One of the reasons why teens turn to shortcuts, such as judging a claim based on the reliability or apparent authenticity of the person making it, or turning to peers and influencers over trusted expert sources, is that they simply encounter too much information to deal with. To overcome this, we need to learn information sorting: how to quickly tell whether or not a source is even worth our attention before considering it.
If you’ve found that the source is reliable enough to be worth your attention, you can now read it more critically.
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MediaSmarts’ experts are available to facilitate virtual and in-person workshops in school and community settings for parents/guardians, educators, youth and the general public. Our workshops cover topics such as online safety, misinformation, digital well-being, managing tech in the home, diversity and representation in media, digital citizenship, critical thinking, online hate and more.
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Learn more about how we practice integrity in all our work, including research projects, educational content and knowledge mobilization efforts.
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MediaSmarts is excited to offer two free virtual digital media literacy professional workshops for educators thanks to funding from the Ontario Ministry of Education. These two new professional development workshops were developed to support the updated Grade 1-9 Language Curriculum in Ontario.
The following fact-checking videos have been produced by teens for teens. The viral claims they chose to fact-check touch on a range of topics from the environment, health, science and food to beauty products, social media trends and even presumed “weird” local bylaws that caught their attention.