(upbeat music) (upbeat music continues) - Good evening and welcome to Generation Rising.

I'm Anaridis Rodriguez.

Tonight, we're diving into the intersection of education and media literacy.

As more and more of us rely on all kinds of media, especially social media for news and information, studies reveal that we are less likely to get the facts right about a whole host of issues including politics and science, and more likely to believe a false narrative.

Educators across the country and here in Rhode Island are trying to change that dynamic.

One of those educators joining us tonight is Sara Sweetman, associate professor at the University of Rhode Island, and a consultant for PBS kid shows like Sesame Street, Molly of Denali, and Eleanor Wonders Why.

Sara, welcome.

- Thank you.

- Thank you for being here.

- I'm excited to be here and talk about this really important topic.

- It is very important as we grow up in this digital age, right?

Parenting kids with all this technology and access to it.

Let's talk about media literacy.

It is Media Literacy Week, sounds relatively new to me.

I'd never heard of it before.

What is it and who does it serve?

- Great, yeah.

So Media Literacy Week is coming up the week of October 21st to the 25th.

And it is being celebrated here in Rhode Island and all across the country, and even all across the world.

The National Association of Media Literacy Education is sort of spearheading the movement.

And I think really the main goal of the week is to get the public talking about media literacy and what that means.

As you said, it's a fairly new concept, and so it's really important that we're talking about it and hearing voices from our community about what media literacy means to everybody so that we can incorporate that into education.

- And anyone can participate.

It's free to participate.

And you are encouraging educators, even businesses, to be part of this initiative.

Can you talk about what the structure is and how do they benefit from it?

- Yeah, so this year's media literacy has been broken down into different parts of the media literacy sort of definition so that each day, we can think about a piece of media literacy.

So Monday, where the focus is, the theme is on access to media as a whole.

And really with that, we can think about who has access to media, what allows more people to have access to media.

And then on the second day, the focus is on analysis, and that's really looking at who's creating media, what is the message, who is that message for?

And then the third day is a focus on evaluation.

And that's really where we put our own ideas into media.

How does that make us feel?

What are we taking away from it?

How does that affect me personally?

The fifth day is focused on creating, so the idea that we can better understand media, especially if we're creators of media.

We're not just consumers, but creators.

And there are so many tools out there now that make it easy for us to create media, which goes back to the concern over if so many people are creating media, how do we know, how do we consume it with critical thinking?

And then the last day is to act.

And really media is intended to give messages.

And with those messages we can do a lot of things.

We can show the knowledge that we've gained from the messages, but we can also advocate for populations that might need advocating for.

So the week is really divided out into helping us understand more about the expansiveness or broadness of media literacy as a whole.

- And you mentioned populations that need advocating.

Children would be one of those special populations, right?

- [Sara] For sure.

- In reading through your background, you started out as a teacher, so a lot of that I assume informs your work now.

Parents already know the challenges that they're facing when it comes to access to technology with their children, but what are educators seeing when it comes to the challenges of children's learning experiences when you introduce technology and media?

- Yeah, so I think the biggest challenge, we're facing quite a few challenges.

One is that technology, the nature of technology is that it's continuously evolving.

And as it evolves and changes, it's really hard for our education systems to keep up both financially and with capacity of understanding the new technologies.

I think teachers feel like they just get good at a piece of tech, using a piece of technology, of engaging kids with that piece of technology.

And then it's either outdated or they have upgraded to another form of technology.

And so it's three steps forward and two steps back.

And it can sometimes feel a little frustrating.

- [Anaridis] Yeah.

- I think one of the other challenges is the messages that teachers get from the media.

It's really quite confusing.

We get a lot of messages from public health in media that says screens are harmful and we should limit the amount of screen time that we're giving to our children.

And then on the other hand, businesses are saying, we need children who are ready with 21st century skills, and they need to be able to navigate this increasingly technical society.

And so those two messages don't match.

They can be very confusing.

I think that the really biggest challenge that teachers are facing is that in the last 10 to 20 years, media's really been redefining what it means to be literate.

And so if we think back, although, well we don't think back 'cause I don't really remember 1440 when the printing press was invented, but from 1440 till the 1990s, literacy has meant the ability to read and write and the printed word, right?

If you look up literate, what it means to be literate in the Oxford Dictionary, it will say the ability to read and write.

And that's really just not the case anymore.

And I would say in 600 years that we have been working really hard in education about finding the best way is to teach kids to read and write.

I'm still not sure we all agree on the very best ways for doing that and that we've had a lot of time to work with it.

So the idea that media that we have information in our pockets that we can find out, we have personal devices is really changing the definition of what it means to be literate.

We know that we've added sort of to that learning to read and write, listening and viewing are also skills, but it's so much more than that.

- Really?

- I think back to when I was a child and I had to write a report in school, I would go to my Britannica encyclopedia that I loved.

- Yeah.

- And you would look up your topic and you would write your report from the one source.

Right?

Now if you have a similar topic and a child who's eight years old is looking up, they have infinite sources, right?

And it's so much more complex.

And what does that mean for us in education?

- And what does that mean for the child's learning experience also?

That is so interesting that now literacy has a different definition and I really have never thought about it that way.

So how does technology and media impact the child's learning experience?

Like you mentioned there are mixed messages that it increases anxiety, that it reduces attention span.

Is that the case?

- Yeah, that's interesting.

Knowing I was coming on the show, I asked my 18-year-old daughter last night what she felt like was the biggest challenge with media in her world.

And she responded that a lot of media reports the things in the world that are challenging or that are upsetting, and that's important for media to do that.

But that there's a lot of information coming at young children about the world that can be- - Negative.

- Yeah.

And so I think we obviously know that there is growing anxiety in young children and there's a responsibility of media development for sure to be reporting the good along with what's happening in the world that's not so good.

And I think we need to teach kids how to engage with media.

Things like limiting media isn't really an educational perspective on media.

We need to teach children how to regulate their own media consumption and how to navigate through that immense media world when they are looking up something about, you know, if they're writing a report on a certain time period or how to navigate through not getting lost in the world of media.

- How do you bridge that gap?

You work with PBS on many children's programming, so tell me about your work and how you introduce media to children through shows like Sesame Street.

- Sure.

So I think when I was in the classroom teaching prior to 2009 when I very first started working with Sesame Street, I used media like a lot of teachers did at the time.

I used it to celebrate when the classroom had done something fantastic or to maybe reinforce an idea I had already taught, but I didn't use it in ways that really highlighted it and accentuated the ability media has to help kids learn.

In 2009, I got a call from Sesame asking to come down and to present to researchers and educators, producers and actors about what STEM meant.

Elmo had been featured on the front of Time Magazine when President Obama had initiated his Educate to Innovate campaign.

And Sesame was in a little bit of a panic, what does STEM mean and what does this mean for us as a show?

And I think from that very first presentation, you know, it was so fun.

I brought down, at the time I was working for a program here in Rhode Island where I got to go in and out of lots of classrooms and I brought down amazing lessons that I had seen teachers do.

And I described those lessons to the writers and they would turn that into, oh, so I could describe a lesson about second graders building a tower out of found materials.

And the writers would turn that into, oh, Grover's in a junkyard and he has to get over the fence and he's using the materials he can find to climb up and over the fence.

And I was like, yes, that's STEM education, the idea of integrating science, technology, engineering, and math in solving real world's problems.

- That's amazing.

And I remember those episodes, like watching them with my children.

I've noticed that there is a science focus more on Sesame Street than in years past.

How can communities participate with the education that they're receiving through these shows?

- Yeah, so it's great that you ask that because I think on the development side, when I'm working with the teams and we're deciding on what the curriculum of a show is gonna be and even the design of the characters, so I'll give an example.

One of the things we always hope is that kids play the show.

We talk about that when we're designing the show.

What can we do in the show to help kids be able to play it at home?

We know from research that when kids play the shows, they internalize those lessons and personalize those lessons and they're more meaningful.

And so we do things like right now in the last season of Sesame Street, there's a segment called Mecca Builders.

And in that segment, Cookie, Abby and Elmo, they go into worlds and sort of solve these problems in very childlike ways.

And when we designed their character themselves, they each have a different shape symbol on the front of their sort of Mecca uniform.

And those symbols were there so that kids could easily make costumes.

They could put the sort of hexagon I think Elmo has on his chest, on their chest, and they can be Elmo while they're watching the show.

So a really simple thing that parents can do is to encourage, put a symbol on the kids' shirts that relate to the show and encourage them to act it out while they're viewing.

- And it goes beyond the shows too.

I'm a big consumer of PBS Kids if you haven't ascertained by now, because I love it so much.

The app is amazing and there are so many educational resources on the app.

Can you share with us what you've been working on or you've worked on in the past that seems very effective in allowing children to be more literate when it comes to consuming media?

- For sure.

Yeah, so I think that the shows and the games, it's amazing how much rigor goes into the development of those and how much expertise.

There's lots of expertise from the content area of what the educational goals are.

There's always a content advisor on the show.

There's learning advisors that really guide what are the processes that are gonna best help kids learn?

And so for every minute of media that our children are consuming, there's thousands of hours that went into the development of that.

I think that games offer a really safe place.

Digital games in particular offer a really safe place for our kids to try their ideas out and try their thinking.

And games that I've worked on have really capitalized on this.

They can ask things like what if, and they can try things that are a little bit safer in a game online than if you're in real life.

They can try out their ideas and ask those what if questions.

And so a lot of the games that I've worked on have allowed kids, you know, we all learn technology through kind of messing about.

We sometimes in children's gaming call that a sandbox, right, where you can try different things and see what the cause and effect reaction is of those.

- Yes.

What other types of activities can families do or parents can encourage with their children at home that relate to media literacy?

- For sure.

So I think, you know, I would encourage families, first of all just to notice all the media that's around us, right?

Media isn't just what comes out of a screen, right?

Billboards, books are media, print.

The print that's around us, the art that's around us are all conveying messages.

And so anything really that's trying to convey a message to us sort of fits in that media category.

And I would start Media Literacy Week by a scavenger hunt.

What is the media around you?

Make it a little fun competition.

Who can find the most media messages that are coming at you in a day?

And I think families can start the day with that and end the day with the conversation of what media did you notice and collaboratively maybe try it and make an extensive list of all the media just to be aware that that is around us all the time.

And to start there.

I think also that media can sometimes be a lot for young children.

There's a lot of messaging coming at us and we're trying to interpret the sounds what we're hearing auditorily with what we're hearing visually with what we're experiencing physically in the media world.

And I really encourage parents and teachers to set a purpose for learning when they're engaging in media.

We know that sitting with a child while they're viewing something and having conversations with 'em helps comprehension, helps the learning message.

We also know that parents are busy and that when they're watching a show or they're engaging in a PBS media game, that they're safe.

And it's a moment where we can get something done in the house.

- Yes, yes.

- So things that you can do that aren't necessarily sitting right beside your child the whole time they're viewing is to set a purpose before they watch.

So if your child's gonna watch Eleanor Wonders Why, you might say, oh, I wonder what Eleanor is gonna observe in Animal Town today.

When the show is over, you come tell me what she observed?

- I love that.

- And that really specific takeaway helps when there's so much coming at us in the media and they know what they're looking for.

They know they're gonna look for, Eleanor's gonna observe something - Yeah.

- She does in every show.

And I'm gonna go talk about it after with another adult or anybody in my family.

- And when they're encouraged, they will follow through.

- [Sara] Yeah.

- What is it like working on these shows?

Have you been able to reflect on the impact that this type of programming is having on children?

How did you get here?

Because I'm living vicariously through you being on Sesame Street with Elmo.

That's like my dream.

- Yeah, it is amazing.

To be honest, it's not something I ever sort of planned or aimed for.

- [Anaridis] Yeah.

- I think I tell my college students all the time be open to possibilities and when they're there, you know, they might put you outta your comfort zone.

Being on Sesame Street was definitely pushing my comfort zone, but it was an opportunity I wasn't gonna pass up.

So I think that working in children's media has been a learning experience for me and I love to learn.

So in the beginning, I got the call from Sesame about STEM, about coming to talk to them about STEM because of friends that I had made in the education world and that were there and had mentioned that I was researching STEM education.

And so I would also encourage young people to make networks and connections and let people know what it is you're interested in, what you're excited about, because that can sometimes open doors and opportunities.

And then from working on Sesame Street and helping to set curriculum and edit scripts and being on three of the episodes, then sort of the world becomes quite small in children's media and you kind of get passed around.

- Yeah.

- So I was able to work on quite a few other shows from there.

- That builds credibility though, because I'm sure your experiences, your lived experiences inform the work that you do and your intention and your purpose behind it.

What is your hope for the work that you do in media literacy in general in our communities?

- Yeah.

I think that in education as a whole, I've always been guided by this idea of joy that comes from real authentic learning and that we can start with joy in education.

Sometimes we get bogged down in the requirements that are on us in education and forget that children want to learn, especially when we start with a joyful experience.

And so that's what drew me to STEM education.

No matter what grade I taught, kids loved science, right?

They loved observing and manipulating materials and working hard for finding out and discovering something new.

And then the media draws kids in.

It gets them excited.

And I think starting really from that joyful place is really important.

And we need to not forget that.

I think that my hope, one of the things that media is doing for us as a society is the idea of media consumption and media creation is allowing us to...

The world is becoming a little smaller, right?

We are able to see perspectives from people from all over the world.

We're able to communicate with people from all over the world.

We're able to travel more easily.

And so as we become more of a global society, I am really excited about what that means in creating media.

We're able to hear from more voices in the world and learn new perspectives and ideas.

And so my hope for sort of the future of media is that we really harness that the beauty of those voices that we now are able to hear because of the ease of creating and consuming media.

- Yeah, and think of it as a tool and not as a burden, right?

- For sure.

- We only have a few minutes left, but I know you've got an exclusive up your sleeve, Sara, 'cause off camera you were telling me about a new show that you're working on.

What can you tell us that doesn't get you in trouble?

- Right.

And we can check it.

Yeah, so I am currently working on a show called The Weather Hunters.

It was created, it was a thought product of Al Roker.

And the show is an amazing family.

It's an animated series and it's an amazing family who is into weather and excited by weather and goes through their daily life and sort of explores how weather impacts our daily life in a beautiful way.

And yeah, I'm very excited for that to come out.

I think it's very timely.

We are talking about weather and climate and yeah, should be looking forward to that soon.

- I am very much looking forward to it.

And it's an easy topic for children.

It's very relative.

They can make several observations.

I'm also, I love the weather, so I love that all of these things are coming together.

Is there anything else you would like to share with our community about how they can become more involved with PBS education services or just PBS programming in general, things that they should take advantage of?

- Yeah, the resources that are on PBS Learning Media are incredible.

You can sort by grade level, by topic, and all kinds of sources come up.

Sometimes that can feel a little overwhelming to teachers.

But I think with this sort of sorting feature that's on PBS Learning Media, you can narrow in on what you're looking for.

And I would advise teachers and parents pick one thing, get good at it, practice it, and look for the joy that kids bring with them with the media.

Or maybe even instead of starting with PBS Learning Media, we start with kids.

What are you interested?

What are you viewing?

What are you interested in, why?

And model questions that we can ask about the media they bring to us.

Like, well, who made that program?

Or you know, what do you think the message was?

And who is that important to, that is important to you?

Do you think it would be important to all people?

- Yes, those are great questions.

And it builds on their skill to discern different things, right, to have discernment.

- It is, I think really the one thing I would say is ask questions about media.

That is a lot of what media literacy is.

It's the idea of really asking if we could get kids in the habit of asking questions like, who created this?

What was the purpose?

Who was it for?

Who is it not for?

Those questions, if every time they go to a new piece of media, those are automatically coming up in their head- - Yeah.

- We would have a very different, you know, a healthier future for kids to be critical consumers and critical creators of media.

- You've certainly given me as a parent a new perspective on media that I had never really thought about before.

Because you're right, we get a lot of mixed messages that it is bad.

But thank you so much for enlightening us today.

It was lovely to have you.

- Thank you for having me.

- We have run out of time.

I would like to thank tonight's guest, Sara Sweetman.

You can watch this episode and all our past episodes anytime at watch.ripbs.org.

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