The American Library Association's Public Programs Office is seeking six librarian advisors to support the creation of adult media literacy programming resources focused on how the often-overlooked structural parts of the internet affect the information people see and find online.
Does your library have a podcast? Is someone you know a blogger? Do you have staff or patrons who are “digital storytellers”?
Creating media content has become easier than ever, thanks to the wellspring of new platforms and free tools. While we can’t forget that major companies like Facebook and YouTube are profit-driven, we can help our patrons navigate these platforms and build their technical confidence while also offering opportunities to explore the “bigger picture”: how what we create affects the world around us.
Join us for a free webinar as part of our series on Media Literacy in the Library.
Our current media ecosystem is pretty messy. It is filled with a mix of both professionally produced and user-generated content that tends to get blended together on internet social media platforms like YouTube and Facebook. In this webinar, Michael Spikes of Northwestern University School of Education and Social Policy will discuss how this mix of content leads to a “blurring of the lines” between various types of content making it difficult to tell what is trustworthy and what is not.
Join us for a free webinar as part of our series on Media Literacy in the Library.
Many of us use the internet every day but are unfamiliar to the ways the internet works, including why certain content ends up in our search engine results. There is a largely invisible system at work that tailors and personalizes your online content. In this webinar, Natasha Casey of Blackburn College will discuss cookies, algorithms, and a variety of other parts of the internet that track your online presence. How can we talk about these things with library patrons?
According to the Pew Research Center, “roughly eight-in-ten U.S. adults go online at least daily.” However, many are unfamiliar with the basic ways the internet works, including why certain content ends up in our search engine results.
Since the 2016 U.S. presidential election, we have become increasingly familiar with the universe of fake news and its proliferation and persistence in print, visual and social media.
People who need media literacy skills may not be eager to sign up for a program or class on the subject; in fact, they may not know their skills are lacking at all.
Creating a program dedicated to media literacy is great (and you'll find lots of program ideas here!), but you can also find ways to introduce media literacy concepts into everyday interactions with your patrons.
