social media. For better and for worse. It’s time for the government and education leaders to DTRT. Do The Right Thing. With 20 years’ experience as a media strategist for industry leaders, and owner of MediaWeb Journalism Hub, Dean McCoubrey possesses vast experience and insight into news media, the app landscape, smart technology and social media. He’s turned two decades of expertise towards his ‘Digital Life Skills & Media Literacy’ programme for teens and pre-teens, MySociaLife. Lame Duck Digital 5

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