December 12, 2023 • 55 mins
Dr. Michael Spikes talks to us about reliability, credibility, and relevance of news media, fundamentals of communication, and staying curious in a wide world of media. Dr. Spikes is known for his work in media literacy education, news media literacy, and youth media. He has more than a decade experience as a practitioner and scholar of news media literacy in previous positions with Stony Brook University, Washington DC Public Schools, and the Newseum. Dr. Michael A. Spikes is a lecturer and a project director in the Medill School of Journalism, Media, Integrated Marketing Communications at Northwestern University.
To cite this episode:
Persohn, L. (Host). (2023, Dec 12). A conversation with Michael Spikes (Season 4, No. 6) [Audio podcast episode]. In Classroom Caffeine Podcast series. https://www.classroomcaffeine.com/guests. DOI: 10.5240/AABF-F2D5-71AE-0E7D-6506-N
Connect with Classroom Caffeine at www.classroomcaffeine.com or on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Lindsay Persohn (00:10):
Education Research has a problem the work
of brilliant educationresearchers often doesn't reach
the practice of brilliantteachers.
Classroom Caffeine is here tohelp.
In each episode, I talk with atop education researcher or
expert educator about what theyhave learned from their research
(00:31):
and experiences.
In this episode, Dr MichaelSpikes talks to us about
reliability, credibility andrelevance of news media,
fundamentals of communicationand staying curious in a wide
world of media.
Dr Spikes is known for his workin media literacy, education,
(00:54):
news media literacy and youthmedia.
He has more than a decadeexperience as a practitioner and
scholar of news media literacyin previous positions with Stony
Brook University, Washington DCpublic schools and the museum.
Dr Michael A Spikes is alecturer and project director in
the Medeal School of Journalism, Media, Integrated Marketing
(01:16):
Communications at NorthwesternUniversity.
For more information about ourguest, stay tuned to the end of
this episode.
So pour a cup of your favoritedrink and join me, your host,
Lindsay Persan, for ClassroomCaffeine research to energize
your teaching practice.
Michael, thank you for joiningme.
(01:38):
Welcome to the show.
Michael Spikes (01:40):
Thank you so much for having me.
Lindsay Persohn (01:42):
So, from your own experiences and education,
will you share with us one ortwo moments that inform your
thinking now?
Michael Spikes (01:50):
So one of them that probably sticks out to me
the most when thinking aboutthis question is something that
happened to me right when Istarted with the Center for News
Literacy at Stony BrookUniversity, and that was 2012
that I got offered the job.
They're actually.
What wound up happening was Iwent to Stony Brook for a
(02:12):
teacher training institute backin 2010 to learn about news
literacy, and this was the firsttime I had learned about the
particular approach to teachingnews literacy and what it was.
And about two years later I haddone a lot of, I guess,
lobbying to the folks in charge.
They were really saying like Ilove this stuff and if you ever
(02:34):
have anything that comes up,please let me know.
And I got invited to come backand speak at a conference like a
year after that, in 2011, andin 20 at the end of 2011,.
Then they presented me withsome paperwork about a grant
they had just gotten and askedme what that I think I could do,
and then joined them in 2012.
So after I got offered this job, the first thing I got asked to
(02:55):
do was to get a passport,because I didn't have one, and
travel halfway around the globeto, I should say all the way
around the globe, because Ithink this is on the opposite
side of the globe to me, to thesmall country of Bhutan and
Bhutan if listeners don't know,geographically it is north of
India and south of Tibet.
(03:17):
And the reason why we weregoing there, I was going there
with the then director of thecenter.
We were going there to do sometraining with a NGO there named
the Bhutan Center for Media andDemocracy, because Bhutan was in
the process.
The country is in the processof transitioning from an
absolute monarchy to aconstitutional monarchy where
(03:40):
there would still be a king thatwould be in charge of the
country, but the people wouldbegin to have representatives
like representatives and peoplelike that.
They would start to vote andall those kind of things, and
this was something that was thechoice of the monarch at the
time.
So, in association with thismedia in the ways that we think
(04:02):
about it, and that beingtelevision was relatively new in
the country.
They had had cable television,I think for maybe about 10 years
at that time and the internetwas totally brand new there.
So we were asked to come overto do a bit of media training
for educators in the country.
So I get everything together.
(04:23):
I go over there and on thefirst day I think it was the
first day I was there we haddone traveling in.
This was like March of 2012, anda lot of attention had started
to be paid to the shooting ofTrayvon Martin in Florida, and
while I was there, I jumped onmy computer and I was a pretty
(04:46):
avid user of Facebook at thetime and I remember jumping on
Facebook and seeing lots ofreactions from friends about the
shooting itself, the shooterand really people going off of
very incomplete pieces ofinformation about it and really
(05:07):
letting that direct theirresponses to it.
Now, everyone comes to thisfrom their own point of view.
They use that as a lens tounderstand this.
But I remember coming across astory, or an analysis piece, I
think, that came out of the NewYork Times that talked
specifically about how mediawere portraying both the shooter
(05:30):
and the victim, trayvon, andthe story basically talked about
the fact that the shooter andnow granted, this is not.
I should give the caveat thatthis I hope this will not allude
to my own thoughts on theshooting or associated issues
like these, but, being a personwho was very much interested in
(05:50):
media literacy, having ananalysis piece that talked about
the portrayals of both of thesepeople, and that being that any
images of the shooter that wewere seeing were mostly the
shooter's mugshot and thepictures that we were seeing of
the victim, trayvon, were of amiddle school graduation photo.
And really there wasconversations in this piece that
(06:14):
were about how were theseportrayals shaping the public's
view of what happened.
Now, granted, again, I want togo back and say that the
shooting of a young person isnever justified, like I think
violence like that is important.
I am not a person that believesin that, but I think it was
(06:35):
important for people to thinkabout how did media portrayals
of both of these people not onlyjust say here is what happened,
but also helped to shapepeople's opinions of what
happened?
And so I took this story, sharedit on my Facebook page.
Then, like I go away and acouple of hours later I come
(06:56):
back and the amount of vitriolthat was given to me in terms of
comments to the fact that I hadeven posted this story were
amazing to me.
Like people were calling methings and I have to say, as an
African-American myself, likepeople calling me Uncle Tom,
like who side are you on, youknow all these kind of things
(07:18):
Just by inviting a conversationabout how were these two people
involved in this story beingportrayed and how can we think
more critically about our ownreactions to what happened?
Based on that and it struck meso much, being one, like I say,
(07:38):
being African-American myself,being involved in a project that
was all about learning how tobecome more mindful consumers of
media and how it affects us,and at the same time, being in a
country I had never been inbefore that had largely a
monoculture of people there, andcoming there to teach them
(08:01):
these skills, and one, you know,experiencing it for myself,
like I was one of the only youknow black people over there,
and at one point I've walkedaround in a village and had a
bunch of children following mebecause they thought I was some
famous basketball player, right.
So you know again that to me italso speaks to how media shapes
(08:24):
our portrayals of who we see,who we think we see, and all
those kind of things.
So that experience in particular, I think, really shaped a lot
of my own views on how Iapproach teaching people about
media literacy and from that,one of the things I took away
from that was.
(08:44):
It's very, very important, andat least the thing that I like
to try to focus on are theskills teaching people skill
sets and giving them knowledgeabout how you know and,
particularly for me, how news isproduced, because news media
literacy or news literacy iswhat my area of focus is in, and
(09:05):
that is taking skills so thatpeople can make their own
decisions about you know what'sreliable.
I'm very careful to not justsay what's true and not, because
truth is a so much biggerconcept, much more abstract than
I think.
Something like credibility howdo we know that something is
credible or not?
And knowing if it's useful tous or not irrelevant.
(09:28):
And in those cases, you know, Ialso reflect on something that
happens a lot of times when Igive training workshops and
people ask me well, where do youget your news from?
And really what I think they'reasking me is, where should I
get my news from?
And then I tell folks likethat's not my goal.
My goal here is not to tell youread this or only watch this,
or only go here or only listento this or blah, blah, blah.
(09:51):
I am here to equip you withskills so you can make that
determination for yourself,based in concepts like, again,
credibility, reliability,verification, evidence, like all
those kind of things, so thatyou can become the critical
thinker and exercise a healthydose of skepticism.
(10:13):
Where you're trying to figureout is the information that's in
front of me is it helpful formy needs right now and also, can
I reflect on what needs I havewhen that brings me toward these
pieces of information and media, so that I can become a much
more mindful and this is a termI like to use a lot more mindful
(10:36):
consumer and also, as we knownow, producer of media.
So that's one.
That was probably a really longdescription of the one.
The second one probably relatesa lot to what I was just talking
about, and that was I gave atalk at a local library a few
years ago and this was not toolong after the 2016 election and
(11:00):
I remembered that thecoordinators of this talk had
titled the talk fake news andalternative facts.
That was not my choice, but itbrought in like there was over
90 people came to this talk, soI gave my lecture.
That comes from the model ofnews literacy and that comes
from Stony Burke University'smodel on media bias, and how we
(11:22):
talk about media bias is weframe it around the concepts of
journalistic balance andfairness, and what we like to
say is that it's important tounderstand that balance is a
quantitative measurement betweenall the different sides of a
given situation and it's meantto be its balance.
(11:44):
It's like if you have, say, forinstance, a bill being argued
in Congress, you would give thesame amount of space or time to
a Democratic senator as youwould to a Republican, and then
fairness is really is much morecomplicated, is much more about
are we fair to the evidencethat's in front of us?
And we try to frame this bysaying it's important to have
(12:05):
balance when we have a situationthat we that's still being
debated, like we don't knoweverything just yet, so it's
important for us to getinformation in a balanced sort
of way.
But when there is aproliferation of evidence on,
say, one side rather than theother, if one does present that
as about with balance, then wecan have an unfair, we give an
(12:29):
unfair advantage to one sideover the other.
We create a false equivalencybetween both sides.
So this is where fairnessbecomes very, very important, so
that we be fair to the amountof evidence.
If there's a proliferation ofevidence on one side, we have to
present the story in that kindof way.
So, anyway, we use that toframe media bias.
(12:49):
To say outlet is bias If there'san unfair representation of a
particular subject.
Again and again and again,that's what we will call bias.
Also, in terms of personal bias, I also sort of use the
definition and I think a lot ofpeople misuse this term.
We talk about personal bias,but not just talking about that.
(13:11):
A person has a particularviewpoint on something.
People can have their own views.
It is a willing distortion ofincoming information to fit in
that particular point of view.
So if we hear lots of thingsabout the 2020 election being
stolen and it being these hoaxand so on, if there's a
(13:34):
proliferation of evidence thatshows us that's not the case,
then I would say that the personthat puts that out there is
biased, because they willwillingly distort that evidence
and information to fit thatpoint of view.
So, anyway, so I give all thatbackground to say I give this
lecture in a hour form, so Ijust gave it to you in a couple
of minutes.
I give this lecture at thislocal library and I have a
(13:57):
gentleman coming to meafterwards and he says to me I
really liked your stuff, but Ididn't like your examples.
And granted, I do use examplesto highlight the concepts I'm
talking about.
They come from mainstream mediasources, say, like a CNN or
even a Fox News, or even likethe New York Times.
So they'll come from theseplaces.
(14:18):
So I asked the gentleman I sayso, tell me, you know, give me
some hints, tell me where else Imight want to draw some of my
examples from.
He gave me the names of acouple of outlets that I might
call a little questionable.
But the thing I take away fromthat experience was I got this
gentleman to at least engageagain in the skills, the
(14:42):
knowledge, those pieces.
It wasn't that, although Ididn't agree with the places he
got information from, this wasnot a situation where I was just
trying to bash all of thosesources.
The hope is that by givingthese particular skills that I
could allow this gentleman maybenot in the immediate time,
because that I would neverexpect that to happen, but in
(15:05):
that time it at least would givehim the skills and he could be
receptive to that to say how doI know that this is useful, that
is credible, that it's areliable source for me to get my
information from.
So I would say those twosituations were really sort of
drive.
I think a lot of the work inthe approaches that I take now
(15:27):
what you're sharing with us,michael, I think, well, it's
obviously critical.
Lindsay Persohn (15:31):
It's always been critical, but I feel like
it's become much more criticalin the last at least decade and
it actually it makes me think ofconversations I've had,
sometimes even with my ownfamily, when I say, well, what
are you watching?
And they say the news.
And I'm like you know, that'snot news, right, that's news
commentary, which is not thesame thing.
But I think the way that youhighlight some of these
(15:54):
definitions and you highlightthese concepts can really help
us to understand what it is thatwe're consuming and how we
actually do make our own senseof it, not someone else's sense
of it.
Because I feel like,particularly as a resident of
Florida and having lived herefor about 40 years now, it has
been very interesting to heareven tidbits of conversations
(16:17):
out in public and things likethat and just sort of people's
beliefs and what they're foundedon, that they aren't
necessarily their own beliefs,they are the views of someone
else that are you can, you caneven tell that they're being
parroted right and that I havefound to be a very intriguing
and alarming kind of publicconversation lately, because you
(16:39):
know, we really shouldn't betaking what everybody else
thinks of what's going on in theworld and just taking their
views, you know, kind of withoutany sort of, as you said,
healthy skepticism.
I think that's just such animportant point for us to
understand what that means,because I understand that you're
also not saying that doesn'tmean we don't believe in
(17:00):
anything, right, that doesn't.
That doesn't mean we becomeapathetic to the news, because I
think sometimes that's theother alternative.
But how do we approach this?
With our eyes wide open, so tospeak, in order to see not just
one side of a story butpotentially multiple sides, and
to take into account things wemay not yet have considered
ourselves.
Michael Spikes (17:22):
Yeah, yeah, those, yeah, those concepts I
think are really reallyimportant and key to, I think,
any approach to media literacyor the plethora of other
literacies that are out there.
You know, you've heard memention news literacy or news
media literacy.
There's digital literacy,there's, I've heard, algorithmic
literacy.
There's all kinds of stuff outthere, right, and it's really
(17:44):
about building a almost like adisposition that is based in
that healthy skepticism.
And just what you said is whatI mentioned to lots of people
when I give talks and I say wewant to build that in our
students, no matter who they are, if those are adults or if they
are children.
We want to build a healthyskepticism, but we also do
(18:07):
acknowledge there's a fine linebetween healthy skepticism and
cynicism, and cynicism beingwhen somebody just says, well, I
can't believe anything becauseit's all sort of based in, you
know, like when you talk aboutnews in particular, people say,
well, you know they're allcontrolled by these cabals and
you know they're all out forprofit and da, da, da, da, da.
(18:28):
I can acknowledge, yeah, that'sthe case.
News outlets, you know,especially mainstream news
outlets.
They are profit makingbusinesses, right, but one of
the things that I also tried tobuild in and this, again, this
goes back to that idea aboutbuilding that disposition it is
understanding what are theintentions of the producers.
(18:49):
One can say that a news outletin particular, yes, they're
trying to make a profit becausethey have to pay people.
It does take money to captureand interpret and write and
distribute content.
And although the internet hassort of led us into believing
(19:10):
that all content is just free,right, it still takes people to
create that content and peoplefor all.
I mean, I don't know about you,but I know I got to get a check
at the end of the day because Igot bills to pay.
So with that, I do hope thatthere could be some financial
incentives that come along withthat.
But at the same time, like wehave, then we have to really say
(19:32):
, like, what are the intents ofthe content?
What are the methods that drive, that are driven by those
intents?
So I would say, for, likejournalists, the goal should be
to inform, right.
So with that being the primaryintent, then that drives the
methods.
They go out, they talk tomultiple people, they structure
(19:52):
stories in a way that they'reeasily accessible for their
audiences, and so on.
But also, as you just mentioned, we have a very complex and
somewhat blurred lines that popup in the sort of internet
ecosystem where we have lots ofpeople who may create things
that they self-identify as news,but really what it sort of
(20:16):
turns into and the methods thatthey use are really more opinion
styles.
So we hear, like, thoughts,analysis, you know, and so on,
of you know recent things thatare going on, and we sort of
interpret it as news because itconcerns current events.
Yes, and it also can meet aneed for us, right?
(20:39):
I think it's important toacknowledge that when I think,
when something happens and thisis also something we talk about
in the model of news that areseeded I draw from and we say,
like it's almost like humannature for us to want to receive
and share information, Right,you hear a rumor or you hear
something that you think nobodyelse knows, and what's the first
(20:59):
thing you want to do?
You want to tell someone.
Right, so we always have thatinnate need.
So when we go back to this ideaof news and opinion and how
those things kind of get mergedtogether in our current
ecosystem, when something bighappens, we want to talk about
it with people and in a lot ofcases, those sort of like
heavily talk, heavilyopinionated shows almost
(21:22):
Provides us that space to be apart of a conversation about
that particular issue.
So it almost meets a need thatwe have to talk about it, like
think about this podcast.
We're talking about education,we have conversations.
We want it to be veryconversational.
It's not just Me from Ohio orwhoever your guest is, just from
(21:44):
all high saying I say X and youshould believe all that.
Right, it's really, it's aconversation.
So, and it's something that Ithink as humans, it makes us
much different than many othermammals out there.
We we can reason, we can debate, we can do all these kind of
things and that's what we wantto do.
So I think it's important tojust keep those things in mind,
(22:05):
where, again, we have to keep inmind what are the intents, and
not only the intents of thecreators of the media, To know
what methods drive it, to knowwhat we're looking at, but also
what are our own Intentions forcoming towards that piece.
So, just like I talked aboutthese very heavily
conversational shows aboutcurrent events, it may be
(22:28):
meeting a need that we have towork out like what is this very
complicated thing that'shappening.
So just to be aware of thosethings.
Lindsay Persohn (22:38):
Yeah, and as you were describing that,
michael, I was also thinkingabout a Potentially a whole new
genre news, which is spoof news.
I'm sure you've seen these sayguy know, folks have sent links
to me where you've got someonewho is posing as a journalist,
posing to share facts, out inthe public and Most often people
just agree with him and act asthough they know exactly what
(23:00):
he's talking about, you knowwhich, which certainly does not
carry with it that that healthyskepticism, that critical stance
, right Would people?
Yeah that, yes, that that's it,that's it when you, when you
know it's completely fabricated.
So lots of things to navigatethese days, that's for sure.
Yeah so what do you wantlisteners to know about your
(23:20):
work?
I?
Michael Spikes (23:21):
think the primary, primary thing I would
hope for people to take away isthat, especially when we talk
about, I think, media literacyin general and all of the
various I like to refer to themas subdomains of media literacy
or the sister domains, almostlike the information literacy
and things like that I hope thatwhat people can really think
(23:43):
about is these are skills thatare meant to develop
dispositions, and thatdisposition is not something
that you develop overnight, soit is not something that you get
from.
You played the game and now,all of a sudden, you super smart
and doing this.
You went to my talk and, yeah,you might have learned a lot,
(24:03):
but there's still a lot more tolearn.
Right, you may have taken aclass and you learned a lot from
that, but that's not the placewhere that kind of learning ends
, and I think the other thing,too, is that we also have to
understand like we learncontinually throughout life, no
matter if we're in school or not.
(24:24):
Right, so it is to really sortof unlock.
I would hope at least myapproach to this would be to
unlock and innate curiosity thatSometimes one may argue
schooling can almost Beat out ofus right towards just finding
very discreet and specificanswers to questions and Not
(24:48):
sort of saying like I know X, Imight know X, this one little
fact, but there's still a wholelot of other stuff that I still
don't know.
So I think, if anything, I hopethat people can take away that
sense of that innate curiosityis something that we have to
continually draw on, pull on andwork from, because if not, if
(25:10):
we don't use that, then theskills that I know, that I try
to teach, and the skills thatwe're talking about, they become
super effortful, because itdoes take effort.
It takes effort for us to stepback and say wait a minute,
where'd that come from?
Or how did you know that, orwhat's the evidence to support
that?
Or even, especially more so,when one is either talking to
(25:34):
people they know really, reallywell, people that they trust and
people who think look at Allthose things like them, right,
so it can be very easy for us toslip into, I think, the very
sort of like yep, I agree withthat, because we all want to
have information that tells uswe smart and where you know
(25:56):
we're perfect, right, you smart,you look great, you do all this
stuff so great and you got allthese people that agree with you
.
Like who doesn't want that right?
Like nobody wants to be in aconversation where people just
continually go, ah, no, no, no,you know now, granted, that
could be fun if you're debatingwith people, yeah, but but at
the same time, like we, we sitaround with our friends,
(26:18):
everybody agrees With oneanother and it could be
difficult to be the person thatstands on the side and says, I
Right, it could be difficult tobe that person and, again, it
does take effort to do that.
So it's also important for us toagain that innate sense of
curiosity.
(26:38):
So what we do, hopefully, is wecan engage that sort of again
that skepticism, that part of usthat says, hmm, wait, or?
Or ask those questions when didthat come from?
That we asked those questionstoward learning, toward
development, toward Greaterunderstanding, so that we can
(27:02):
become people that are, that cansay to ourselves like I may not
know everything, because nobodydoes, but I can be comfortable
in saying I know X, yeah, Ithink I'm pretty confident about
that, but I don't know why.
Well, why is it XYZ?
(27:23):
So I don't know that and I?
and one last thing I'll say tothis too, is that you know and I
use this a lot, so people knowme might be like, yeah, he said
that like 5,000 times, but youknow, I say like in pursuing a
PhD and even having people callme like doctor, which I'm still
like, yeah, I guess I did that,but you know.
But one of the things peopletake from that is that you must
(27:45):
be so smart, you know all thisstuff, you know and so on.
And what I like to tell peopleis yes, I know a lot about this
very specific thing, right, thatmay be only like six or seven
other people really really know,really, really well, but by
doing that sort of the trainingthat I've gone through to get
this degree, it's made me somuch more comfortable with
(28:09):
saying I know this really reallywell, but it is a ton of stuff
I don't know right, and it'smade me and it's again, it's
unlocked at curiosity where I go, all those things I don't know,
I go, oh, I need to find outmore, right, I need to find out
more, because by finding outmore about those things I don't
know, it helps me know even morein the space of the stuff that
(28:30):
I do know right.
So hopefully we can continue tobuild that within people.
Lindsay Persohn (28:36):
I couldn't agree more, michael, that once
you get that title of doctor,people just sort of assume that
you're an expert at lots ofthings.
But really, I think the journeyof the PhD is as much as it is
developing a very specificknowledge base.
It's also realizing how muchyou don't know and how much
there is left to know in theworld, right, always pursuing
(28:59):
those kinds of curiosities.
And so that actually leads meto something else I was thinking
about as you're talking.
We talked about skills, we'vetalked about knowledge for media
literacy, but what strikes meis that you're also talking
about dispositions, right, it'snot just a set of skills, it's
not just a knowledge that wemight carry with us, but it is
this sort of it's, thisposturing toward news and media
(29:22):
that helps us to remain criticalyet open, right, and I think
that there's a really finebalance there between being open
to other points of view andother perspectives or other
verifiable truths or other waysof looking at situations.
That even goes beyond theskills and the knowledge, and
still like remaining open butalso remaining skeptical.
(29:42):
I feel like that's just a.
There's a balance there.
Michael Spikes (29:46):
Right, right, right, right.
Yeah, I think in this, again, Ithink this comes back like what
I talked about earlier, likethese ideas about bias,
perspective, points of view.
Right, to acknowledge that weall have our own points of view,
we all are going to haveopinions on things, right?
And again, I think that makesus learned people, like by
(30:10):
having specific points of view.
If a person just wants to say,well, I don't have a point of
view on anything, then I thinkthat just leaves an apathy,
right, like what you referred toearlier.
Just, I don't care aboutanything, and it's just like,
well, why would I want to talkto you?
And that's not very interesting, right, right?
So, keeping those things inmind, I think we have to
acknowledge that we all have ourown points of view.
(30:32):
Like an analogy I use a lot oftimes when I teach is that when
we come towards new information,we bring all our baggage with
us.
We bring our previousexperiences, our identities,
what we learn, where we comefrom, who we are all those
things with us, right?
So we bring all that with us,we come towards this information
and that provides us the lenswith which we see the world,
(30:57):
right?
So, and it is through that lensthat shapes our perspectives.
But also what we would hope isthat, you know, learning like
media literacy skills and theassociated critical thinking
skills allows us to open thatlens up and say, oh, there might
be something else over herethat I don't know or something I
(31:19):
didn't understand, or bereceptive to hearing the
experiences of those people whoare very different than us and
bring a very different lens tothe same situation.
We know of many times where I'msure, like people have probably
gotten into arguments withpeople where something happens
(31:40):
and then they say, well, I sawit like this.
And then the other person goeswell, I saw it like this, all
right.
And then that conflict happenswhere you have these very set in
your ways beliefs and you justgo, well, I'm only going to see
it like this.
And the other person says, well, you know what, I'm just going
to do the same thing.
I'll just dig in even furtherand just say I just believe X
(32:03):
and that's.
Those tensions can't getresolved until we take a step
back and can say your lens is X,my lens is this.
Can we acknowledge those twolenses and then say, ok, what do
we do now so at least we canunderstand where we're coming
from.
Lindsay Persohn (32:21):
I think that's so important, and something I've
been thinking about a lotlately and I think I even
mentioned it in the last episodeis that I feel like the older I
get and the more people I meet,the more willing I am to
consider that maybe the things Ithink and the things that I do
aren't necessarily the best, soto speak.
(32:42):
Quote unquote right, that maybethere are better ways of seeing
things or better ways of doingthings that maybe I didn't ever
consider.
Right, because I think wheneverwe think about like our own
lens and our own perspective,sometimes that comes with some
really strong blinders.
Right, like we don't evenrealize that someone else stands
in the world in a differentplace than we do.
(33:03):
Right, and so fundamentally,the way they see is going to be
different than the way that wesee because they haven't had the
same experiences, because theydon't have the same background,
because they don't have the sameknowledge, they don't have the
same skills, they don't have thesame interests.
And I just I think that, that Ithink more and more about that,
that perhaps these norms thatwe become so accustomed to maybe
(33:25):
it's really not the best way,maybe it's just the way that we
can't see around.
Michael Spikes (33:30):
Right, right, right, but also, at the same
time and I think this issomething we probably we see a
lot that we struggle with in ourcurrent era, and that is, I
think, more and more, thoseperspectives and lenses are
being we're being exposed to somany more now, right, and they
challenge the norms that havehelped shape our society,
(33:52):
because norms are used to helpshape societies and groups of
people.
Right, like it was interestingenough, I just came back to
begin in this week from beinginvolved with a teacher training
Institute at the National WorldWar Two Museum down in New
Orleans, and we talked a lotabout the role of propaganda,
not only in terms of, like theNazi propaganda because usually
(34:15):
when we talk about propaganda,that's what we first think about
that were used to mobilize asociety towards, you know, the
ends that Adolf Hitler had inGermany and why they felt they
needed to do the things thatthey did, but we also wanted to
think about propaganda in termsof mobilizing a society toward
(34:38):
another group of ends, right,those ends being, you know they
have this sort of.
They have a, an exhibit that'scalled the arsenal of democracy,
which was a phrase that we, youwas used by Franklin Roosevelt
as part of that effort to reallysay to Americans we have to get
involved in this conflictbecause if we don't, the
(35:02):
consequences of that could bedire.
Right, and communicating thatto a group of people who really
did not feel like the US neededto get involved in this conflict
up until you know Pearl Harbormade it very evident for us, I
think, is like super interesting, right.
So in that particular case youdo have you know people and
(35:25):
using things like media topersuade a group of people to
believe certain things that saylike this is the society we want
to live in, right, and thereare certain norms that we have
as part of our society that canbe that sort of tell us, like
you stop at a stoplight when thelight is rare, right, you stop
at the stop sign.
(35:46):
It kind of says for us, it sayslike here are the rules we
follow.
But then there have also beennorms that have said like
certain people are better thanothers.
You know, again, the extremebeing the Nazi, you know the
Nazi example.
But like now we talk about media, one of the things I talk with
lots of people about is the factthat we do not have very many
(36:09):
shared cultural experiencesanymore.
Right, like if you think aboutthe sheer amount of selection we
have of television shows andmusic and everything that's out
there, right, everybody is all.
It's almost like our wholesociety has been segmented into
these little micro audiences andthey all are really into the
(36:33):
things that they're into andthat's great, I mean.
I think you know, on the goodside, that has allowed us to be
exposed to messages and people'sand perspectives that we never
would have seen before, becausethere's certain groups of people
, whether they be minorities interms of ethnic group or
religious, you know, group,sector or whatever did not have
(36:58):
access to the capital, did nothave access to the equipment,
did not have access to the meansto broadcast messages that they
felt were very important totheir groups.
So now the internet has verymuch democratized media and it's
made it where lots of morepeople can get their messages
out, and we can hear that fromvery many.
(37:19):
But again, what that has doneis this it's caused conflicts in
the ways that, like now, we seethe world right and we see many
examples of that out in theworld.
Now I would even say for myself,like as I get older this is my
analogy I just go like I justdon't watch anything anymore.
Like I you know people tell meabout did you watch that?
(37:43):
I go no, did you see on neff?
No, did you know?
Because it's just so much outthere.
What I usually just want to dois just reading about it Because
, yeah, I'm just like otherpeople.
I have things that I see and I'mlike, yeah, I don't really get
that, or I don't even know if Ireally want to spend the time
with it, and I may go back tothe sort of nostalgic, you know,
(38:07):
view of like oh, I think I'llwatch some old episodes of like
the prices right or somethingtoday, like that'd be the choice
right, cause it's just like,well, yeah, that'd be okay.
I think that, cause I know that,I know that I recognize it is
something that relates to me andlike resonates and all those
(38:27):
kinds of things.
So, anyway, sorry, I just wentoff on somewhat of a tangent,
but I think again, like thosechallenges to those norms is
something that we I think youknow we're really struggling
with today, and part of that isbecause we have opened up the
doors to so many more messages.
Now, that's not to say thatthis is a crisis I wouldn't say
(38:49):
that, but I would say that itwhat it has done is.
It's made evident that we allnow have to become much more
mindful of what we're getting,where we're getting it from and,
again, why we are going tothose places.
To get that information,entertainment, wherever from
these places, why do we go tothose places to do so?
Lindsay Persohn (39:13):
Yeah, and I can totally relate to that
perspective.
I actually have found myselfwatching old episodes of
pressure luck not too long ago,because, you're right, there's
so much, where do you start?
And I tend to not start a newseries because I know I won't
find the time to finish it.
Hey, have you seen the sevenseries of such and such?
I'm like, no, haven't even seenthe first one.
(39:35):
So I can totally sympathizewith that viewpoint that
sometimes now I'll just I'll bereading over here right.
Or I'll be working on anotherproject over here.
I totally, totally understandthat.
So there's something youmentioned earlier, michael, that
I just want to kind of pickback up on, because you
mentioned a model that youtypically work from, a model of
news media literacy, and I'mwondering if you might share a
(39:58):
bit about that with us,particularly if it's something
that educators might findportable, something that they
can actualize in theirclassrooms, right, so something
that they can work with in orderto support young people in
particular, to navigate the wide, wide digital world.
Michael Spikes (40:16):
Yeah, so I will give the caveat that, as a human
, I have my own point of view onthese things right.
So the model that I draw fromis one that I am very familiar
with, is one I've worked with alot, and I can say that from my
scholarship that I've had theopportunity to evaluate a number
(40:37):
of other models, specificallyof news literacy, and I do have
to say I keep coming back to theone that I have been so
familiar with and that comesfrom the Center for News
Literacy at Stony BrookUniversity.
Now, for many people who mightbe familiar with news literacy,
they probably are more familiarwith another model of this
education and that comes fromthe News Literacy Project.
(40:59):
I think they do great work.
They have a online platformthat's called Checkology that is
open and free for people toaccess, and their approach is
much more about the developmentand learning through modules
instead of like sheer, justlessons.
So you can go to their website,you can learn a particular
(41:23):
concept on their website, watcha video.
I know they have like an app.
I think they have some gamesout there that people can play
and they have a community ofteachers who are talking about
these things out there.
So they've built a very robustsystem.
The reason why I come back tothe Center for News Literacy's
approach is that it is a fullcourse.
It does have, I think, 14lessons as part of it, and I do
(41:47):
find that its sequence oflessons fit well into one
another that come toward acapstone skill, which is active
deconstruction of media.
Now it uses and this is one ofthe things that I think
distinguishes news medialiteracy from, say, media
(42:09):
literacy, and that is that itteaches the same skills as media
literacy, those mindfulconsumption and production
practices, but it does sothrough the lens of journalism.
So it draws from the practicesof journalists that journalists
use to do their jobs.
It draws from those practicesto help others pick those up and
(42:30):
use them in their everyday life, and it also uses news as a
platform for practicing thoseskills.
So if we teach students, likejournalists, verify claims made
in news stories by providingevidence to support those claims
, we then would tell ourstudents you turn around and
(42:52):
when you watch the news you lookfor that evidence.
You look for evidence ofverification, you look for that.
So, with that being said, thatmodel is available from the
Center for News Literacy.
I will obviously, I will saythat I played a big role in
putting parts of that together.
I did not develop this modelthat was developed by Howard
(43:14):
Schneider and the group ofindividuals that helped to
establish the Center for NewsLiteracy but I played a key role
in making those resourcesavailable online through the
Center's Digital Resource Center, and those make available lots
of the resources that were usedto teach the course.
The whole course is up there.
I even have taken off a pieceof it and made another version
(43:38):
of that course an online course.
It's called Get News Smart.
That's available from theCenter itself, and then I have
another version that's calledGet, basically Get News Smart 2.
That has the same content,because I continue to use that
model in my own teaching.
The other one that I willmention again this is you know
(43:59):
what I'm here I'm going to touteven my own stuff is that you
may be familiar with the factthat in 2021, yes, I think
that's the year Illinois becamethe first state that required
putting to place a requirementfor media literacy education for
all high school students, andnow, granted, that's defined as
(44:22):
a unit and that unit is superbroad.
But in response to that, acolleague of mine by the name of
Yanti Friesen, and I gottogether and really started to
think a lot about what willimplementation of this new law
look like.
So what we did was we gottogether and we founded an
organization called the IllinoisMedia Literacy Coalition and
(44:44):
through that, what we wanted todo is bring together a group of
these are interested parties,and these include teachers,
librarians, educators of allstripes to come together to talk
about what this should looklike in our state.
We wrote a framework for medialiteracy that includes four
basic concepts, because we knowthat there's lots of resources
(45:06):
out there that teachers coulddraw from.
So we wanted to give a sort ofbroad approach to media literacy
.
Again, I see that as the upperlevel of news literacy, but
media literacy, and through thatframework we hope that teachers
can see these concepts and thenthink, oh, I'm already doing
some of this already and this ishow it can be implemented in my
(45:28):
existing content.
So we don't bring them newstuff, we just sort of give them
new vocabulary around thethings they already do.
So that again is from ourorganization, the Illinois Media
Literacy Coalition.
Lindsay Persohn (45:41):
Great and we can link to any of those
resources on your guest page forlisteners who may want to learn
more about any of theseinitiatives and how they can
support them, and I would guessboth developing teachers' own
media literacies as well assupporting their students to
develop their media literacies.
Michael Spikes (46:00):
Yeah, yeah, this is a big bit of interest of
mine has been not so much onjust students' work but, yes,
more so on teachers, great.
Lindsay Persohn (46:09):
Great, yeah, that would be fantastic.
We'll include links to thosesites on your guest page for
listeners.
So, michael, given thechallenges of today's
educational climate, whatmessage do you want teachers to
hear?
Michael Spikes (46:22):
I think number one.
The message I want to give toteachers is this is a continuing
practice that we mentioned, soI want to encourage them to
continue to engage with thetopics around media literacy and
also, I should say, probablyeven more important, is to not
(46:45):
get too bogged down by all ofthe technological changes.
Teachers should not feel like Ineed to know TikTok and every
other social media platform thatpops up in order to engage in
these skills with their students, because I will tell you, I
know TikTok.
I don't use it regularlybecause I, for me, as a viewer,
(47:09):
it just it doesn't speak to me.
I can't I really I can't standwatching videos like badly shot
video, all that kind of stuff.
Like I am a media professional,I do not want to watch your
badly shot videos, right, thatdoesn't appeal to me.
But with that, to understandthat really, when we talk about
social media, what we're talkingabout is, when it really comes
(47:31):
down to, is communication.
It is how we communicate withone another.
Basically, all of these appsand things like that, these are
platforms that basicallyfacilitate communication amongst
individuals.
So, keeping that in mind, if wethink about the fundamentals of
how we communicate, I have amessage I send it to someone,
(47:54):
somebody receives it, theyinterpret it, they may give me
some feedback to tell me whetheror not they got it or not, and
then I'll respond back.
Right, like.
Those are the basics, like Ialways start almost every class
I teach with that basic.
They call it the transactionalmodel of communications.
It is a sender has a messagethey want to send.
(48:16):
They send it through, I shouldsay, a channel, whether that be
text, like right now I'm talkingto you, so through voice.
They may do it through video,which, would you know, combine
both visuals and the audio, andso on, or like in terms of this
podcast, we just we have audioand they are inherent advantages
(48:39):
and limitations to all of thosedifferent mediums, right that
we send messages through.
Think about the fact that mediais the plural of medium, right?
So keeping that into account,so those shape, those can shape
how we put those messagestogether.
And then again, the receiverreceives that message and if we
(49:02):
hope that they interpret it inthe same way that we have for
sending it, right?
So if we keep that in mind, Ithink that very, very basic
thing it can help us to reallyengage with these topics, no
matter what the platform, nomatter what the technology, no
matter.
You know again, the sharedexperiences through media,
probably things that we just donot have as much these days, but
(49:25):
we still communicate with oneanother continuously.
So I think it's important tokeep those things in mind when
we think about engaging thesetopics with our students.
Secondly I'll just throw outthere and we talked about this a
lot earlier is, I think, in anyclassroom, in any educator, the
thing that we really want to dois unlock and continue to
(49:48):
encourage students to engagewith this innate curiosity about
the world and to take themethods that we use in the
classroom questioning, you know,assessing, evaluating, all
those kind of things and takethem far outside of the
classroom.
So I would encourage any of theeducators that are out there to
(50:11):
continue doing that.
I would venture to guess that,if you are listening to a
podcast about teaching, that youare always interested in
improving your practice, right,and the way you do so is by
staying curious yourself, right,you stay curious about what
could I continue to do?
So we want to keep encouragingmore and more teachers to do
(50:31):
that in their classrooms,encourage their students to do
that, and I think the skills,that I give certain vocabulary
around, you'll find that theseare things that you already do.
So those are the two big thingsthat I would give to teachers.
Lindsay Persohn (50:49):
Well, it's such a helpful message, I feel like,
because you know it is easy toget lost in all the newest and
the latest and the greatest.
But whenever we boil it back tothe fundamentals of
communication because thatremains the same even when the
platforms change right andstaying curious, I think those
are such critical messages intoday's day and age when I think
(51:11):
, as an educator, it is easy tolose yourself in the noise right
.
It's easy to sort of lose yourmission, to lose your own
purpose or your own vision.
It's even easy to lose yourcuriosity whenever you feel like
you're sort of being beat overthe head from every direction.
You know.
But I think, whatever you boilit back to fundamentals and
curiosity, it's just really it'sa very helpful way to think
(51:33):
about it.
So I really appreciate that,michael.
Michael Spikes (51:36):
I'm glad.
I hope that lots of people takethat forward into the next
school year.
Lindsay Persohn (51:42):
Great.
Well, michael, I thank you somuch for your time today and I
thank you for your contributionsto the world of education.
Michael Spikes (51:49):
Thank you so much for having me as part of
this ongoing conversation.
I hope there was lots for yourlisteners to take away, and if
they have any questions for me,please feel free to reach out.
Lindsay Persohn (51:59):
Perfect.
Thank you so much.
We'll include your contactinformation on your guest page
as well.
Great Thank you.
Dr Michael Spikes is known forhis work in media literacy
education, news media literacyand youth media.
Dr Spikes research is centeredon the practice and pedagogy of
media literacy education andnews media literacy, working
(52:21):
toward encouraging criticalthinking to limit the effects of
exposure to myths anddisinformation.
His focus is on the design,assessment and enactments of
these literacies in classroomsand other learning environments.
He has recently been involvedin implementation of strategies
for incorporating units of medialiteracy education into
existing K through 12 curriculafor educators in Illinois.
(52:44):
Michael is also the co-founderof the Illinois Media Literacy
Coalition and the Illinois StateChapter Leader for Media
Literacy.
Now His work is recognized bythe Illinois State Board of
Education as key resources formedia literacy education and by
the Illinois News BroadcastersAssociation as a 2022 recipient
(53:06):
of the Illinois of the YearAward.
He has previously held roles asa media producer and editor for
NPR, the PBS, news Hour and theKellogg School of Management,
project manager for the Centerfor News Literacy at Stony Brook
University and a media studiesteacher in both public and
charter schools in Washington DC.
(53:27):
His work has appeared ininformation and learning
sciences Journal of EducationalTechnology Systems and in
several book chapters.
Michael earned his PhD in thelearning sciences from
Northwestern University's Schoolof Education and Social Policy
in August of 2023.
Dr Michael A Spikes is alecturer and project director in
(53:49):
the Medill School of Journalism, media, integrated Marketing
Communications at NorthwesternUniversity.
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(54:09):
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(54:31):
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(54:52):
Special thanks to the ClassroomCaffeine team Leah Berger,
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As always, I raise my mug toyou, teachers.
Thanks for joining me.
Education Research has a problem the work
of brilliant educationresearchers often doesn't reach
the practice of brilliantteachers.
Classroom Caffeine is here tohelp.
In each episode, I talk with atop education researcher or
expert educator about what theyhave learned from their research
(00:31):
and experiences.
In this episode, Dr MichaelSpikes talks to us about
reliability, credibility andrelevance of news media,
fundamentals of communicationand staying curious in a wide
world of media.
Dr Spikes is known for his workin media literacy, education,
(00:54):
news media literacy and youthmedia.
He has more than a decadeexperience as a practitioner and
scholar of news media literacyin previous positions with Stony
Brook University, Washington DCpublic schools and the museum.
Dr Michael A Spikes is alecturer and project director in
the Medeal School of Journalism, Media, Integrated Marketing
(01:16):
Communications at NorthwesternUniversity.
For more information about ourguest, stay tuned to the end of
this episode.
So pour a cup of your favoritedrink and join me, your host,
Lindsay Persan, for ClassroomCaffeine research to energize
your teaching practice.
Michael, thank you for joiningme.
(01:38):
Welcome to the show.
Michael Spikes (01:40):
Thank you so much for having me.
Lindsay Persohn (01:42):
So, from your own experiences and education,
will you share with us one ortwo moments that inform your
thinking now?
Michael Spikes (01:50):
So one of them that probably sticks out to me
the most when thinking aboutthis question is something that
happened to me right when Istarted with the Center for News
Literacy at Stony BrookUniversity, and that was 2012
that I got offered the job.
They're actually.
What wound up happening was Iwent to Stony Brook for a
(02:12):
teacher training institute backin 2010 to learn about news
literacy, and this was the firsttime I had learned about the
particular approach to teachingnews literacy and what it was.
And about two years later I haddone a lot of, I guess,
lobbying to the folks in charge.
They were really saying like Ilove this stuff and if you ever
(02:34):
have anything that comes up,please let me know.
And I got invited to come backand speak at a conference like a
year after that, in 2011, andin 20 at the end of 2011,.
Then they presented me withsome paperwork about a grant
they had just gotten and askedme what that I think I could do,
and then joined them in 2012.
So after I got offered this job, the first thing I got asked to
(02:55):
do was to get a passport,because I didn't have one, and
travel halfway around the globeto, I should say all the way
around the globe, because Ithink this is on the opposite
side of the globe to me, to thesmall country of Bhutan and
Bhutan if listeners don't know,geographically it is north of
India and south of Tibet.
(03:17):
And the reason why we weregoing there, I was going there
with the then director of thecenter.
We were going there to do sometraining with a NGO there named
the Bhutan Center for Media andDemocracy, because Bhutan was in
the process.
The country is in the processof transitioning from an
absolute monarchy to aconstitutional monarchy where
(03:40):
there would still be a king thatwould be in charge of the
country, but the people wouldbegin to have representatives
like representatives and peoplelike that.
They would start to vote andall those kind of things, and
this was something that was thechoice of the monarch at the
time.
So, in association with thismedia in the ways that we think
(04:02):
about it, and that beingtelevision was relatively new in
the country.
They had had cable television,I think for maybe about 10 years
at that time and the internetwas totally brand new there.
So we were asked to come overto do a bit of media training
for educators in the country.
So I get everything together.
(04:23):
I go over there and on thefirst day I think it was the
first day I was there we haddone traveling in.
This was like March of 2012, anda lot of attention had started
to be paid to the shooting ofTrayvon Martin in Florida, and
while I was there, I jumped onmy computer and I was a pretty
(04:46):
avid user of Facebook at thetime and I remember jumping on
Facebook and seeing lots ofreactions from friends about the
shooting itself, the shooterand really people going off of
very incomplete pieces ofinformation about it and really
(05:07):
letting that direct theirresponses to it.
Now, everyone comes to thisfrom their own point of view.
They use that as a lens tounderstand this.
But I remember coming across astory, or an analysis piece, I
think, that came out of the NewYork Times that talked
specifically about how mediawere portraying both the shooter
(05:30):
and the victim, trayvon, andthe story basically talked about
the fact that the shooter andnow granted, this is not.
I should give the caveat thatthis I hope this will not allude
to my own thoughts on theshooting or associated issues
like these, but, being a personwho was very much interested in
(05:50):
media literacy, having ananalysis piece that talked about
the portrayals of both of thesepeople, and that being that any
images of the shooter that wewere seeing were mostly the
shooter's mugshot and thepictures that we were seeing of
the victim, trayvon, were of amiddle school graduation photo.
And really there wasconversations in this piece that
(06:14):
were about how were theseportrayals shaping the public's
view of what happened.
Now, granted, again, I want togo back and say that the
shooting of a young person isnever justified, like I think
violence like that is important.
I am not a person that believesin that, but I think it was
(06:35):
important for people to thinkabout how did media portrayals
of both of these people not onlyjust say here is what happened,
but also helped to shapepeople's opinions of what
happened?
And so I took this story, sharedit on my Facebook page.
Then, like I go away and acouple of hours later I come
(06:56):
back and the amount of vitriolthat was given to me in terms of
comments to the fact that I hadeven posted this story were
amazing to me.
Like people were calling methings and I have to say, as an
African-American myself, likepeople calling me Uncle Tom,
like who side are you on, youknow all these kind of things
(07:18):
Just by inviting a conversationabout how were these two people
involved in this story beingportrayed and how can we think
more critically about our ownreactions to what happened?
Based on that and it struck meso much, being one, like I say,
(07:38):
being African-American myself,being involved in a project that
was all about learning how tobecome more mindful consumers of
media and how it affects us,and at the same time, being in a
country I had never been inbefore that had largely a
monoculture of people there, andcoming there to teach them
(08:01):
these skills, and one, you know,experiencing it for myself,
like I was one of the only youknow black people over there,
and at one point I've walkedaround in a village and had a
bunch of children following mebecause they thought I was some
famous basketball player, right.
So you know again that to me italso speaks to how media shapes
(08:24):
our portrayals of who we see,who we think we see, and all
those kind of things.
So that experience in particular, I think, really shaped a lot
of my own views on how Iapproach teaching people about
media literacy and from that,one of the things I took away
from that was.
(08:44):
It's very, very important, andat least the thing that I like
to try to focus on are theskills teaching people skill
sets and giving them knowledgeabout how you know and,
particularly for me, how news isproduced, because news media
literacy or news literacy iswhat my area of focus is in, and
(09:05):
that is taking skills so thatpeople can make their own
decisions about you know what'sreliable.
I'm very careful to not justsay what's true and not, because
truth is a so much biggerconcept, much more abstract than
I think.
Something like credibility howdo we know that something is
credible or not?
And knowing if it's useful tous or not irrelevant.
(09:28):
And in those cases, you know, Ialso reflect on something that
happens a lot of times when Igive training workshops and
people ask me well, where do youget your news from?
And really what I think they'reasking me is, where should I
get my news from?
And then I tell folks likethat's not my goal.
My goal here is not to tell youread this or only watch this,
or only go here or only listento this or blah, blah, blah.
(09:51):
I am here to equip you withskills so you can make that
determination for yourself,based in concepts like, again,
credibility, reliability,verification, evidence, like all
those kind of things, so thatyou can become the critical
thinker and exercise a healthydose of skepticism.
(10:13):
Where you're trying to figureout is the information that's in
front of me is it helpful formy needs right now and also, can
I reflect on what needs I havewhen that brings me toward these
pieces of information and media, so that I can become a much
more mindful and this is a termI like to use a lot more mindful
(10:36):
consumer and also, as we knownow, producer of media.
So that's one.
That was probably a really longdescription of the one.
The second one probably relatesa lot to what I was just talking
about, and that was I gave atalk at a local library a few
years ago and this was not toolong after the 2016 election and
(11:00):
I remembered that thecoordinators of this talk had
titled the talk fake news andalternative facts.
That was not my choice, but itbrought in like there was over
90 people came to this talk, soI gave my lecture.
That comes from the model ofnews literacy and that comes
from Stony Burke University'smodel on media bias, and how we
(11:22):
talk about media bias is weframe it around the concepts of
journalistic balance andfairness, and what we like to
say is that it's important tounderstand that balance is a
quantitative measurement betweenall the different sides of a
given situation and it's meantto be its balance.
(11:44):
It's like if you have, say, forinstance, a bill being argued
in Congress, you would give thesame amount of space or time to
a Democratic senator as youwould to a Republican, and then
fairness is really is much morecomplicated, is much more about
are we fair to the evidencethat's in front of us?
And we try to frame this bysaying it's important to have
(12:05):
balance when we have a situationthat we that's still being
debated, like we don't knoweverything just yet, so it's
important for us to getinformation in a balanced sort
of way.
But when there is aproliferation of evidence on,
say, one side rather than theother, if one does present that
as about with balance, then wecan have an unfair, we give an
(12:29):
unfair advantage to one sideover the other.
We create a false equivalencybetween both sides.
So this is where fairnessbecomes very, very important, so
that we be fair to the amountof evidence.
If there's a proliferation ofevidence on one side, we have to
present the story in that kindof way.
So, anyway, we use that toframe media bias.
(12:49):
To say outlet is bias If there'san unfair representation of a
particular subject.
Again and again and again,that's what we will call bias.
Also, in terms of personal bias, I also sort of use the
definition and I think a lot ofpeople misuse this term.
We talk about personal bias,but not just talking about that.
(13:11):
A person has a particularviewpoint on something.
People can have their own views.
It is a willing distortion ofincoming information to fit in
that particular point of view.
So if we hear lots of thingsabout the 2020 election being
stolen and it being these hoaxand so on, if there's a
(13:34):
proliferation of evidence thatshows us that's not the case,
then I would say that the personthat puts that out there is
biased, because they willwillingly distort that evidence
and information to fit thatpoint of view.
So, anyway, so I give all thatbackground to say I give this
lecture in a hour form, so Ijust gave it to you in a couple
of minutes.
I give this lecture at thislocal library and I have a
(13:57):
gentleman coming to meafterwards and he says to me I
really liked your stuff, but Ididn't like your examples.
And granted, I do use examplesto highlight the concepts I'm
talking about.
They come from mainstream mediasources, say, like a CNN or
even a Fox News, or even likethe New York Times.
So they'll come from theseplaces.
(14:18):
So I asked the gentleman I sayso, tell me, you know, give me
some hints, tell me where else Imight want to draw some of my
examples from.
He gave me the names of acouple of outlets that I might
call a little questionable.
But the thing I take away fromthat experience was I got this
gentleman to at least engageagain in the skills, the
(14:42):
knowledge, those pieces.
It wasn't that, although Ididn't agree with the places he
got information from, this wasnot a situation where I was just
trying to bash all of thosesources.
The hope is that by givingthese particular skills that I
could allow this gentleman maybenot in the immediate time,
because that I would neverexpect that to happen, but in
(15:05):
that time it at least would givehim the skills and he could be
receptive to that to say how doI know that this is useful, that
is credible, that it's areliable source for me to get my
information from.
So I would say those twosituations were really sort of
drive.
I think a lot of the work inthe approaches that I take now
(15:27):
what you're sharing with us,michael, I think, well, it's
obviously critical.
Lindsay Persohn (15:31):
It's always been critical, but I feel like
it's become much more criticalin the last at least decade and
it actually it makes me think ofconversations I've had,
sometimes even with my ownfamily, when I say, well, what
are you watching?
And they say the news.
And I'm like you know, that'snot news, right, that's news
commentary, which is not thesame thing.
But I think the way that youhighlight some of these
(15:54):
definitions and you highlightthese concepts can really help
us to understand what it is thatwe're consuming and how we
actually do make our own senseof it, not someone else's sense
of it.
Because I feel like,particularly as a resident of
Florida and having lived herefor about 40 years now, it has
been very interesting to heareven tidbits of conversations
(16:17):
out in public and things likethat and just sort of people's
beliefs and what they're foundedon, that they aren't
necessarily their own beliefs,they are the views of someone
else that are you can, you caneven tell that they're being
parroted right and that I havefound to be a very intriguing
and alarming kind of publicconversation lately, because you
(16:39):
know, we really shouldn't betaking what everybody else
thinks of what's going on in theworld and just taking their
views, you know, kind of withoutany sort of, as you said,
healthy skepticism.
I think that's just such animportant point for us to
understand what that means,because I understand that you're
also not saying that doesn'tmean we don't believe in
(17:00):
anything, right, that doesn't.
That doesn't mean we becomeapathetic to the news, because I
think sometimes that's theother alternative.
But how do we approach this?
With our eyes wide open, so tospeak, in order to see not just
one side of a story butpotentially multiple sides, and
to take into account things wemay not yet have considered
ourselves.
Michael Spikes (17:22):
Yeah, yeah, those, yeah, those concepts I
think are really reallyimportant and key to, I think,
any approach to media literacyor the plethora of other
literacies that are out there.
You know, you've heard memention news literacy or news
media literacy.
There's digital literacy,there's, I've heard, algorithmic
literacy.
There's all kinds of stuff outthere, right, and it's really
(17:44):
about building a almost like adisposition that is based in
that healthy skepticism.
And just what you said is whatI mentioned to lots of people
when I give talks and I say wewant to build that in our
students, no matter who they are, if those are adults or if they
are children.
We want to build a healthyskepticism, but we also do
(18:07):
acknowledge there's a fine linebetween healthy skepticism and
cynicism, and cynicism beingwhen somebody just says, well, I
can't believe anything becauseit's all sort of based in, you
know, like when you talk aboutnews in particular, people say,
well, you know they're allcontrolled by these cabals and
you know they're all out forprofit and da, da, da, da, da.
(18:28):
I can acknowledge, yeah, that'sthe case.
News outlets, you know,especially mainstream news
outlets.
They are profit makingbusinesses, right, but one of
the things that I also tried tobuild in and this, again, this
goes back to that idea aboutbuilding that disposition it is
understanding what are theintentions of the producers.
(18:49):
One can say that a news outletin particular, yes, they're
trying to make a profit becausethey have to pay people.
It does take money to captureand interpret and write and
distribute content.
And although the internet hassort of led us into believing
(19:10):
that all content is just free,right, it still takes people to
create that content and peoplefor all.
I mean, I don't know about you,but I know I got to get a check
at the end of the day because Igot bills to pay.
So with that, I do hope thatthere could be some financial
incentives that come along withthat.
But at the same time, like wehave, then we have to really say
(19:32):
, like, what are the intents ofthe content?
What are the methods that drive, that are driven by those
intents?
So I would say, for, likejournalists, the goal should be
to inform, right.
So with that being the primaryintent, then that drives the
methods.
They go out, they talk tomultiple people, they structure
(19:52):
stories in a way that they'reeasily accessible for their
audiences, and so on.
But also, as you just mentioned, we have a very complex and
somewhat blurred lines that popup in the sort of internet
ecosystem where we have lots ofpeople who may create things
that they self-identify as news,but really what it sort of
(20:16):
turns into and the methods thatthey use are really more opinion
styles.
So we hear, like, thoughts,analysis, you know, and so on,
of you know recent things thatare going on, and we sort of
interpret it as news because itconcerns current events.
Yes, and it also can meet aneed for us, right?
(20:39):
I think it's important toacknowledge that when I think,
when something happens and thisis also something we talk about
in the model of news that areseeded I draw from and we say,
like it's almost like humannature for us to want to receive
and share information, Right,you hear a rumor or you hear
something that you think nobodyelse knows, and what's the first
(20:59):
thing you want to do?
You want to tell someone.
Right, so we always have thatinnate need.
So when we go back to this ideaof news and opinion and how
those things kind of get mergedtogether in our current
ecosystem, when something bighappens, we want to talk about
it with people and in a lot ofcases, those sort of like
heavily talk, heavilyopinionated shows almost
(21:22):
Provides us that space to be apart of a conversation about
that particular issue.
So it almost meets a need thatwe have to talk about it, like
think about this podcast.
We're talking about education,we have conversations.
We want it to be veryconversational.
It's not just Me from Ohio orwhoever your guest is, just from
(21:44):
all high saying I say X and youshould believe all that.
Right, it's really, it's aconversation.
So, and it's something that Ithink as humans, it makes us
much different than many othermammals out there.
We we can reason, we can debate, we can do all these kind of
things and that's what we wantto do.
So I think it's important tojust keep those things in mind,
(22:05):
where, again, we have to keep inmind what are the intents, and
not only the intents of thecreators of the media, To know
what methods drive it, to knowwhat we're looking at, but also
what are our own Intentions forcoming towards that piece.
So, just like I talked aboutthese very heavily
conversational shows aboutcurrent events, it may be
(22:28):
meeting a need that we have towork out like what is this very
complicated thing that'shappening.
So just to be aware of thosethings.
Lindsay Persohn (22:38):
Yeah, and as you were describing that,
michael, I was also thinkingabout a Potentially a whole new
genre news, which is spoof news.
I'm sure you've seen these sayguy know, folks have sent links
to me where you've got someonewho is posing as a journalist,
posing to share facts, out inthe public and Most often people
just agree with him and act asthough they know exactly what
(23:00):
he's talking about, you knowwhich, which certainly does not
carry with it that that healthyskepticism, that critical stance
, right Would people?
Yeah that, yes, that that's it,that's it when you, when you
know it's completely fabricated.
So lots of things to navigatethese days, that's for sure.
Yeah so what do you wantlisteners to know about your
(23:20):
work?
I?
Michael Spikes (23:21):
think the primary, primary thing I would
hope for people to take away isthat, especially when we talk
about, I think, media literacyin general and all of the
various I like to refer to themas subdomains of media literacy
or the sister domains, almostlike the information literacy
and things like that I hope thatwhat people can really think
(23:43):
about is these are skills thatare meant to develop
dispositions, and thatdisposition is not something
that you develop overnight, soit is not something that you get
from.
You played the game and now,all of a sudden, you super smart
and doing this.
You went to my talk and, yeah,you might have learned a lot,
(24:03):
but there's still a lot more tolearn.
Right, you may have taken aclass and you learned a lot from
that, but that's not the placewhere that kind of learning ends
, and I think the other thing,too, is that we also have to
understand like we learncontinually throughout life, no
matter if we're in school or not.
(24:24):
Right, so it is to really sortof unlock.
I would hope at least myapproach to this would be to
unlock and innate curiosity thatSometimes one may argue
schooling can almost Beat out ofus right towards just finding
very discreet and specificanswers to questions and Not
(24:48):
sort of saying like I know X, Imight know X, this one little
fact, but there's still a wholelot of other stuff that I still
don't know.
So I think, if anything, I hopethat people can take away that
sense of that innate curiosityis something that we have to
continually draw on, pull on andwork from, because if not, if
(25:10):
we don't use that, then theskills that I know, that I try
to teach, and the skills thatwe're talking about, they become
super effortful, because itdoes take effort.
It takes effort for us to stepback and say wait a minute,
where'd that come from?
Or how did you know that, orwhat's the evidence to support
that?
Or even, especially more so,when one is either talking to
(25:34):
people they know really, reallywell, people that they trust and
people who think look at Allthose things like them, right,
so it can be very easy for us toslip into, I think, the very
sort of like yep, I agree withthat, because we all want to
have information that tells uswe smart and where you know
(25:56):
we're perfect, right, you smart,you look great, you do all this
stuff so great and you got allthese people that agree with you
.
Like who doesn't want that right?
Like nobody wants to be in aconversation where people just
continually go, ah, no, no, no,you know now, granted, that
could be fun if you're debatingwith people, yeah, but but at
the same time, like we, we sitaround with our friends,
(26:18):
everybody agrees With oneanother and it could be
difficult to be the person thatstands on the side and says, I
Right, it could be difficult tobe that person and, again, it
does take effort to do that.
So it's also important for us toagain that innate sense of
curiosity.
(26:38):
So what we do, hopefully, is wecan engage that sort of again
that skepticism, that part of usthat says, hmm, wait, or?
Or ask those questions when didthat come from?
That we asked those questionstoward learning, toward
development, toward Greaterunderstanding, so that we can
(27:02):
become people that are, that cansay to ourselves like I may not
know everything, because nobodydoes, but I can be comfortable
in saying I know X, yeah, Ithink I'm pretty confident about
that, but I don't know why.
Well, why is it XYZ?
(27:23):
So I don't know that and I?
and one last thing I'll say tothis too, is that you know and I
use this a lot, so people knowme might be like, yeah, he said
that like 5,000 times, but youknow, I say like in pursuing a
PhD and even having people callme like doctor, which I'm still
like, yeah, I guess I did that,but you know.
But one of the things peopletake from that is that you must
(27:45):
be so smart, you know all thisstuff, you know and so on.
And what I like to tell peopleis yes, I know a lot about this
very specific thing, right, thatmay be only like six or seven
other people really really know,really, really well, but by
doing that sort of the trainingthat I've gone through to get
this degree, it's made me somuch more comfortable with
(28:09):
saying I know this really reallywell, but it is a ton of stuff
I don't know right, and it'smade me and it's again, it's
unlocked at curiosity where I go, all those things I don't know,
I go, oh, I need to find outmore, right, I need to find out
more, because by finding outmore about those things I don't
know, it helps me know even morein the space of the stuff that
(28:30):
I do know right.
So hopefully we can continue tobuild that within people.
Lindsay Persohn (28:36):
I couldn't agree more, michael, that once
you get that title of doctor,people just sort of assume that
you're an expert at lots ofthings.
But really, I think the journeyof the PhD is as much as it is
developing a very specificknowledge base.
It's also realizing how muchyou don't know and how much
there is left to know in theworld, right, always pursuing
(28:59):
those kinds of curiosities.
And so that actually leads meto something else I was thinking
about as you're talking.
We talked about skills, we'vetalked about knowledge for media
literacy, but what strikes meis that you're also talking
about dispositions, right, it'snot just a set of skills, it's
not just a knowledge that wemight carry with us, but it is
this sort of it's, thisposturing toward news and media
(29:22):
that helps us to remain criticalyet open, right, and I think
that there's a really finebalance there between being open
to other points of view andother perspectives or other
verifiable truths or other waysof looking at situations.
That even goes beyond theskills and the knowledge, and
still like remaining open butalso remaining skeptical.
(29:42):
I feel like that's just a.
There's a balance there.
Michael Spikes (29:46):
Right, right, right, right.
Yeah, I think in this, again, Ithink this comes back like what
I talked about earlier, likethese ideas about bias,
perspective, points of view.
Right, to acknowledge that weall have our own points of view,
we all are going to haveopinions on things, right?
And again, I think that makesus learned people, like by
(30:10):
having specific points of view.
If a person just wants to say,well, I don't have a point of
view on anything, then I thinkthat just leaves an apathy,
right, like what you referred toearlier.
Just, I don't care aboutanything, and it's just like,
well, why would I want to talkto you?
And that's not very interesting, right, right?
So, keeping those things inmind, I think we have to
acknowledge that we all have ourown points of view.
(30:32):
Like an analogy I use a lot oftimes when I teach is that when
we come towards new information,we bring all our baggage with
us.
We bring our previousexperiences, our identities,
what we learn, where we comefrom, who we are all those
things with us, right?
So we bring all that with us,we come towards this information
and that provides us the lenswith which we see the world,
(30:57):
right?
So, and it is through that lensthat shapes our perspectives.
But also what we would hope isthat, you know, learning like
media literacy skills and theassociated critical thinking
skills allows us to open thatlens up and say, oh, there might
be something else over herethat I don't know or something I
(31:19):
didn't understand, or bereceptive to hearing the
experiences of those people whoare very different than us and
bring a very different lens tothe same situation.
We know of many times where I'msure, like people have probably
gotten into arguments withpeople where something happens
(31:40):
and then they say, well, I sawit like this.
And then the other person goeswell, I saw it like this, all
right.
And then that conflict happenswhere you have these very set in
your ways beliefs and you justgo, well, I'm only going to see
it like this.
And the other person says, well, you know what, I'm just going
to do the same thing.
I'll just dig in even furtherand just say I just believe X
(32:03):
and that's.
Those tensions can't getresolved until we take a step
back and can say your lens is X,my lens is this.
Can we acknowledge those twolenses and then say, ok, what do
we do now so at least we canunderstand where we're coming
from.
Lindsay Persohn (32:21):
I think that's so important, and something I've
been thinking about a lotlately and I think I even
mentioned it in the last episodeis that I feel like the older I
get and the more people I meet,the more willing I am to
consider that maybe the things Ithink and the things that I do
aren't necessarily the best, soto speak.
(32:42):
Quote unquote right, that maybethere are better ways of seeing
things or better ways of doingthings that maybe I didn't ever
consider.
Right, because I think wheneverwe think about like our own
lens and our own perspective,sometimes that comes with some
really strong blinders.
Right, like we don't evenrealize that someone else stands
in the world in a differentplace than we do.
(33:03):
Right, and so fundamentally,the way they see is going to be
different than the way that wesee because they haven't had the
same experiences, because theydon't have the same background,
because they don't have the sameknowledge, they don't have the
same skills, they don't have thesame interests.
And I just I think that, that Ithink more and more about that,
that perhaps these norms thatwe become so accustomed to maybe
(33:25):
it's really not the best way,maybe it's just the way that we
can't see around.
Michael Spikes (33:30):
Right, right, right, but also, at the same
time and I think this issomething we probably we see a
lot that we struggle with in ourcurrent era, and that is, I
think, more and more, thoseperspectives and lenses are
being we're being exposed to somany more now, right, and they
challenge the norms that havehelped shape our society,
(33:52):
because norms are used to helpshape societies and groups of
people.
Right, like it was interestingenough, I just came back to
begin in this week from beinginvolved with a teacher training
Institute at the National WorldWar Two Museum down in New
Orleans, and we talked a lotabout the role of propaganda,
not only in terms of, like theNazi propaganda because usually
(34:15):
when we talk about propaganda,that's what we first think about
that were used to mobilize asociety towards, you know, the
ends that Adolf Hitler had inGermany and why they felt they
needed to do the things thatthey did, but we also wanted to
think about propaganda in termsof mobilizing a society toward
(34:38):
another group of ends, right,those ends being, you know they
have this sort of.
They have a, an exhibit that'scalled the arsenal of democracy,
which was a phrase that we, youwas used by Franklin Roosevelt
as part of that effort to reallysay to Americans we have to get
involved in this conflictbecause if we don't, the
(35:02):
consequences of that could bedire.
Right, and communicating thatto a group of people who really
did not feel like the US neededto get involved in this conflict
up until you know Pearl Harbormade it very evident for us, I
think, is like super interesting, right.
So in that particular case youdo have you know people and
(35:25):
using things like media topersuade a group of people to
believe certain things that saylike this is the society we want
to live in, right, and thereare certain norms that we have
as part of our society that canbe that sort of tell us, like
you stop at a stoplight when thelight is rare, right, you stop
at the stop sign.
(35:46):
It kind of says for us, it sayslike here are the rules we
follow.
But then there have also beennorms that have said like
certain people are better thanothers.
You know, again, the extremebeing the Nazi, you know the
Nazi example.
But like now we talk about media, one of the things I talk with
lots of people about is the factthat we do not have very many
(36:09):
shared cultural experiencesanymore.
Right, like if you think aboutthe sheer amount of selection we
have of television shows andmusic and everything that's out
there, right, everybody is all.
It's almost like our wholesociety has been segmented into
these little micro audiences andthey all are really into the
(36:33):
things that they're into andthat's great, I mean.
I think you know, on the goodside, that has allowed us to be
exposed to messages and people'sand perspectives that we never
would have seen before, becausethere's certain groups of people
, whether they be minorities interms of ethnic group or
religious, you know, group,sector or whatever did not have
(36:58):
access to the capital, did nothave access to the equipment,
did not have access to the meansto broadcast messages that they
felt were very important totheir groups.
So now the internet has verymuch democratized media and it's
made it where lots of morepeople can get their messages
out, and we can hear that fromvery many.
(37:19):
But again, what that has doneis this it's caused conflicts in
the ways that, like now, we seethe world right and we see many
examples of that out in theworld.
Now I would even say for myself,like as I get older this is my
analogy I just go like I justdon't watch anything anymore.
Like I you know people tell meabout did you watch that?
(37:43):
I go no, did you see on neff?
No, did you know?
Because it's just so much outthere.
What I usually just want to dois just reading about it Because
, yeah, I'm just like otherpeople.
I have things that I see and I'mlike, yeah, I don't really get
that, or I don't even know if Ireally want to spend the time
with it, and I may go back tothe sort of nostalgic, you know,
(38:07):
view of like oh, I think I'llwatch some old episodes of like
the prices right or somethingtoday, like that'd be the choice
right, cause it's just like,well, yeah, that'd be okay.
I think that, cause I know that,I know that I recognize it is
something that relates to me andlike resonates and all those
(38:27):
kinds of things.
So, anyway, sorry, I just wentoff on somewhat of a tangent,
but I think again, like thosechallenges to those norms is
something that we I think youknow we're really struggling
with today, and part of that isbecause we have opened up the
doors to so many more messages.
Now, that's not to say thatthis is a crisis I wouldn't say
(38:49):
that, but I would say that itwhat it has done is.
It's made evident that we allnow have to become much more
mindful of what we're getting,where we're getting it from and,
again, why we are going tothose places.
To get that information,entertainment, wherever from
these places, why do we go tothose places to do so?
Lindsay Persohn (39:13):
Yeah, and I can totally relate to that
perspective.
I actually have found myselfwatching old episodes of
pressure luck not too long ago,because, you're right, there's
so much, where do you start?
And I tend to not start a newseries because I know I won't
find the time to finish it.
Hey, have you seen the sevenseries of such and such?
I'm like, no, haven't even seenthe first one.
(39:35):
So I can totally sympathizewith that viewpoint that
sometimes now I'll just I'll bereading over here right.
Or I'll be working on anotherproject over here.
I totally, totally understandthat.
So there's something youmentioned earlier, michael, that
I just want to kind of pickback up on, because you
mentioned a model that youtypically work from, a model of
news media literacy, and I'mwondering if you might share a
(39:58):
bit about that with us,particularly if it's something
that educators might findportable, something that they
can actualize in theirclassrooms, right, so something
that they can work with in orderto support young people in
particular, to navigate the wide, wide digital world.
Michael Spikes (40:16):
Yeah, so I will give the caveat that, as a human
, I have my own point of view onthese things right.
So the model that I draw fromis one that I am very familiar
with, is one I've worked with alot, and I can say that from my
scholarship that I've had theopportunity to evaluate a number
(40:37):
of other models, specificallyof news literacy, and I do have
to say I keep coming back to theone that I have been so
familiar with and that comesfrom the Center for News
Literacy at Stony BrookUniversity.
Now, for many people who mightbe familiar with news literacy,
they probably are more familiarwith another model of this
education and that comes fromthe News Literacy Project.
(40:59):
I think they do great work.
They have a online platformthat's called Checkology that is
open and free for people toaccess, and their approach is
much more about the developmentand learning through modules
instead of like sheer, justlessons.
So you can go to their website,you can learn a particular
(41:23):
concept on their website, watcha video.
I know they have like an app.
I think they have some gamesout there that people can play
and they have a community ofteachers who are talking about
these things out there.
So they've built a very robustsystem.
The reason why I come back tothe Center for News Literacy's
approach is that it is a fullcourse.
It does have, I think, 14lessons as part of it, and I do
(41:47):
find that its sequence oflessons fit well into one
another that come toward acapstone skill, which is active
deconstruction of media.
Now it uses and this is one ofthe things that I think
distinguishes news medialiteracy from, say, media
(42:09):
literacy, and that is that itteaches the same skills as media
literacy, those mindfulconsumption and production
practices, but it does sothrough the lens of journalism.
So it draws from the practicesof journalists that journalists
use to do their jobs.
It draws from those practicesto help others pick those up and
(42:30):
use them in their everyday life, and it also uses news as a
platform for practicing thoseskills.
So if we teach students, likejournalists, verify claims made
in news stories by providingevidence to support those claims
, we then would tell ourstudents you turn around and
(42:52):
when you watch the news you lookfor that evidence.
You look for evidence ofverification, you look for that.
So, with that being said, thatmodel is available from the
Center for News Literacy.
I will obviously, I will saythat I played a big role in
putting parts of that together.
I did not develop this modelthat was developed by Howard
(43:14):
Schneider and the group ofindividuals that helped to
establish the Center for NewsLiteracy but I played a key role
in making those resourcesavailable online through the
Center's Digital Resource Center, and those make available lots
of the resources that were usedto teach the course.
The whole course is up there.
I even have taken off a pieceof it and made another version
(43:38):
of that course an online course.
It's called Get News Smart.
That's available from theCenter itself, and then I have
another version that's calledGet, basically Get News Smart 2.
That has the same content,because I continue to use that
model in my own teaching.
The other one that I willmention again this is you know
(43:59):
what I'm here I'm going to touteven my own stuff is that you
may be familiar with the factthat in 2021, yes, I think
that's the year Illinois becamethe first state that required
putting to place a requirementfor media literacy education for
all high school students, andnow, granted, that's defined as
(44:22):
a unit and that unit is superbroad.
But in response to that, acolleague of mine by the name of
Yanti Friesen, and I gottogether and really started to
think a lot about what willimplementation of this new law
look like.
So what we did was we gottogether and we founded an
organization called the IllinoisMedia Literacy Coalition and
(44:44):
through that, what we wanted todo is bring together a group of
these are interested parties,and these include teachers,
librarians, educators of allstripes to come together to talk
about what this should looklike in our state.
We wrote a framework for medialiteracy that includes four
basic concepts, because we knowthat there's lots of resources
(45:06):
out there that teachers coulddraw from.
So we wanted to give a sort ofbroad approach to media literacy
.
Again, I see that as the upperlevel of news literacy, but
media literacy, and through thatframework we hope that teachers
can see these concepts and thenthink, oh, I'm already doing
some of this already and this ishow it can be implemented in my
(45:28):
existing content.
So we don't bring them newstuff, we just sort of give them
new vocabulary around thethings they already do.
So that again is from ourorganization, the Illinois Media
Literacy Coalition.
Lindsay Persohn (45:41):
Great and we can link to any of those
resources on your guest page forlisteners who may want to learn
more about any of theseinitiatives and how they can
support them, and I would guessboth developing teachers' own
media literacies as well assupporting their students to
develop their media literacies.
Michael Spikes (46:00):
Yeah, yeah, this is a big bit of interest of
mine has been not so much onjust students' work but, yes,
more so on teachers, great.
Lindsay Persohn (46:09):
Great, yeah, that would be fantastic.
We'll include links to thosesites on your guest page for
listeners.
So, michael, given thechallenges of today's
educational climate, whatmessage do you want teachers to
hear?
Michael Spikes (46:22):
I think number one.
The message I want to give toteachers is this is a continuing
practice that we mentioned, soI want to encourage them to
continue to engage with thetopics around media literacy and
also, I should say, probablyeven more important, is to not
(46:45):
get too bogged down by all ofthe technological changes.
Teachers should not feel like Ineed to know TikTok and every
other social media platform thatpops up in order to engage in
these skills with their students, because I will tell you, I
know TikTok.
I don't use it regularlybecause I, for me, as a viewer,
(47:09):
it just it doesn't speak to me.
I can't I really I can't standwatching videos like badly shot
video, all that kind of stuff.
Like I am a media professional,I do not want to watch your
badly shot videos, right, thatdoesn't appeal to me.
But with that, to understandthat really, when we talk about
social media, what we're talkingabout is, when it really comes
(47:31):
down to, is communication.
It is how we communicate withone another.
Basically, all of these appsand things like that, these are
platforms that basicallyfacilitate communication amongst
individuals.
So, keeping that in mind, if wethink about the fundamentals of
how we communicate, I have amessage I send it to someone,
(47:54):
somebody receives it, theyinterpret it, they may give me
some feedback to tell me whetheror not they got it or not, and
then I'll respond back.
Right, like.
Those are the basics, like Ialways start almost every class
I teach with that basic.
They call it the transactionalmodel of communications.
It is a sender has a messagethey want to send.
(48:16):
They send it through, I shouldsay, a channel, whether that be
text, like right now I'm talkingto you, so through voice.
They may do it through video,which, would you know, combine
both visuals and the audio, andso on, or like in terms of this
podcast, we just we have audioand they are inherent advantages
(48:39):
and limitations to all of thosedifferent mediums, right that
we send messages through.
Think about the fact that mediais the plural of medium, right?
So keeping that into account,so those shape, those can shape
how we put those messagestogether.
And then again, the receiverreceives that message and if we
(49:02):
hope that they interpret it inthe same way that we have for
sending it, right?
So if we keep that in mind, Ithink that very, very basic
thing it can help us to reallyengage with these topics, no
matter what the platform, nomatter what the technology, no
matter.
You know again, the sharedexperiences through media,
probably things that we just donot have as much these days, but
(49:25):
we still communicate with oneanother continuously.
So I think it's important tokeep those things in mind when
we think about engaging thesetopics with our students.
Secondly I'll just throw outthere and we talked about this a
lot earlier is, I think, in anyclassroom, in any educator, the
thing that we really want to dois unlock and continue to
(49:48):
encourage students to engagewith this innate curiosity about
the world and to take themethods that we use in the
classroom questioning, you know,assessing, evaluating, all
those kind of things and takethem far outside of the
classroom.
So I would encourage any of theeducators that are out there to
(50:11):
continue doing that.
I would venture to guess that,if you are listening to a
podcast about teaching, that youare always interested in
improving your practice, right,and the way you do so is by
staying curious yourself, right,you stay curious about what
could I continue to do?
So we want to keep encouragingmore and more teachers to do
(50:31):
that in their classrooms,encourage their students to do
that, and I think the skills,that I give certain vocabulary
around, you'll find that theseare things that you already do.
So those are the two big thingsthat I would give to teachers.
Lindsay Persohn (50:49):
Well, it's such a helpful message, I feel like,
because you know it is easy toget lost in all the newest and
the latest and the greatest.
But whenever we boil it back tothe fundamentals of
communication because thatremains the same even when the
platforms change right andstaying curious, I think those
are such critical messages intoday's day and age when I think
(51:11):
, as an educator, it is easy tolose yourself in the noise right
.
It's easy to sort of lose yourmission, to lose your own
purpose or your own vision.
It's even easy to lose yourcuriosity whenever you feel like
you're sort of being beat overthe head from every direction.
You know.
But I think, whatever you boilit back to fundamentals and
curiosity, it's just really it'sa very helpful way to think
(51:33):
about it.
So I really appreciate that,michael.
Michael Spikes (51:36):
I'm glad.
I hope that lots of people takethat forward into the next
school year.
Lindsay Persohn (51:42):
Great.
Well, michael, I thank you somuch for your time today and I
thank you for your contributionsto the world of education.
Michael Spikes (51:49):
Thank you so much for having me as part of
this ongoing conversation.
I hope there was lots for yourlisteners to take away, and if
they have any questions for me,please feel free to reach out.
Lindsay Persohn (51:59):
Perfect.
Thank you so much.
We'll include your contactinformation on your guest page
as well.
Great Thank you.
Dr Michael Spikes is known forhis work in media literacy
education, news media literacyand youth media.
Dr Spikes research is centeredon the practice and pedagogy of
media literacy education andnews media literacy, working
(52:21):
toward encouraging criticalthinking to limit the effects of
exposure to myths anddisinformation.
His focus is on the design,assessment and enactments of
these literacies in classroomsand other learning environments.
He has recently been involvedin implementation of strategies
for incorporating units of medialiteracy education into
existing K through 12 curriculafor educators in Illinois.
(52:44):
Michael is also the co-founderof the Illinois Media Literacy
Coalition and the Illinois StateChapter Leader for Media
Literacy.
Now His work is recognized bythe Illinois State Board of
Education as key resources formedia literacy education and by
the Illinois News BroadcastersAssociation as a 2022 recipient
(53:06):
of the Illinois of the YearAward.
He has previously held roles asa media producer and editor for
NPR, the PBS, news Hour and theKellogg School of Management,
project manager for the Centerfor News Literacy at Stony Brook
University and a media studiesteacher in both public and
charter schools in Washington DC.
(53:27):
His work has appeared ininformation and learning
sciences Journal of EducationalTechnology Systems and in
several book chapters.
Michael earned his PhD in thelearning sciences from
Northwestern University's Schoolof Education and Social Policy
in August of 2023.
Dr Michael A Spikes is alecturer and project director in
(53:49):
the Medill School of Journalism, media, integrated Marketing
Communications at NorthwesternUniversity.
For the good of all students,classroom Caffeine aims to
energize education, research andpractice.
If this show gives you thingsto think about, help us spread
the word.
(54:09):
Talk to your colleagues andeducator friends about what you
hear.
You can support the show bysubscribing, liking and
reviewing this podcast throughyour podcast provider.
Visit classroomcaffeinecom,where you can subscribe to
receive our short monthlynewsletter, the Espresso Shot.
On our website, you can alsolearn more about each guest,
(54:31):
find transcripts for ourepisodes, more topics using our
drop-down menu of tags, requestan episode, topic or potential
guest, support our researchthrough our listener survey or
learn more about the researchwe're doing on our publications
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Connect with us on social mediathrough Instagram, facebook and
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We would love to hear from you.
(54:52):
Special thanks to the ClassroomCaffeine team Leah Berger,
abaya Veluru, stephanie Bransonand Shaba Hojfath.
As always, I raise my mug toyou, teachers.
Thanks for joining me.
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