Analysis and Reflection of Final Project
Introduction
When I began working with the Living SchoolBook Project
in the fall of 1995, the Internet was beginning to become a popular medium from
which to search and find information. Just two years later, the numbers of subscribers
to Internet services have grown and connecting all students to the "information
superhighway" by the year 2000 has became a major educational goal in our country.
But simply bringing media into a school does not necessarily lead to the enhancement
of learning or motivation of students. Rather, the integration of media and education
needs to be accomplished in a way which is useful to students and teachers and
not just as an add-on to the curriculum. The Living
SchoolBook Project (LSB) has created opportunities for supportive collaborations
between people of various ages, backgrounds, and computer abilities. LSB
Community members draw on each other as resources in order to engage in educational
experiences while making use of the media of our culture.
Computers, televisions, radios, newspapers, CDs, magazines, movies, a wide variety of
advertisements, and many other forms of video, text, and images all contribute to the
construction of the rapidly changing nature of our mass-media society. With the rise of this
media culture, we are being bombarded with messages. The media constructs and presents
to its consumers representations of age, class, race, gender, sexual identity, and
physical beauty norms.
Just as we have learned to be literate of print texts, we need to become literate of media
texts. Therefore, becoming media literate in a media-based culture is essential for navigating
through the sea of texts, images, and messages that we encounter on a day-to-day basis. Media
literacy is described as "the movement to expand notions of literacy to include the powerful
post-print media that dominate our informational landscape, [which] helps people understand,
produce, and negotiate meanings in a culture made up of powerful images, words, and sounds"
(Aufderheide, 1993; p. 1). Learning how to navigate through the media -
with the media - is an important skill for all citizens. Understanding
what it means to become media literate, and how to apply this knowledge, needs to be embedded in
both K-12 and higher education instruction.
The following is an analysis and reflection of the "Critical
Media Literacy" web site that I created for the LSB
Community in response to some of the pedagogical implications of integrating
media selections and technologies into K-12 and higher education classrooms. First,
I will provide some background on the Living SchoolBook
Project.
About the Living SchoolBook Project and its Community
The LSB Community is a collaborative group
of teachers, students, researchers, computer scientists, business corporations,
and content providers (for examples visit
"LSB Partners") who have been brought together to explore "rich" technologies
and develop educational applications. Using an
advanced infrastructure network which consists of wide-bandwidth and high
power software and hardware products, selected K-12 schools are experimenting
with creating collaborative interactive learning environments inside and outside
of the classroom. Engaging with computer applications and technologies like digital
video, the WWW, and advanced networking systems, these learning environments become
hands-on and interactive for students, teachers, and other
LSB partners.
The overall goal of the Living SchoolBook Project
(LSB) is to connect the best high performance computing and communications
technology to selected K-12 schools, while researching the impact and thinking
of teachers and students when they are introduced to these "rich" technologies.
Through their experiences, LSB Community members
are discovering ways in which their collaboration has been working toward preparing
K-12 and higher education students and teachers for the integration of technology
into schools. It appears that the development of projects which make use of these
technological resources have influenced both educational pedagogy and practice.
Projects are developed by teachers, students, and/or LSB staff and fall under
two main categories - Interactive Journeys and
Cached Network Resources. Interactive Journeys are Internet projects which
may combine images, videos, descriptive text, and audio in order to create virtual
journeys to places like museums, historic sites, and zoos. Some of these projects,
which are currently posted on the LSB site are:
The Herkimer House,
New York State Historical
Art , and the Children's Discovery
Zoo.
Cached Network Resource Projects are based on the idea of "caching" or storing, Internet links
on a local server. For example, many times teachers want their
students to research a certain set of web sites for a class project during the school day. But,
because of busy Internet lines and heavy "traffic" (especially between 12-2pm), teachers and
students may spend most of the class period waiting for the site to come up on the computer screen;
this waiting does not prove to be a very productive use of class time. Therefore, web sites may
be cached - making these links always easily accessible to LSB schools.
The Critical Media Literacy web site is located within
the Cached Network Resources, and eventually all the links in this site will be
cached. Presently Gender Issues (a site inspired
by two students) is the only other project in this section. Since LSB
projects utilize a variety of media (e.g. Newtons Apple, NewsBank, the Internet,
video conferencing, videos, audio, photographs,
etc.) it is important to understand how to combine these pieces in order to create
potentially new and exciting projects. Both students and teachers have the opportunity
to use the media as an educational resource for content, as well as a vehicle
for response to various issues. Therefore, I thought that by introducing an awareness
of media literacy to the Living SchoolBook, the
LSB Community could benefit educationally.
Media, Technology, and Education
Being a part of the collaborative research and development team for the Living
SchoolBook, has opened my eyes to the multitude of possibilities available
for education through the incorporation of media and technology into the lives
of learners. Through the first two years of the LSB
Project, much has been learned about what is involved in the creation of multimedia
Internet-based projects, in particular, those of the Interactive Journey genre.
In creating these projects, a variety of issues -- both technological and educational
in nature -- have emerged. Questions pertaining to assessment and evaluation of
media projects are becoming important to teachers for grading purposes. Should
students' grades reflect the final product or the entire process of publishing
a web site? Will computer skills get in the way of students' or teachers' expression
of ideas and creativity? Can the content get lost behind the aesthetics of the
created web site?
Since web-based projects bring together a variety of media selections, copyright and fairuse
guidelines need to be addressed. "Borrowing" of others' content is common when creating web pages;
this leads to questions of ethics, law, and communications. The issue of whether or not copyright
laws should be taught alongside the typical course content, or separate from course content, will
soon need to be raised. Who will teach ethics and copyright law in the schools and at what grade-level
do you begin to teach these subject areas?
Another important question to ask when combining media, technology, and education may be: Is the
Internet just another educational fad? Looking back at film strips, movies, and CD-ROMs, it is
necessary to examine if these technologies were ever truly integrated into the classroom, and if
they were, how they were. Schools are spending large sums of money on computers and getting
connected to the Internet, but the tension between what technology allows and what
curriculum demands may interfere with each other. How will schools and communities deal with these economic
and technological tensions?
Working with wide-bandwidth I can see that the Internet and other technologies can motivate
learners and educators if used properly; otherwise, these technologies may be seen as another
educational fad disguised in different packaging. The possibilities of pairing interactivity
with advanced technology can motivate learners, as well as educators. School curricula needs
to adapt for the citizens of a mediated culture -- a culture in which people can communicate with
others whom they might never had an opportunity to communicate with before this type of technology
made it possible.
Applying my research interests (media, education, and youth) to my Living
SchoolBook experiences, I began to see how the media can function both as
content and as a tool in the educational process. Media selections can be used
as curricular content to illustrate educational goals in various disciplines such
as social studies, English, and science. For example, comparisons between different
media like commercials, news articles, or web sites can assist in instructing
students about power relations. Researching the media through the lenses of gender,
race, ethnicity, age, and disability issues can be brought into the classroom
by being made into age appropriate lesson plans. Thinking about gender through
history, race through literature, or disability through science can raise critical
questions about society through a multi-disciplinary approach.
In addition to utilizing media as educational content, the media can also become a tool for
investigation. Video cameras, tape recorders, and computers can all be put in the hands of
learners. Providing learners with these tools, they can experiment with (and understand how)
text, audio, video, and still images are created, constructed, and manipulated to tell a certain
story or convey a specific message. Bringing together media content with media tools is an
important aspect of learning within a media culture.
While working with cutting-edge technology in schools, I have also found that
understanding and learning about new critical literacies are necessary. When media and technology
are brought into schools and integrated into the curriculum, educators and learners begin to realize
the importance of investigating and researching from which perspective media resources are "speaking" from.
The combination of media literacy analysis with critical thinking skills which, "in a postmodern image culture requires learning
how to read images critically and to unpack the relations between images, texts, social trends, and
products in commercial culture" (Kellner, 1991; p. 74), can form a "critical media
literacy."
Interestingly, I have found that students are more comfortable with the technology
and more media literate than are the teachers. This is apparent when students take the lead on
projects and teach their teachers how to use the computer or search the web. Many times teachers
will look to students as experts and claim that they need their students present in order to
proceed on a project. The integration of media and technology into education seems to motivate
students, attract alternative learners, foster learning environments which shift agency to students,
and allow the label of "learners" to be shared by both students and teachers. Along with this shift
of roles, learning becomes a more collaborative effort, and changes teacher and student thinking about
learning.
Pedagogical Questions
Re-evaluating how to teach, learn, and share with technologies will influence both learners and educators
as well as what should be taught in schools. Issues relating to curriculum, content, pedagogy,
learning environments, and what is considered useful information in the changing media culture all need
to be addressed.
When all courses and all students may not benefit from technology, we need to think about
why we are investing so much time, money, and effort in the integration of technology
into education and why students need to have a knowledge and understanding of
technology. As technology is being incorporated into the educational system, it seems
important to question whether or not it should even be integrated. The balance of
technology and non-technology learning processes needs to be achieved since not in
every instance should technology take the place of hands-on learning skills. In some
cases reading a book, writing an essay, or putting together a traditional portfolio is
more appropriate than watching a video tape, producing a film, or creating a multimedia
portfolio.
Using technology and integrating it into the classroom can open educational opportunities for students
with various learning styles allowing for newer ways to present
and share projects. The researching, investigating, and constructing interactive multi-
media projects, are not solely concerned with products or final outcome, but rather with
the learning process. Decisions about how to design and layout web pages, edit text, select
and understand content, integrate images, and combine audio and text together all contribute
to this process of learning.
The media may effect the curriculum by allowing for projects and the project process
to become more multi-disciplinary. Making connections between social studies, English, and
art may lead to new learning investigations which bring together ideas, time periods,
students, teachers, and parents. Thinking about what has traditionally been considered
knowledge, fact, and how these ideas are being taught is quickly being altered by what
information is being made available to students and teachers. Within the increasing media
culture the need to be able to distinguish between various constructions of information,
entertainment, and media hype it is especially important to have research skills. It seems
difficult to comprehend that issues related to television and movies are being left out of
the curriculum as content and discussion issues when they are so prevalent in our culture.
Having access to software and hardware that enables manipulation of text and images raises
many questions for educators and learners, such as: (1) If I can alter images, does the
media? (2) Can all "facts" be considered true? (3) When I read something in the newspaper,
hear something on the radio, or see something on TV, how do I know what I'm seeing or hearing
has or has not been manipulated? (4) What makes a source credible? Questions such as these
may lead to critical thinking skills that are not always being taught in all schools today.
These investigations lead to the question, what constitutes a learning environment?
With the increase of getting information from other sources, no longer does learning and
teaching take place within classrooms and schools; rather, almost any place could potentially
be termed a "learning environment". What does this mean for schools, classrooms,
teachers, and students of the future? With the notion of a learning environment expanding to include places
other than a classroom -- libraries, zoos, museums, television, movie theaters, musicals, the
Internet, CD-ROMs, and concerts can all become viewed as learning environments. This can have a
great impact on the nature of schools, how they are designed, and how students and teachers
function within or outside of school walls. Redefining school, teachers, knowledge, and what
learning is about will need to occur.
Lessons Learned
I think that it would be an ideal for all web sites to be "works in progress" --
always being improved, updated, and responded to. This idea of a "work in progress"
seems to fit nicely with educational goals. For students to work collaboratively on
constructing a web-based project is an exciting process. They can work both individually
and as part of a group by gathering feedback from one another, their teachers, classmates,
and anyone else out on the web. Students could then respond to these comments by editing
their work. This dialogic process can make learning a shared experience. My educational
experience has been that a final paper is due at the end of the course, the teacher makes
comments on it, and gives you a grade. Seldom is there an opportunity to further your
thinking on that specific piece of writing since the course is over, and inevitably, the
final paper "dies." If a paper or web project were kept alive by making it a "work in
progress," it could continually be revised and shared with others.
Another important thing that I learned while doing this project was the value of
hypertext links. In the past, I found hypertext links to be distracting since they can
lead you away from what you are trying to find (if you are in fact searching for something).
But, hypertext links can be a useful tool for learning by providing supporting information
and enriching the learning experience by making it multi-layered rather than linear.
Projects that are multi-layered are more realistic than linear ones. Creating projects
that allow for multiple entry points and routes to investigation can open opportunities
for all types of learners to become actively involved.
Lastly, the CML site is based on the notion of blurring
boundaries which I think is an important learning strategy. The very idea of constructing
web sites is based in multidisciplinary studies and requires that you think about
new ways to draw different disciplines together in order to create an interesting
product. The boundaries between disciplines are blurred in order to allow for
multidisciplinary learning and allows for more realistic problems to solve rather
than typical neatly-packaged questions and answers that most students are subjected
to in schools. In creating a site you cannot avoid focusing on math, or English,
or social studies, for instance. You need to be able to combine multiple disciplines
together and use various aspects of art, English, social studies, etc. in order
to communicate your ideas through this medium. This allows for realistic learning
experiences since life's learning experiences are rarely divided neatly into disciplines.
It appears as though students and teachers need to become critical consumers of the media
culture which will enable them to become more media literate in creating their own multimedia
projects both on the web and in the classroom. But, the question remains -- what types of
implications does this have for education and will the technology have the power to alter
educational practices?
Conclusion
Over my past two years with the Living SchoolBook,
I have had the opportunity to work in a unique
collaboration with students, teachers, researchers, computer scientists, corporate
sponsors, content suppliers, and community agencies. I have watched educational
institutions actively engaging learners and educators in the process of adapting,
both personally and pedagogically, to the growing media culture.
I have also been able to work directly with the media and technology. In creating
the Critical Media Literacy web site, I have realized
that there are positives and negatives to using the media as content and as a
tool. The purpose of the Critical Media Literacy web
site is to provide students, teachers, administrators, parents, and other community
members with the necessary tools to begin to understand, critically analyze, and
respond to the media culture. In addition, they can learn, using the media of
our culture, how to create learning environments from, about, and with the media.
I view the Critical Media Literacy site as a "work in
progress," similar to a paper that is always undergoing editing. As the teachers
and students work their way through this site, I hope to receive additional feedback
from them and incorporate these suggestions into future versions of this site.
The dialogic nature of the CML site has already provided
learning experiences for the LSB community and myself. I hope that the dialogue
around CML continues along with the creative problem solving, generating of ideas,
sharing of information, and learning from others.
References:
(Return to top of page)
Aufderheide, P. (1993). Media Literacy. A Report of the National Leadership Conference on
Media Literacy. Queenstown, MD: Report on the National Leadership Conference on Media Literacy.
(ERIC Document Reproduction Service No: ED (365 294).
Kellner, D. (1991). Reading images critically: Toward a postmodern pedagogy. Chap in. Giroux, H. A.
(Ed). Postmodernism, Feminism, and Cultural Politics: Redrawing Educational Boundaries. Albany:
State University of New York Press.
Return to the Critical Media Literacy web site featured
within the Living SchoolBook pages
|| What CML is || CML and LSB ||
Links to CML sites &
resources || Media Content Resources and Tools ||
Constructing CML activities || Feedback and contributions ||
Archives of CML activities || Analysis/Reflection of Final Paper
||