Spotting Deepfakes

Have you ever seen a photo or video online that seemed too good to be true? With today's technology, it's getting harder and harder to tell what's real and what's fake, especially with things called deepfakes.

Defeating Distraction

Here are some tips to develop a healthier relationship with technology:

Escaping the Comparison Trap

This tip sheet will give you some tips for building a healthier relationship with social media so you can avoid the comparison trap and feel better about yourself online.

Understand How the 'Comparison Trap' Works

Here are a few things about social media that make us more likely to compare ourselves to others:

Understanding artificial intelligence (AI) tools

Grades: 6-12

Duration: 60 to 90 minutes, plus extension activities

Author: MediaSmarts and TELUS

Learning goals:

Key concepts/big ideas:

Building Better Tech Habits

The Building Better Tech Habits workshop offers parents and guardians actionable strategies for managing screen time, with a focus on the understanding that digital well-being solutions are not one-size-fits-all. The workshop addresses both the opportunities and challenges that digital technology presents to youth and adults alike, and provides a comprehensive and informed perspective on digital well-being.

Ads That Don’t Look Like Ads

In this lesson, students learn what makes something an ad and how to distinguish advertisements from reviews, focusing on the key concepts of genre, tropes, bias, disclosure, and framing. Students begin by viewing and analyzing a video to prompt critical questions about the creator’s intent and visual style, then delve into the advertising genre by learning about its essential elements, like the presence of a product and brand. Students examine the differences between the “ad” and “review” genre and also use companion reading skills to evaluate the reliability and potential bias of a source by searching for undisclosed "brand deal" or "sponsored" content. Finally, students create two media pieces about the same product—one crafted as a persuasive ad and the other as an honest review—to demonstrate their ability to apply the genre elements and tropes learned throughout the lesson.

Understanding AI: Online Content

Generative AI is a new and evolving technology. It has many productive uses like acting as a research aid for homework or an assistant when planning an event. But like most technology that came before, generative AI can also be used for harmful purposes; for instance, it can be used to create fake websites, voice recordings, videos, images, and social media posts that mislead, embarrass or hurt people. What used to require a lot of technical skill to create, can now be done easily: most people who make fake content use widely-available AI tools.