HERCOR COLLEGE

Km. 1 Lawaan, Roxas City, Capiz

5800

Department: College of Education Course Code: EDUC202

Name of Instructor: Richele B. Dorado Schedule: __________
Course Descriptive Title: Building and Enhancing New Literacies Across the Curriculum Learning Module
Semester: 2nd Sem

Name of Student: ________________________________ ________ Course Code:_____________________

Name of Instructor:_______________________________________ Schedule:________________________
Course Descriptive Title: ___________________________________ Contact no.:________________________

Building and Enhancing New Literacies Across the Curriculum Learning Module

Course Description:
By the design of the course, we already imply strong connections of media to society, specifically to its power
structures – from media institutions, to big businesses, and even political blocks.

 Module Release:
 Submission of Evaluation Task: WEEK 9-10

INTRODUCTION

This week, you will study and understand the

relationship between Media Literacy and
Cyber/Digital Literacy. Of all the 21st century
literacies presented, none of them embodies the
“newness” of these literacies quite like those
needed to make sense of the absolute deluge of
information brought to us by the internet. With
the vast number of websites, web forums, and
social media applications now available for us, never before has there been so much information – in nearly every form
imaginable, from nearly every source imaginable – available to us twenty-four hours a day, no matter our location.

Along with these concepts, you will encounter activities that will gauge and evaluate your learning and
comprehension regarding the subject matter. Materials for your references are also available and attached in this
module. For this week, you are expected to gear yourself with the basic understanding of the course in preparation for a
larger scope of commitment to learn Building and Enhancing New Literacies Across the Curriculum course.

OBJECTIVES

At the end of this chapter, you should be able to:

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 1. Develop a working under understanding of Media and Cyber/Digital Literacy and how they relate to one another.
2. Appreciate the importance of developing Media and Cyber/Digital Literacy both in ourselves and one another in
the information age; and
3. Realize that practical steps must be taken to develop these literacies early in children and cannot wait “until
they are older.”

DISCUSSION (Chapter 5: Media and Cyber or Digital Literacies)

Media Literacy

Like all the literacies discussed in this

book, media literacy can be defined in several
ways. Aufderheide (1993) defines it as the
ability to access, analyze, evaluate, and
communicate messages in a wide variety of
forms," while Christ and Potter (1998) define
it as "the ability to access, analyze, evaluate,
and create messages across a variety of
contexts." Hobbs (1998) posits that it is a
term used by modern scholars to refer to the
process of critically analyzing and learning to
create one's own messages in print, audio,
video, and multimedia.

Perhaps in its simplest sense, media literacy can thus be defined as "the ability to identify different types of
media and understand the messages they are communicating" (Common Sense Media, n.d.). The exact type of media
varies--television, radio, newspapers, magazines, books, handouts, flyers, etc.-but what they all have in common is that
they were all created by someone, and that someone had a reason for creating them.

According to Boyd (2014), media literacy education began in the United States and United Kingdom as a direct
result of war propaganda in the 1930s and the rise of advertising in the 1960s. In both cases, media was being used to
manipulate the perspective (and subsequent actions) of those exposed to it, thereby giving rise to the need to educate
people on how to detect the biases, falsehoods, and half-truths depicted in print, radio, and television.

Because media communication lends itself so easily and so well to the purpose of manipulating consumers'
perceptions on issues both political and commercial, being able to understand the "why"behind media communication is
the absolute heart of media literacy today.

Despite the relatively simple and clear definition of media literacy, it should come as no surprise that scholars
and educators have been debating for quite some time on how media literacy should be both defined and taught.
Aufderheide (1993) and Hobbs (1998) reported, "At the 1993 Media Literacy National Leadership Conference, U.S.
educators could not agree on the range of appropriate goals for media education or the scope of appropriate
instructional techniques." The conference did, however, identify five essential concepts necessary for any analysis of
media messages:

1. Media messages are constructed.

2. Media messages are produced within economic, social, political, historical, and aesthetic contexts.

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 3. The interpretative meaning-making processes involved in message reception consist of an interaction
between the reader, the text, and the culture.

4. Media has unique "languages," characteristics which typify various forms, genres, and symbol systems of
communication.

5. Media representations play a role in people's understanding of social reality.

What these five concepts boil down to is that while the producer of a particular media has an intended meaning
behind the communication, what actually gets communicated to the consumers depends not only on the media itself
but also on the consumers themselves and on their respective cultures. The consumers' perceived meaning is what then
develops into how people understand social reality.

An immediate example of this is the media portrayal of Mindanao. Because so little good news coming from the
island is communicated by the news networks, the average Filipino-who might never have been to Mindanao comes to
believe that the entire island is involved in armed conflict, that anyone from Mindanao is somehow involved in the
conflict, and therefore (understandably) refuses to go there, nor allow any of his or her relatives to do so. It is unlikely
that this was the news media's intention, but it is the viewer's interpretation that ultimately determined his or her
beliefs and behavior.

What Media Literacy is Not

Given the broad and somewhat nebulous nature of media literacy, its implied definition can be gleaned by
understanding what media literacy is not. The following is a list of actions that are often mistaken for being
representative of media literacy (Center for Media Literacy, n.d.):

 Criticizing the media is not in and of itself, media literacy. However, being media literate sometimes requires
that one indeed criticize what one sees and hears.

 Merely producing media is not media literacy although part of being media literate is the ability to produce
media.

 Teaching with media (videos, presentations, etc.) does not equal media literacy. An education in media literacy
must also include teaching about media.

 Viewing media and analyzing it from a single perspective is not media literacy. True media literacy requires both
the ability and willingness to view and analyze media from multiple positions and perspectives.

 Media literacy does not simply mean knowing what and what not to watch; it does mean "watch carefully, think
critically."

Challenges to Media Literacy Education

One glaring challenge to teaching Media Literacy is, "how do we teachit?"

Teaching it as a subject in itself might not be feasible given how overburdened the curriculum is at the moment,
while integrating it into the subjects that are currently being taught might not be enough to teach what are essentially
media consumption habits-skills and attitudes that are learned by doing and repetition rather than by mere classroom
discussion (Koltay, 2011).

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 Livingstone and Van Der Graaf (2010) identified "how to measure media literacy and evaluate the success of
media literacy initiatives" as being one of the more pernicious challenges facing educators in the 21st century, for the
simple reason that if we cannot somehow measure the presence of media literacy in our students, how do we know we
have actually taught them?

Finally, a more fundamental challenge to Media Literacy Education is one of purpose. As Chris & Potter (1998)
put it, "Is media literacy best understood as a means of inoculating children against the potential harms of the media or
as a means of enhancing their appreciation of the literary merits of the media?"

Digital Literacy

In the first chapter of this book, we read

how Gee, Hull, and Lankshear (1996) noted how
literacy always has something to do with reading a
text with understanding, and that there are many
kinds of texts, and each one requires a specific set
of skills to understand and make meaning out of
them. Digital Literacy (also called e-literacy, cyber
literacy, and even information literacy by some
authors) is no different although now the "text" can
actually be images, sound, video, music, or a
combination thereof.

Digital Literacy can be defined as the ability to locate, evaluate, create, and communicate information on various
digital platforms. Put more broadly, it is the technical, cognitive, and sociological skills needed to perform tasks and
solve problems in digital environments (Eshet-Alkalai, 2004). It finds its origins in information and computer literacy
(Bawden, 2008, 2001: Snavely & Cooper, 1997; Behrens, 1994; Andretta, 2007; Webber & Johnson, 2000), so much so
that the skills and competencies listed by Shapiro and Hughes (1996) in a curriculum they envisioned to promote
computer literacy should sound very familiar to readers today:

 tool literacy - competence in using hardware and software tools;

 resource literacy - understanding forms of and access to information resources;
 social-structural literacy - understanding the production and social significance of information:
 research literacy - using IT tools for research and scholarship: publishing literacy - ability to communicate and
publish information;
 emerging technologies literacy - understanding of new developments in IT; and
 critical literacy - ability to evaluate the benefits of new technologies (Note that this literacy is not the same as
critical thinking," which is often regarded as a component of information literacy).

It should also come as no surprise that digital literacy shares a great deal of overlap with media literacy: so much so
that digital literacy can be seen as a subset of media literacy, dealing particularly with media in digital form. The
connection should be fairly obvious—if media literacy is "the ability to identify different types of media and understand
the messages they are communicating," then digital literacy can be seen as "media literacy applied to the digital media,"
albeit with a few adjustments.

The term "digital literacy" is not new; Lanham (1995), in one of the earliest examples of a functional definition of the
term described the "digitally literate person" as being skilled at deciphering and understanding the meanings of images,
sounds, and the subtle uses of words so that he/she could match the medium of communication to the kind of
information being presented and to whom the intended audience is. Two years later, Paul Gilster (1997) formally

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defined digital literacy as "the ability to understand and use information in multiple formats from a wide range of
sources when it is presented via computers," explaining that not only must a person acquire the skill of finding things,
he/she must also acquire the ability to use these things in life.

Bawden (2008) collated the skills and competencies comprising digital literacy from contemporary scholars on the
matter into four groups:

1. Underpinnings - This refers to those skills and competencies that "support" or "enable" everything else within
digital literacy, namely: traditional literacy and computer/ICT literacy (i.e., the ability to use computers in
everyday life).
2. Background Knowledge - This largely refers to knowing where information on a particular subject or topic can
be found, how information is kept, and how it is disseminated-a skill taken for granted back in the day when
information almost exclusively resided in the form of printed text.
3. Central Competencies - These are the skills and competencies that a majority of scholars agree on as being core
to digital literacy today, namely:
 reading and understanding digital and non-digital formats;
 reating and communicating digital information: evaluation of information;
 knowledge assembly:
 information literacy; and
 media literacy.

4. Attitudes and Perspectives - Bawden (2008) suggests that it is these attitudes and perspectives that link digital
literacy today with traditional literacy, saying "it is not enough to have skills and competencies, they must be
grounded in some moral framework," specifically:
 independent learning - the initiative and ability to learn whatever is needed for a person's specific
situation; and
 moral / social literacy - an understanding of correct, acceptable, and sensible behavior in a digital
environment.

Information Literacy within Digital Literacy

Given the ease with which digital media (as opposed to traditional print media) can be edited and manipulated,
the ability to approach it with a healthy amount of skepticism has become a "survival skill" for media consumers. Eshet-
Alkalai (2004) draws attention to Information Literacy as a critical component of Digital Literacy as "the cognitive skills
that consumers use to evaluate information in an educated and effective manner." In effect, Information Literacy acts as
a filter by which consumers evaluate the veracity of the information being presented to them via digital media and
thereupon sort the erroneous, irrelevant, and biased from what is demonstrably factual.

From this perspective, part of the efforts of Digital Literacy Education should be toward developing media
consumers who think critically and are ready to doubt the quality of the information they receive, even if said
information comes from so-called "authoritative sources." However, a majority of studies on Information Literacy seem
to concentrate more on the ability to search for information rather than its cognitive and pedagogical aspects (Eshet-
Alkalai, 2004; Zinns, 2000; Burnett & McKinley, 1998).

Socio-Emotional Literacy within Digital Literacy

Alongside Information Literacy, Eshet-Alkalai (2004) highlights a kind of Socio-Emotional literacy needed to
navigate the Internet, raising questions such as, "How do I know if another user in a chatroom is who he says he is or
"How do I know if a call for blood donations on the Internet is real or a hoax?”

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 Such questions should make us realize that there are no hard and fast rules for determining the answers. Instead,
there is a necessary familiarity with the unwritten rules of Cyberspace; an understanding that while the Internet is a
global village of sorts, it is also a global jungle of human communication embracing everything from truth to falsehoods,
honesty and deceit, and ultimately, good and evil. According Eshet-Alkalai (2004). This Socio-Emotional literacy requires
users to be "very critical, analytical, and mature"- implying a kind of richness of experience that the literate transfers
from real life to their dealings online. Curiously, while research shows that the older a user is the less likely they are to
behave naively online, this does not exempt them from the occasional lapse: They might not believe that a Nigerian
prince is bequeathing 100 million dollars in gold bullion to them in exchange for their bank details, but they might be
willing to believe that someone really is giving away 1000 units of the latest smartphone in exchange for their contact
information

Digital literate users know how to avoid the “traps” of cyberspace mainly because they are familiar with the
social and emotional patterns of working in cyberspace - that is really just an outworking of human nature.

Digital Natives

The term digital native has become something of a buzzword in the education sector over the past decade. This
was popularized by Prensky (2001) in reference to the generation that was born during the information age los opposed
to digital immigrants-the generation prior that acquired familiarity with digital systems only as adults) and who has not
known a world without computers, the Internet, and connectivity.

Despite the fact that Prensky's original paper was not an academic one and had no empirical evidence to
support its claims, educators and parents alike latched onto the term, spawning a school of thought wherein the decline
of modern education is explained by educators' lack of understanding of how digital natives learn and make decisions.

However, a popular misconception borne out of the term digital natives and the educational ideas it spawned is
that the generation in question is born digitally literate. If this is the case, then the question, "How can digital
immigrants teach digital natives a literacy they already have?" is a valid one, to which the answer would be, correctly,
“they cannot."

But the problem here is that "digitally literate" is popularly defined as the ability to use computers or use the
Internet, which as we have seen earlier, forms only one part of the crucial skills and competencies required to be
digitally literate. Our expanded view of the term "literate" allows us to see that while the digital natives in our
classrooms are most certainly familiar with digital systems-perhaps even more so than their instructors-this does not
mean they automatically know how to read, write, process, and communicate information on these systems in ways
that are both meaningful and ethical especially when the information involved does not involve technology's most
common use: personal entertainment. That is to say, when the task at hand does not involve what the digital natives
consider to be entertainment, the gaps in their literacy begin to show.

A good example of this is the difficulty many Senior High School instructors have in teaching research: Students
who are otherwise quite familiar with using the Internet for entertainment are suddenly at a loss in locating, accessing.
and understanding information from research journals and websites, mainly because they are looking for information on
topics they are either unfamiliar with, uninterested in, or both.

Another problem concerning digital natives is the misconception that everyone belonging to the generation is
on more or less equal footing in regard to digital literacy. Although the drawing of such a conclusion is understandable
(given the near-ubiquity of digital technology and the Internet), it is nonetheless mistaken, as no one is truly "born
digital." Instead, the determining factor is access to education and experience: children born to poorer families will
naturally seem less digitally literate for lack of access to technology and an education in said technologies, while those
born to privileged families will display more of the literacies discussed earlier.

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Challenges to Digital Literacy Education

Digital Literacy Education shares many of the same challenges to Media Literacy For example: How should it be
taught? How can it be measured and evaluated? Should it be taught for the protection of students in their consumption
of information or should it be to develop their appreciation for digital media?
Brown (2017) also noted that despite the global acknowledgement that Digital Literacy Education is a need,
there is as of yet no overarching model or framework for addressing all of the skills deemed necessary. Put simply, there
is no single and comprehensive plan anywhere for teaching digital literacy the way it should be taught. Accordingly, he
asked, "What assumptions, theories, and research evidence underpin specific frameworks? Whose interests are being
served when particular frameworks are being promoted? Beyond efforts to produce flashy and visually attractive models
how might we reimagine digital literacies to promote critical mindsets and active citizenry in order to reshape our
societies for new ways of living, learning, and working for a better future for all?”

Despite the challenges posed by the broad and fluid nature of media (and therefore digital) literacy, educators in
the Philippines can spearhead literacy efforts by doubling-down on those concepts and principles of Media Literacy that
are of utmost importance, namely, critical thinking and the grounding of critical thought in a moral framework.

 Teach media and digital literacy integrally. Any attempt teach these principles must first realize that they
cannot be separated from context-meaning, they cannot be taught separately from other topics. Critical
Thinking requires something other than itself to think critically about, and thus cannot develop in a vacuum.
Similarly, developing a moral framework within students cannot be taught via merely talking about it. This moral
framework develops by practicing it, that is, basing our decisions on it in the context of everything else we do in
our day-to-day lives. We therefore agree with Koltay (2011) that the teaching of the fundamental principles of
these and other literacies should be done integratively with other subjects in school, however difficult the
process might be. In other words, teach them in mathematics, sciences, language arts, social studies, and so on.
Make them part of the school curriculum and in the everyday life of the students. Anything else will be as
misguided as merely telling a plant to grow and expecting it to do so by the power of your words.

 Master your subject matter. Whatever it is you teach you must not only possess a thorough understanding of
your subject matter. you must also understand why you are teaching it, and why it is important to learn. As
educators, we must not shy away from a student genuinely asking us to explain why something we are teaching
is important. After all, teaching is in itself a kind of media the students are obliged to consume; it is only fair they
know why.

 Think "multi-disciplinary." How can educators integrate media and digital literacy in a subject as abstract as
Mathematics, for example? The answer lies in stepping out of the "pure mathematics" mindset and embracing
communication as being just as important to math as computation. Once communication is accepted as
important, this opens-up new venues where the new literacies can be exercised. For example, have students
create a webpage detailing what systems of linear equations are, why they are important, and the techniques
for solving them. Alternatively, they can create poster infographics that explain the same things. The exact same
strategies can be applied to nearly any subject and any topic. It is just a matter of believing, as educators, that
how we communicate is as important as what we communicate.

 Explore motivations, not just messages. While it is very important that students learn what is the message
being communicated by any media text, it is also important to develop in them a habit for asking why is the
message being communicated in the first place. In the case of an information pamphlet warning against some
infectious disease for example, is there an outbreak we are being warned of? If not, could this then be an
attempt to sow panic and discord in the target populace? Why? who stands to gain from doing such things? The
objective here is not so much to find the correct answers, but rather to develop the habit of asking these
questions.

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  Leverage skills that students already have. It is always surprising how much a person can do when they are
personally and affectively motivated to do so in other words, a person can do amazing things when they really
want to. Students can produce remarkably well researched output for things they are deeply interested in, even
without instruction. Hamessing this natural desire to explore whatever interests them will go a long way in
improving media and digital literacy education in your classroom.

Wrap Up

 Media Literacy is the ability to identify different types of media and understand the messages they are
communicating, including who is the intended audience and what is the motivation behind the message.

 Digital/Cyber Literacy is a subset of media literacy; the ability to locate, evaluate, create. And communicate
information on various digital platforms. This includes the ability to verify information as factual as well as
identify and avoid communication with deceitful, malicious, and exploitative content.

 Information Literacy is a subset of media literacy; the ability to locate, access, and evaluate information from
a variety of media sources.

 Of utmost importance to both literacies (media and digital) is the ability to analyse and think critically about
what is being communicated. This means making value judgements about the message (i.e., identifying truth
from falsehood, right from wrong, etc.), and goes beyond simply comprehending the what is being said.

EVALUATION

Write a short reflection about the following set of questions.

1. Can I read/write? Do I know how to write and send emails, create documents and simple spreadsheets, use a
web browser, and make sense of the search results returned by a search engine?

2. Do I know where to find information on local and national news, politics, and events? Do I know where I am
likely to find reliable, factual information on a given topic?

3. Do I know at least three ways to share information online? Do I know how to evaluate if a particular information
source is factual/true and trustworthy? Do I know how to synthesize the contents of several texts or the same
topic into a coherent whole?

4. Do I understand and accept the fact that with all these digital tools at my command, I have both the ability and
responsibility to learn whatever I have to learn, and to do so on my own? Do I understand and agree that there
are morally acceptable and unacceptable behaviours that ought to govern what, how, why, and with whom I
communicate online?

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 RUBRICS/PERFORMANCE INDICATORS
CRITERIA EXEMPLARY ACCEPTABLE DEVELOPING BEGINNING
10 8 6 4

Focus and Details There is one clear, There is one clear, There is one topic. The topic and main
well-focused topic. well-focused topic. Main ideas are ideas are not clear.
Main ideas are clear Main ideas are clear somewhat clear.
and are well but are not well
supported by supported by
detailed and accurate detailed information.
information.

Organization The introduction is The introduction The introduction There is no clear

inviting, states the states the main topic states the main topic. introduction,
main topic, and and provides an A conclusion is structure, or
provides an overview overview of the included. conclusion.
of the paper. paper. A conclusion is
Information is included.
relevant and
presented in a logical
order. The conclusion
is strong.

Sentence Stucture, All sentences are well Most sentences are Most sentences are Sentences sound
Grammar, constructed and have well-constructed and well constructed, but awkward, are
varied structure and have varied structure they have a similar distractingly
Mechanics, &
length. The author and length. The structure and/or repetitive, or are
Spelling
makes no errors in author makes a few length. The author difficult to
grammar, mechanics, errors in grammar, makes several errors understand. The
and/or spelling. mechanics, and/or in grammar, author makes
spelling, but they do mechanics, and/or numerous errors in
not interfere with spelling that interfere grammar, mechanics,
understanding. with understanding. and/or spelling that
interfered with
understanding.

DIRECTIONS TO SUBMIT (IF SUBMISSION IS THROUGH ONLINE )

Submit your work either Online thru this email/Google Class or personally at the scheduled date below in Microsoft Word 97-
2003, .docx or other word processing file. (Google Docs, Open Office are also acceptable.

Google Account:
G OOGLE CLASSROOM :
DIRECTIONS TO SUBMIT (IF SUBMISSION IS THROUGH FACE -TO-FACE )
1. Bring your completed assignment in school (Riverside Campus).
2. Drop your completed assignment at the box (Educ 202 – Bulding and Enhancing New Literacies Across the Curriculum)
placed in front of COE Faculty Room.
3. Make sure to label your completed assignment with your name, course, year and section.

REFERENCES
Building and Enhancing New Literacies Across the Curriculum, First Edition 2019 | Alata, Elen Joy P. et al.