What is media literacy?

If literacy means the ability to read and write to communicate feelings and learning new knowledge and skills through words, than media literacy would contain similar meanings of being able to acquire those information through media. Media literacy is becoming more popular in education and important in our learning and acquiring of information on a daily basis. This is due to the fact that the internet technology is becoming increasingly advanced which brings convenience to, and creating as well as satisfying our constant eager for information. It is also accelerated by the 2019 global pandemic which has forced many learning, communicating and working activities online.

Why is it important?

The internal force for pushing the development and popularity of internet use in education and work field is the vast development of internet technology and multimedia content creation, while the external force being the global pandemic. These two forces have pushed people to adapt to using media, communicating through apps that contain media contents, learning and working with online forms.

As a result, the most important reason for developing media literacy is to get used to the “modern way” of communication and collaboration. One needs the media literacy to be able to decode information, access to the deeper meaning of the information, as well as creating new information in the online context.

Other reasons that make media literacy important are the convenience, diversity and efficiency of the online contents that are provided to the users of media. Being able to well access these types of information would require the users to be media literate meaning that they are able to decode, assess and create media objects themselves. Not being media literate when accessing to media contents, is like trying to catch a fish in the sea when you cannot swim.

Why is it dismissed?

There are many reasons. One should be that people have not realized the importance of it. Media contents are still for entertainment and pleasure for many people and when we think about media contents, we would think that it is informal and can only be used for educational purpose when used to assist traditional offline learning and researching. Media literacy is based on the educational purposes and without realizing the role it plays, there is little need for taking media literacy seriously.

Another reason for it is that some have failed to see the misinformation or potential disinformation that could cause serious problems when media is used for educational purposes. Or the fact that being media literate could potentially bring learners with diverse information and knowledge in a convenient and effective way. In other words, some still do not recognize the power of the media in education, and thus neglected the importance of being able to “speak” the “internet language”.

Why should you aim for varied views but the factual consensus in your PLN? Open dialogues about media literacy and factual information can create conflict; why does this happen?

Both has to do with diverse opinions. Since the users and commenters on the media platforms vary, there is hardly unified thoughts and opinions one factual consensus. Sometimes the barriers of people’s languages, background, education, religions or genders could cause debates or even conflicts. It could be purely theoretical or sometimes conflicts of interests. Although for many cases, it is almost impossible or unlikely that they reach consensus because of the variety. It is also what we want to aim for, varied views rather than factual consensus. Since one size doesn’t fit all, we should keep our mindsets open to other people’s views, judgements and values. Close-mindedness could make it difficult for communication and understanding to happen and thus create conflicts.

What is the benefit of having a PLN that values media literacy?

Having a PLN that values media literacy would increase the credibility, accessibility, authenticity as well as the diversity of the PLN. Media literacy represents the ability to use media for one’s learning. A PLN that values media literacy would be accessible because this ability.

Media literacy also gives the creator more chances to express original thoughts and ideas with the help of media features which could make these contents created more authentic and trustworthy, as someone with media literacy would be more likely to have access to original and credible researches and other original and truthful ideas in the first place.

Valuing media literacy for a PLN also suggests that the PLN value diverse opinions and follow the fundamental rules of online communication. Mutual respect and giving voices to values are the “language” that media literacy “speaks” and a PLN with these features are more likely to benefit by being prone to more expose.