New Age of Technology: Why We Need Media Literacy.

Media literacy is expanded information and communication skill that is responsive to the changing nature of information in our society. It addresses the skills adults and students need to be taught in school, the competencies people must have as we use information in our homes, and the abilities workers must have as we move throughout the twenty-first century and the challenges of a global economy. Most media literacy organizations use this definition of media literacy: The ability to access, analyze, evaluate, and communicate information in a variety of formats. It includes the ability to both read and understand and write. It moves from merely recognizing and comprehending information to the higher order critical thinking skills understood in questioning, analyzing and evaluating that information.

Today, we are in an age right now where most Students and Adults get their information from television and pictures, instead of books and print. Today, we are not only in an age of computers and forms of telecommunications, but are subjected to virtual reality as well. In a lot of today’s movies and television shows, we are highly affected by the sound and special effects put in to these movies and shows. Things like people coming back from the dead, color with black and white, etc. These are seen in a lot of movies and shows out there today. Examples like the horror movie series Friday the 13th, even in old movies like The Wizard Of Oz where it goes from black and white to color.

The problem is that these special effects are not only put in to entertainment media, but news broadcasts as well. A reporter in a news broadcast can magically be transported by computer to look as if she is standing right in front of the White House, which is usually a close up shot that looks as if he or she is as tall as the building. This demonstrates that the reporter has power and authority to report the story. Trends like these need to be questioned by the viewers. The need to question the authenticity and accuracy of all the information. Many people believe that a lot of what they see on the news must be true because it’s the news. That’s not always true, sometimes especially when broadcasting about the war in Iraq they want people to believe that everything is negative over there, but in fact some of the soldiers serving over there are helping the Iraqi’s to rebuild.

A person who is media literate is able to create, produce, and communicate information in all forms. An example of this would be our digital cameras. We can take pictures off them and put them right on to our computers or onto disc. Americans in the workplace and in their daily lives will require the information and communication skills essential to live and work with many formats. Rather than just typing print from page to screen, they will work with still and moving images, graphics and text. If we can distinguish what is real and not real, and be diverse by reading not only on the internet, but by picking up and reading a book or newspaper.