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Helping our kids navigate our digital world - Parent guide

MediaSmarts has partnered with TELUS to develop resources for two online portals designed to help keep Canadian families and kids safe online; the TELUS WISE online educational program and the TELUS WISE footprint website.
Digital Citizenship, Internet & Mobile, Online Ethics, Parents

Talk Back! How to Take Action on Media Issues

Talk Back! How to Take Action on Media Issues gives you the tools to talk back to media companies.
Digital Citizenship, Diversity in Media, Food Marketing, Gender Representation, Journalism & News, Marketing & Consumerism, Movies, Music, Parents, Sports, Stereotyping, Television, Video Games, Violence

Teens Losing Sleep to Tech

As a kid, did you ever hide a flashlight under your pillow? Then pull it out after you were supposed to be asleep, so you could sneak in another half-hour of reading? I did that. A lot.
Cell Phones and Texting, Internet & Mobile, Parents, Social Networking

Doing Good with Social Media

My teens are still young and new to social media, so until now, we’ve mostly been focusing on the risks. Our main message to them has been to be careful, and that less time online is always better.
Cell Phones and Texting, Digital Citizenship, Parents, Social Networking

Break the Fake Tip #4: Check other sources

This step may sometimes be the last one you do, but it could also be the first. The News tab is better than the main Google search for this step because it only shows real news sources. While not every source that’s included is perfectly reliable, they are all news outlets that really exist.
Authenticating Information, Digital Citizenship, Internet & Mobile

Communicating Safely Online: Tip Sheet for Youth

a. Types of Unhealthy Online Relationships Exploitation: Some people use digital media to get teenagers involved in relationships they’re not ready for.
Digital Citizenship, Digital Health, Internet & Mobile, Sexual Exploitation

Online Commerce

Kids don’t just see ads in media: more and more, they buy things right on their screens. This section looks at the ways that young people shop online and how they can be manipulated into spending.
Marketing & Consumerism

So, you want to become a parenting influencer

If you are a parent and you’ve been thinking of starting a blog, writing for parenting magazines, or becoming a social media influencer in the parent sphere, keep reading.
Blogging, Parents, Privacy, Social Networking

An inch wide and a mile deep

Surely you've heard of Inspector Spacetime, the cult British TV series that's run (with interruptions) since 1962. It has a tremendously active, engaged fanbase that's created blogs, videos and music devoted to it. Oh, and one more thing -- it never existed. It was made up as a thirty-second gag on the sitcom Community, as a parody-cum-homage of Doctor Who.
Marketing & Consumerism, Television

That’s Not Me: Addressing diversity in media

Teachers who include media literacy in their classrooms often face issues that don’t arise in other subjects. Nothing illustrates this better than the issue of diversity in media. It’s not unreasonable for teachers to see the topic as a can of worms and be concerned about offending students and their parents – not to mention worrying about what the students themselves might say. At the same time, it’s a topic that is simply too important to be ignored: what we see in media hugely influences how we see others, ourselves and the world. As a result, an ability to analyze media depictions of diversity is not only a key element of being media literate, it’s essential to understanding many of the social issues and concerns that we face as citizens. That’s why Media Awareness Network has developed That’s Not Me – a new online tutorial for professional development to help educators and community leaders approach this issue through key concepts of media literacy.
Indigenous People, Diversity in Media, Parents, Persons with Disabilities, 2SLGBTQ+ Representation, Religion, Stereotyping, Television, Visible Minorities