Ottawa, July 24, 2012 – MediaSmarts (formerly known as Media Awareness Network) is today announcing that all public library members of the Ontario Library Association (OLA) will now have access to its Web Awareness Workshop Series through a one-year licence agreement funded by a grant through Google Canada.
OTTAWA, April 18, 2018 – MediaSmarts, Canada’s centre for digital and media literacy, and the Canadian Teachers’ Federation (CTF) are pleased to announce that this year’s Media Literacy Week will focus on helping students decipher truth from fiction online.
The Northwest Territories Department of Education, Culture and Employment adheres to the WNCP's Framework for English Language Arts which contains a strong media education component. At present, the department is in the process of implementing the WNCP framework at the Kindergarten to Grade 9 levels. For Grades 10-12, the department follows the Alberta curriculum for English Language Arts.
Today, Facebook, MediaSmarts and Aboriginal Peoples Television Network (APTN) released a series of newly translated guides for Aboriginal teens, which provide tips for sharing and making decisions online. The Think Before You Share guides were released in Winnipeg during the opening of the National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation at the University of Manitoba.
In Manitoba, Technology Education includes several subject areas with connections to digital and media literacy: Applied Commerce Education and Human Ecology.
Applied Commerce Education
For parents of teens and tweens, the Internet can sometimes seem like nothing more than an ever-expanding list of websites to keep up on: Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, Snapchat and so on, with new ones appearing every few months. While the safety risks associated with these mainstream sites are often exaggerated – and it’s more effective to build broader critical thinking skills than to focus on the particulars of kids’ latest favourite sites – there are some websites that present very real and specific risks and that parents are much less likely to know about. These are the so-called “rogue websites” that offer unapproved access to copyrighted content such as music, movies and video games.
In this section, we examine some concerns related to the movies kids enjoy and we offer tips for talking about problematic film content such as violence and gender and racial stereotyping.
One of the most noted aspects of the Internet is its anonymity: by and large, people online will treat you as whoever you say you are. In the West, this is often used for mischief or identity play, but in other parts of the world anonymity can have a much more significant and liberating effect.
Meet Sasha. At age 8, she's a real social butterfly, both online and off, and is very concerned with how the world sees her: she spends a lot of time making sure she looks good in photos online but doesn't always think twice about who might see them. Violet is Sasha's older sister and her polar opposite: she's a hardcore gamer, and just as tough as her Level 65 Barbarian. Though she despairs of her sister sometimes, she's also fiercely protective of her and will unleash her considerable wrath on anyone she thinks is picking on Sasha.
How can we help young people develop affective empathy? The best approach depends on how old they are. Children begin to understand empathy as toddlers, but at this stage they are so completely “in the moment” that the best approach is to watch out for situations where we can model and talk about empathy with them. When a child does something or witnesses something that makes somebody feel sad, quietly explain to them how and why it made them feel that way. (It can be valuable to do this with other emotions, such as fear and happiness, as well.)