Why did the authors do this study? The authors wanted to evaluate the impact of implementing media literacy into secondary language arts curriculum to determine the effects on students’ reading, listening and viewing comprehension, writing, and message analysis skills.
How did the authors do the study? Because this study examined the entire school, they had to compare the results of a school that had similar demographics. Data was collected from activities that evaluated students’ comprehension while reading, listening and viewing text or media. Data was compared from the control group and from the school with integrated media literacy.
What data/results emerged from the study? There was a statistically significant difference in the results between the two groups when examining the three types of comprehension that were tested. The students in the treatment group were able to understand the main idea better than the students of the control group. But there wasn’t a statistically significant difference with identifying details between the two groups.
What do the authors conclude from the data analysis? They concluded that the treatment groups’ reading comprehension improved and that the students were continuing to improve their writing skills. The authors agreed that media literacy embedded into instruction is effective in meeting traditional academic goals.
What is the significance of the study? Teachers need to be less fearful when considering other methods to teach traditional academic goals. The teacher who presented this instruction was not an expert with media literacy; she was just a standard secondary language arts instructor.
How do these findings influence your position on media literacy and school curriculum? The results from this finding emphasize my feelings and understanding of how easy and important it is to embed media literacy into the curriculum. This process doesn’t have to be done all at once. Curriculum designers can take this process one step at a time by embedding it into one subject at a time, just like this study.
It's hard to not let fear stop you from teaching the curricula in a different way, because of all the pressure teachers have on them, especially with student scores on WESTTEST and benchmarks.
ReplyDeleteI'm glad you recognize that change should be slow! Begin by doing one media literacy activity year!
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