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References

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Recent studies show that students and adults alike have little trouble finding news, but they have a much harder time discerning whether it is true.

Teaching students how to research used to be limited to introducing them to library sources, but Google and other search engines have changed the game. The democratization of knowledge is arguably good for society, but one significant drawback is that it is incredibly easy to post false news online and make it look like it's coming from a legitimate news source.

To best serve students, a modern education must first start with teaching students to ask "Is it real or is it fake?"

Misconceptions about what constitutes truth

Researchers at Stanford University learned that students do a poor job of recognizing fake news. With so much student research happening online, this underscores why it is essential that teachers help students hone their ability to tell truth from fiction.

In another study, Northwestern University researchers discovered that students often base the value of an article on search engine returns - articles placed higher in Google's rankings are often believed to be more reliable. This is not necessarily the case.

Because discerning real from fake news relies on a skill set developed through practice, educators need to begin teaching news literacy early on. As soon as students begin online research, educators should tackle the question of fake news with them. Students should be taught to recognize certain characteristics of fake news.

A 10-question fake-news test

The News Literacy Project, a national organization focused on helping students become informed citizens, has developed a 10-question tool to identify red flags in online news sources. These questions focus on not only evaluating the date and source of the information, but they also consider rhetorical aspects such as the headline's intent to trigger an emotional reaction or encourage sharing.

Students introduced to these questions early in their researching life can internalize these checks and begin to use them with everything they read.

Teaching news literacy at every age

Recognizing fact or fiction in news articles should be introduced with a lesson that helps students understand the long-term drawbacks of relying upon fake news. Rachel Roberson has developed a lesson plan for KQED that walks older students through the negative influence of fake news. The lesson provides an additional set of questions or techniques for recognizing made-up media.

But age is no reason to wait to teach this key piece of media literacy. Using the News Literacy Project's chart, teachers can work with younger students to examine fake news stories or internet memes as well. The lesson may feel rudimentary, but it will begin to imbue students with an impulse to fact-check what they read. If taught and reviewed routinely, this impulse will become a first-line defense in student research habits.

A crucial first step in media literacy

Recognizing fake news isn't the full extent of media literacy, but it is important groundwork as students begin to develop rhetorical awareness. Using the News Literacy Project's chart, students may come to conclude that news is true, but something still does not feel right. In an era where yellow journalism is as plaguing as fake news, it is essential that educators use the fake-news discussion as a starting point, but continue their media literacy work to help students recognize that passing the "fake or real" test is a first, not final, step in choosing best sources for research.

My next piece will explore further lessons in media literacy to help students distinguish, beyond "fake or real," the manipulative tactics some articles use that may pass the fake-news sniff test but still don't make for effective research.
Monica Fuglei is a graduate of the University of Nebraska in Omaha and a current faculty member of Arapahoe Community College in Colorado, where she teaches composition and creative writing.

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Fake News: Teaching Students Why it Matters, How to Spot it | Resilient Educator

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Fake news online has become so common that teachers need to make a concerted effort to teach students to discern between what's real and what's made up.

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Abstract

Filter Bubbles, exacerbated by use of digital platforms, have accelerated opinion polarization. This research builds on calls for interventions aimed at preventing or mitigating polarization. This research assesses the extent that an online digital platform, intentionally displaying two sides of an argument with methodology designed to "open minds" and aid readers willingness to consider an opposing view. This "open mindedness" can potentially penetrate online filter bubbles, alleviate polarization and promote social change in an era of exponential growth of discourse via digital platforms.

Utilizing "The Perspective" digital platform, 400 respondents were divided into five distinct groups varying in number of articles reading material related to "Black Lives Matter" (BLM). Results indicate that those reading five articles, either related or unrelated to race, were significantly more open-minded towards BLM than the control group. Those who read five race-related articles also showed significantly reduced levels of holding a hardliner opinion towards BLM than control.

Introduction

Filter Bubbles [1] refer to a state of "intellectual isolation" that can result from people becoming encapsulated in streams of data. This includes news or social network updates, that are personalized to reader interests because of algorithm-based searches. Furthermore, people tend to join groups that share their narratives and world views [2]. This phenomenon presents the danger that critical issues will get filtered, leaving people unexposed to views different from their own [3]. Thus, online users will be operating under misperceptions shaped by their "echo chamber", in which users are selectively served information based on personal information [4,5].

Such an environment is conducive to increasing biases, notably "confirmation bias", which connotes seeking or interpreting evidence in ways that are partial to existing beliefs, expectations, or hypotheses at hand [6]. Exposure to filter bubbles can hinder pluralistic dialogue and thus jeopardizes democracies in modern society [7]. Various studies have shown the impact of filter bubbles on the creation of polarization [8,9] and extremism [10,11]. These consequences lead to the generation of, since living inside a filter bubble and being exposed to racist, sexist, or homophobic views might lead one to experience desensitization and further spread of discriminatory materials [12]. Furthermore, polarization in its extreme form may also lead to social/national fragmentation and even civil war ( Gutiérrez Sanín & , 2014; [13].

Filter bubbles and echo chambers damage the media as a credible public communication channel. The risks of filter bubbles for public communication on issues of fundamental importance, such as nature conservation, far outweigh potential benefits, hindering an effective response [14]. One reason is that not only do they enable fake news, but they also condition individuals to be less critical of misinformation [15]. Some researchers even claim that filter bubbles inhibit general learning, whereby any form of knowledge that could shape new communities is lost [16]. Consequently, filter bubbles threaten the evolution of science, since they may lead researchers to focus on narrower niches [17] and limit cross-fertilization among scientists from different disciplines. Hence hampering innovation [18,19]. As such, while the internet has the potential to broaden our perspective via access to a myriad of information, it also poses extraordinary challenges. Filter bubbles, created mostly via social media discourse, in addition to a fragmented media landscape and drive to personalization, have collectively narrowed exposure and willingness to consider opposing views, resulting in closed-mindedness and further opinion polarization.

"The Perspective" is an online platform founded in March 2017. The award-winning website sets out to broaden horizons and "open minds" by displaying two sides of current events, historical and classic debates, employing both design and a psychological framework to facilitate consideration of ideas that are different from one's own. "The Perspective" offers three to five top trending stories on a weekly basis, ranging from politics to entertainment, in which two equally subjective opposing views on the topics are curated. Readers can comment on the subject and answer quizzes if they wish.

The site's primary goal is allowing its readers direct access to news and information, unfiltered by their usual personalized browsing preferences. This is achieved by applying a methodology designed to circumvent rejection. As such, "The Perspective" sets out to "open minds" and burst the online filter bubbles by helping readers look at issues from another point of view and overcome biases such as confirmation bias [20].

¹For widely debated issues, the site's data indicates that visitors spend an average of more than 5 min on a single page concerning widely debated issues. This is achieved by initially exploring peripheral, less controversial themes. Deploying an unfamiliar weaker argument may improve the attention of one's opponent. The other tactic is the "Moral Foundations Theory" [21]. This posits that people on the right and left share the same values when interpreting the morality of a particular instance, but do not ascribe the same priority to these values. According to this theory, one is more likely to make progress during a debate by appealing to moral concerns. ² Additional techniques include using "softer" words such as "maybe" and "possibly" and adding a sincere personal story, which is harder to contradict.

This research was set to empirically measure the effectiveness of "The Perspective", a widely used digital commercial platform hoping to show it may be used to motivate social change by promoting communication and discourse, alleviating polarization, and the risks created by filter bubbles and echo chambers.

Section snippets

Opinion polarization

Opinion polarization has been observed over numerous societal, political, and economic issues (Baldassarri et al., 2008; DiMaggio et al., 1996; Finkel et al., 2020; Fiorina, 2011; Wroe et al., 2019). One indicator of the polarized mass public opinion is the intensification of prejudiced attitudes, evidenced by the increasing percentage of partisans who support the extremes (Abramowitz & Saunders, 2006; Jacobson, 2006). Media plays a considerable role in opinion polarization. The proliferation

Methodology and study design

This research set out to examine if a commonly used digital platform that exhibits two sides of an argument can be utilized to open minds and reduce opinion polarization. We examined the effects of a single exposure to the format, a single exposure preceded by an affirming FITD message, multiple exposures concerning one issue (race), and multiple exposures regarding multiple issues. To best examine the effects of these interventions on open-mindedness and polarization we used a novel method

Open-mindedness

We first looked at peoples' reported open-mindedness beyond experimental condition. We found that generally participants perceived themselves as open-minded as the mean reported open-mindedness was higher than the mid-point of the scale (M = 5.09, SD = 0.86). Furthermore, the more people reported being a part of a filter bubble (M = 5.09, SD = 1.27), the less open-minded they reported being ( r = −0.19, p < .001). We then examined whether there were differences in open-mindedness between the

Discussion

This research set out to assess to what extent can a digital platform be useful in aiding online readers' willingness to consider an opposing opinion and reducing opinion polarization. Finding a method that can assist with open-mindedness and opinion polarization can potentially penetrate online "filter bubbles" in an era of substantial growth of communication via digital platforms and social networks. It used a novel method of an intervention tournament to assess the beneficial effect of

Summary and next steps

The contribution of this research lies both in theory and empirical application. This research expanded knowledge to the theoretical body of research on open-mindedness, confirmation bias and opinion polarization. It also shows that implementations of techniques aimed at increasing open-mindedness and reducing opinion polarization can be implemented via digital platforms that offer two sides of an argument, such as "The Perspective". ⁷

Limitations & future research

Our results should be interpreted in the context of several limitations: A. We cannot deny a possible influence of social desirability bias or demand characteristics on the results of our research. It is possible that the participants who read "The Perspective" articles for 5 days, understood the goal of the research and answered the questionnaire accordingly. However, as mentioned, we wanted the experimental context to be natural, and it was the only way to test multiple exposures to the

Conclusion

The present research showed that exposing people to "The Perspective" articles, which present both sides of each story while using a unique psychological editorial methodology, increases open-mindedness and decreases opinion polarization-two grand universals maladies which are fueled by digital platforms. As digital communication and specifically social network discourse is increasing rapidly, recommendations for creating such a platform are essential. It is our hope that this study will

Author statement

Gali Einav: Conceptualization, Supervision, Writing-Original Draft preparation, Project administration Ofir Allen: Methodology, Data curation, Writing - Original draft preparation, Investigation Tamar Gur: Methodology, Validation, Visualization, Investigation. Yossi Maaravi: Original Draft Preparation, Reviewing and Editing. Daniel Ravner Original Draft Preparation, Software, Validation, Resources.

Understanding and controlling the filter bubble through interactive visualization: a user study

Bursting The Filter Bubble: Democracy, Design, and Ethics

Beyond the filter bubble: interactive effects of perceived threat and topic involvement on selective exposure to information

Filter Bubbles, Echo Chambers, and Fake News: How Social Media Conditions Individuals to Be Less Critical of Political Misinformation

Homophily and acrophily as drivers of political segregation

Fake News: How Our Brains Lead Us into Echo Chambers that Promote Racism and Sexism

View full text

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Bursting filter bubbles in a digital age: Opening minds and reducing opinion polarization through digital platforms

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Filter Bubbles, exacerbated by use of digital platforms, have accelerated opinion polarization. This research builds on calls for interventions aimed ...

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“Soft Surveillance: Social Media Filter Bubbles as an Invitation to Critical Digital Literacies” on Manifold @CUNY

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Screentime Monitoring | Safes Parental Control App

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Digital Literacy: How to Burst the Social Media Filter Bubble

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In this blog post, we will explore how filter bubbles can impact our children’s understanding of the world and what we can do to burst them.

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Add to saved lessons

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LESSON OVERVIEW

This ESL lesson plan deals with the topic of filter bubbles. The term was coined by Eli Pariser and it means a situation in which someone only hears or sees news and information that supports what they already believe and like, especially a situation created on the Internet as a result of algorithms that choose the results of someone's searches. The lesson plan also includes some common Internet vocabulary.

Big shout-out to Michael Love who brought the idea of doing this lesson to us and even gave us a good video to work on! Thanks again for the inspiration!

B2 / Upper Intermediate 60 min Standard Lesson Free / Premium Plan

INTERNET VOCABULARY

The worksheet starts with a task on Internet vocabulary. Students have to read eight questions and then complete them with words given. There are such words as to scroll down, to bookmark, to browse, live streaming, etc. After that, they can check in pairs if they've filled in the gaps correctly. Next, they need to work in pairs or groups and answer questions from ex. 1.

VIDEO

Before watching the video, students read a statement by Mark Zuckerberg and discuss whether they agree with it or not. Make your students elaborate on their opinions. Then, students watch an interactive video about filter bubbles. They have to follow the instructions that appear on the screen and do various tasks. There are five tasks they will need to do throughout the video, including listening comprehension, vocabulary and discussion points. You can find the questions and answers in the Teacher's Version of the worksheet.

Remember that you can click the replay button when the video stops for a task. This will play again only a selected part of the video relevant to that question.

POST-VIDEO VOCABULARY

After watching the video, your students will have to match parts of phrases to create collocations. Some of the phrases are taken straight from the video so your students might have it easier. Nevertheless, all of these phrases will prove useful during the next stage - discussion.

DISCUSSION

The lesson finishes with some discussion points. Divide your class into small groups (3-4 people) and ask them to discuss the provided questions. Encourage your students to use the vocabulary they've learnt in the previous tasks. All the discussion points are obviously related to the concept of filter bubbles, personalized search results and the their consequences. Enjoy!

EXTRA WORKSHEET - Internet slang you need to know

As we talk about the world of the Internet, you might find our extra worksheet on Internet slang useful. It looks into such funny expressions as FOMO, YOLO, epic fail, facepalm, etc. It's just the language that most Internet users will encounter one day while browsing the web. Check it out at Top 10 Internet slang words you need to know.

WORKSHEETS

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Teach your students some Internet vocabulary, introduce them to the concept of filter bubbles through our interactive video and engage them in a discussion!

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Fake News & Filter Bubbles: our new media literacy lesson plans - Young Citizens

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Young Citizens has launched two new resources for secondary schools to develop media literacy and digital citizenship. On average,…

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Teaching Students About the Meaning of Confirmation Bias

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Spread the loveConfirmation bias is a common psychological phenomenon that affects how people interpret information and make decisions. It refers to the tendency for people to seek out, interpret, and remember information that confirms their pre-existing beliefs or assumptions while ignoring or dismissing information that contradicts them.

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Editor's note: This post is part two of a series on teaching and learning how to know in 2017. Find part one, a discussion of key terms from cognitive science and media literacy, here. Find part three, a window into a classroom discussion on trust and knowledge, here. Find part four, a review of how students learn how to know (epistemological development) here. Find part five, a discussion of skepticism and bias, here. Find part six, an argument for teaching about diverse ideologies and perspectives, here.

"Everyone's all about the fake news (which is important to tackle critically) but who's talking about preparing youth for the REAL news?"
-Maha Bali, associate professor of practice at the Center for Learning and Teaching at the American University in Cairo, via Twitter

Have you ever noticed the high-altitude instructions on a box of brownie or cake mix that tell you to change the ingredients slightly to account for atmospheric differences? To me, this is what teaching in the current moment feels like: We are still making brownies, but we have to adjust the recipe just a bit to account for the atmospheric changes of the so-called " post-truth era." The previous entry in this series sought to help educators understand the array of key terms necessary for teaching students how to know in the contemporary media landscape-the atmospheric changes, to continue the metaphor. But even if teachers understand these terms generally, bringing them into the classroom meaningfully is indeed challenging.

Teachers, many with great skill and expertise, have been helping students learn to separate fact from fiction, identify bias and opinion, and practice critical thinking since well before the recent rise of fake news and echo chambers. The atmosphere is now different, but we are still baking brownies.

Of all the terms I described in the previous entry, confirmation bias is perhaps most accessible for students. It's also a good starting place for teachers looking to teach their students how to know in this new knowledge landscape. Teaching about this term in a non-political context is essential for avoiding partisan defensiveness. It's also a lot of fun.

As a quick refresher, confirmation bias refers to our tendency to more readily believe information that supports-or confirms-our existing worldviews and to exclude information that might contradict previously held assumptions.

In preparing to teach about confirmation bias, choose a topic about which you know students will have a range of deeply held opinions. Here in New England, the cheating accusations against the NFL's New England Patriots serve up a perfect test case. First, I asked students to indicate whether they were fans of the team (to find out how partisan they are). We then discussed the allegations that the Patriots cheated, with the more strident fans growing increasingly defensive. (Students were excited to find out later that prominent researchers have studied this example.) We then reflected on why it's challenging to accept evidence that doesn't fit with our worldviews. Students noted that no one likes to be wrong, that their identity as fans of the team took a hit if they acknowledged any cheating, and that evidence is rarely as clear-cut as those on any side of an argument would prefer.

Then we switched gears and started working on a fairly standard essay on the Industrial Revolution. Students first combed through several sources selected to include a variety of perspectives on whether the Industrial Revolution was a positive or negative experience for the United States. As students sifted through this evidence, we referred back to our conversation about the Patriots. Students immediately saw the connection, noting the importance of being skeptical of one's own ideas and letting the evidence, not pre-existing viewpoints, convince them. And because they had a thorough grounding in actual historical facts, they were able to grapple with the meaning of those facts and how much value to place on different pieces of evidence. They were then free to start laying out their arguments. In their conversations with one another and with me, they thought through counterarguments and responses to those counterarguments, strengthening their thinking in the process.

Students submitted their essays, and we had some time to informally debate in class. But in the informal debate, students could argue for or against the theses in their own and classmates' essays. This is a classic history class exercise, but because students had been primed to think about confirmation bias, they were even more adept than usual at scrutinizing and poking holes in their own and others' arguments.

In the weeks since that unit ended, students have referred to these ideas whenever we're in discussion, encouraging one another to re-examine their evidence and stay skeptical about their own viewpoints. We've discussed Manifest Destiny, for example, and looked at the ways the desire to see the United States' history in a positive light can make it harder for some to learn and acknowledge the atrocities committed against American Indians and to recognize this history of "expansion" as colonization. Students were eager to see this as an example of confirmation bias.

Investigating confirmation bias isn't tangential to the curricula. Fake news gets significant airtime right now in a time of partisanship, political polarization and declining confidence in the media. Still, concerns about the impact of fake news are actually concerns about learning to know. Through the work of cognitive scientists and neuroscientists, we understand more about how we know, and we teachers need to use that understanding in our classes. Equipped with even a cursory understanding, students can become more aware of how they form their thoughts, how to build knowledge and how to cultivate skepticism.

After all, the best way to teach students to avoid what's fake is to help them learn how to understand what's real.
Gold is aseventh- and eighth-grade history teacher at Moses Brown School in Providence, Rhode Island. You can reach him on Twitter @jonathansgold.

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Teaching Students About Confirmation Bias

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Concerns about the impact of fake news are actually concerns about learning to know. That's why teaching about confirmation bias is imperative.

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Recent studies show that students and adults alike have little trouble finding news, but they have a much harder time discerning whether it is true.

Teaching students how to research used to be limited to introducing them to library sources, but Google and other search engines have changed the game. The democratization of knowledge is arguably good for society, but one significant drawback is that it is incredibly easy to post false news online and make it look like it's coming from a legitimate news source.

To best serve students, a modern education must first start with teaching students to ask "Is it real or is it fake?"

Misconceptions about what constitutes truth

Researchers at Stanford University learned that students do a poor job of recognizing fake news. With so much student research happening online, this underscores why it is essential that teachers help students hone their ability to tell truth from fiction.

In another study, Northwestern University researchers discovered that students often base the value of an article on search engine returns - articles placed higher in Google's rankings are often believed to be more reliable. This is not necessarily the case.

Because discerning real from fake news relies on a skill set developed through practice, educators need to begin teaching news literacy early on. As soon as students begin online research, educators should tackle the question of fake news with them. Students should be taught to recognize certain characteristics of fake news.

A 10-question fake-news test

The News Literacy Project, a national organization focused on helping students become informed citizens, has developed a 10-question tool to identify red flags in online news sources. These questions focus on not only evaluating the date and source of the information, but they also consider rhetorical aspects such as the headline's intent to trigger an emotional reaction or encourage sharing.

Students introduced to these questions early in their researching life can internalize these checks and begin to use them with everything they read.

Teaching news literacy at every age

Recognizing fact or fiction in news articles should be introduced with a lesson that helps students understand the long-term drawbacks of relying upon fake news. Rachel Roberson has developed a lesson plan for KQED that walks older students through the negative influence of fake news. The lesson provides an additional set of questions or techniques for recognizing made-up media.

But age is no reason to wait to teach this key piece of media literacy. Using the News Literacy Project's chart, teachers can work with younger students to examine fake news stories or internet memes as well. The lesson may feel rudimentary, but it will begin to imbue students with an impulse to fact-check what they read. If taught and reviewed routinely, this impulse will become a first-line defense in student research habits.

A crucial first step in media literacy

Recognizing fake news isn't the full extent of media literacy, but it is important groundwork as students begin to develop rhetorical awareness. Using the News Literacy Project's chart, students may come to conclude that news is true, but something still does not feel right. In an era where yellow journalism is as plaguing as fake news, it is essential that educators use the fake-news discussion as a starting point, but continue their media literacy work to help students recognize that passing the "fake or real" test is a first, not final, step in choosing best sources for research.

My next piece will explore further lessons in media literacy to help students distinguish, beyond "fake or real," the manipulative tactics some articles use that may pass the fake-news sniff test but still don't make for effective research.
Monica Fuglei is a graduate of the University of Nebraska in Omaha and a current faculty member of Arapahoe Community College in Colorado, where she teaches composition and creative writing.

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Fake News: Teaching Students Why it Matters, How to Spot it | Resilient Educator

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Fake news online has become so common that teachers need to make a concerted effort to teach students to discern between what's real and what's made up.

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It's okay, but a bit wordy, with articles that are fairly lengthy and involved. I'm not sure that just looking at the name of a source would help you truly figure out if something's fake or not-you'd probably also have to do some Googling as well.

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Pick any of the big topics of the day - Brexit, climate change or Trump's immigration policies - and wander online.

What one is likely to find is radical polarization - different groups of people living in different worlds, populated with utterly different facts.

Many people want to blame the "social media bubble" - a belief that everybody sorts themselves into like-minded communities and hears only like-minded views.

From my perspective as a philosopher who thinks about communities and trust, this fails to get at the heart of the issue.

In my mind, the crucial issue right now isn't what people hear, but whom people believe.

Bubble or cult?

My research focuses on "epistemic bubbles" and "echo chambers." These are two distinct ideas, that people often blur together.

An epistemic bubble is what happens when insiders aren't exposed to people from the opposite side.

An echo chamber is what happens when insiders come to distrust everybody on the outside.

An epistemic bubble, for example, might form on one's social media feed. When a person gets all their news and political arguments from Facebook and all their Facebook friends share their political views, they're in an epistemic bubble. They hear arguments and evidence only from their side of the political spectrum. They're never exposed to the other side's views.

An echo chamber leads its members to distrust everybody on the outside of that chamber. And that means that an insider's trust for other insiders can grow unchecked.

Two communications scholars, Kathleen Hall Jamieson and Joseph Cappella, offered a careful analysis of the right-wing media echo chamber in their 2008 book, "The Echo Chamber."

Rush Limbaugh and the Fox News team, they said, systematically manipulated whom their followers trusted. Limbaugh presented the world as a simple binary - as a struggle only between good and evil. People were trustworthy if they were on Limbaugh's side. Anybody on the outside was malicious and untrustworthy.

In that way, an echo chamber is a lot like a cult.

Echo chambers isolate their members, not by cutting off their lines of communication to the world, but by changing whom they trust. And echo chambers aren't just on the right. I've seen echo chambers on the left, but also on parenting forums, nutritional forums and even around exercise methods.

In an epistemic bubble, outside voices aren't heard. In an echo chamber, outside voices are discredited.

Is it all just a bubble?

Many experts believe that the problem of today's polarization can be explained through epistemic bubbles.

According to legal scholar and behavioral economist Cass Sunstein, the main cause of polarization is that internet technologies have made the world such that people don't really run into the other side anymore.

Many people get their news from social media feeds. Their feeds get filled up with people like them - who usually share their political views. Eli Pariser, online activist and chief executive of Upworthy, spotlights how the invisible algorithms behind people's internet experience limit what they see.

For example, says Pariser, Google keeps track of its user's choices and preferences, and changes its search results to suit them. It tries to give individuals what they want - so liberal users, for example, tend to get search results that point them toward liberal news sites.

If the problem is bubbles, then the solution would be exposure. For Sunstein, the solution is to build more public forums, where people will run into the other side more often.

The real problem is trust

In my view, however, echo chambers are the real problem.

New research suggests there probably aren't any real epistemic bubbles. As a matter of fact, most people are regularly exposed to the other side.

Moreover, bubbles should be easy to pop: Just expose insiders to the arguments they've missed.

But this doesn't actually seem to work, in so many real-world cases. Take, for example, climate change deniers. They are fully aware of all the arguments on the other side. Often, they rattle off all the standard arguments for climate change, before dismissing them. Many of the standard climate change denial arguments involve claims that scientific institutions and mainstream media have been corrupted by malicious forces.

What's going on, in my view, isn't just a bubble. It's not that people's social media feeds are arranged so they don't run across any scientific arguments; it's that they've come to systematically distrust the institutions of science.

This is an echo chamber. Echo chambers are far more entrenched and far more resistant to outside voices than epistemic bubbles. Echo chamber members have been prepared to face contrary evidence. Their echo-chambered worldview has been arranged to dismiss that evidence at its source.

They're not totally irrational, either. In the era of scientific specialization, people must trust doctors, statisticians, biologists, chemists, physicists, nuclear engineers and aeronautical engineers, just to go about their day. And they can't always check with perfect accuracy whether they have put their trust in the right place.

An echo chamber member, however, distrusts the standard sources. Their trust has been redirected and concentrated inside the echo chamber.

To break somebody out of an echo chamber, you'd need to repair that broken trust. And that is a much harder task than simply bursting a bubble.

[ Deep knowledge, daily. Sign up for The Conversation's newsletter. ]

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The problem of living inside echo chambers

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Rush Limbaugh is said to have presented the world as a simple binary - as a struggle only between good and evil. That worked, as a philosopher explains, because many people live in echo chambers.

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Digital Media Literacy: What is an Echo Chamber?

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Learn how echo chambers can create misinformation and distort perspectives.

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We find ourselves in a filter bubble any time we're only surrounded by views and opinions we agree with, while being sheltered from opposing perspectives. Filter bubbles distort our understanding of the world and hamper our ability to make balanced decisions. Here's how to pop the bubble.
***

The Basics

Read the headline, tap, scroll, tap, tap, scroll.

It is a typical day and you are browsing your usual news site. The New Yorker, BuzzFeed, The New York Times, BBC, The Globe and Mail, take your pick. As you skim through articles, you share the best ones with like-minded friends and followers. Perhaps you add a comment.

Few of us sit down and decide to inform ourselves on a particular topic. For the most part, we pick up our smartphones or open a new tab, scroll through a favored site and click on whatever looks interesting. Or we look at Facebook or Twitter feeds to see what people are sharing. Chances are high that we are not doing this intending to become educated on a certain topic. No, we are probably waiting in line, reading on the bus or at the gym, procrastinating, or grappling with insomnia, looking for some form of entertainment.

We all do this skimming and sharing and clicking, and it seems so innocent. But many of us are uninformed about or uninterested in the forces affecting what we see online and how content affects us in return - and that ignorance has consequences.

The term "filter bubble" refers to the results of the algorithms that dictate what we encounter online. According to Eli Pariser, those algorithms create "a unique universe of information for each of us ... which fundamentally alters the way we encounter ideas and information."

Many sites offer personalized content selections, based on our browsing history, age, gender, location, and other data. The result is a flood of articles and posts that support our current opinions and perspectives to ensure that we enjoy what we see. Even when a site is not offering specifically targeted content, we all tend to follow people whose views align with ours. When those people share a piece of content, we can be sure it will be something we are also interested in.

That might not sound so bad, but filter bubbles create echo chambers. We assume that everyone thinks like us, and we forget that other perspectives exist.

Filter bubbles transcend web surfing. In important ways, your social circle is a filter bubble; so is your neighborhood. If you're living in a gated community, for example, you might think that reality is only BMWs, Teslas, and Mercedes. Your work circle acts as a filter bubble, too, depending on whom you know and at what level you operate.

One of the great problems with filters is our human tendency to think that what we see is all there is, without realizing that what we see is being filtered.

Eli Pariser on Filter Bubbles

The concept of filter bubbles was first identified by Eli Pariser, executive of Upworthy, activist, and author. In his revolutionary book Filter Bubbles, Pariser explained how Google searches bring up vastly differing results depending on the history of the user. He cites an example in which two people searched for "BP" (British Petroleum). One user saw news related to investing in the company. The other user received information about a recent oil spill.

Pariser describes how the internet tends to give us what we want:

Your computer monitor is a kind of one-way mirror, reflecting your own interests while algorithmic observers watch what you click.

Pariser terms this reflection a filter bubble, a "personal ecosystem of information." It insulates us from any sort of cognitive dissonance by limiting what we see. At the same time, virtually everything we do online is being monitored - for someone else's benefit.

Each time we click, watch, share, or comment, search engines and social platforms harvest information. In particular, this information serves to generate targeted advertisements. Most of us have experienced the odd sensation of deja vu as a product we took a look at online suddenly appears everywhere we go online, as well as in our email inboxes. Often this advertising continues until we succumb and purchase the product.

Targeted advertisements can help us to find what we need with ease, but costs exist:

Personalization is based on a bargain. In exchange for the service of filtering, you hand large companies an enormous amount of data about your daily life - much of which you might not trust your friends with.

The internet has changed a great deal from the early days, when people worried about strangers finding out who they were. Anonymity was once king. Now, our privacy has been sacrificed for the sake of advertising revenue:

What was once an anonymous medium where anyone could be anyone-where, in the words of the famous New Yorker cartoon, nobody knows you're a dog-is now a tool for soliciting and analyzing our personal data. According to one Wall Street Journal study, the top fifty Internet sites, from CNN to Yahoo to MSN, install an average of 64 data-laden cookies and personal tracking beacons each. Search for a word like "depression" on Dictionary. com, and the site installs up to 223 tracking cookies and beacons on your computer so that other Web sites can target you with antidepressants. Share an article about cooking on ABC News, and you may be chased around the Web by ads for Teflon-coated pots. Open-even for an instant-a page listing signs that your spouse may be cheating and prepare to be haunted with DNA paternity-test ads. The new Internet doesn't just know you're a dog; it knows your breed and wants to sell you a bowl of premium kibble.

The sources of this information can be unexpected. Companies gather it from places we might not even consider:

When you read books on your Kindle, the data about which phrases you highlight, which pages you turn, and whether you read straight through or skip around are all fed back into Amazon's servers and can be used to indicate what books you might like next. When you log in after a day reading Kindle e-books at the beach, Amazon can subtly customize its site to appeal to what you've read: If you've spent a lot of time with the latest James Patterson, but only glanced at that new diet guide, you might see more commercial thrillers and fewer health books.

One fact is certain. The personalization process is not crude or random. It operates along defined guidelines which are being refined every day. Honing occurs both on the whole and for individuals:

Most personalized filters are based on a three-step model. First, you figure out who people are and what they like. Then, you provide them with content and services that best fit them. Finally, you tune to get the fit just right. Your identity shapes your media. There's just one flaw in this logic: Media also shape identity. And as a result, these services may end up creating a good fit between you and your media by changing ... you.

In The Shallows, Nicholas Carr also covers online information collection. Carr notes that the more time we spend online, the richer the information we provide:

The faster we surf across the surface of the Web-the more links we click and pages we view-the more opportunities Google gains to collect information about us and to feed us advertisements. Its advertising system, moreover, is explicitly designed to figure out which messages are most likely to grab our attention and then to place those messages in our field of view. Every click we make on the Web marks a break in our concentration, a bottom-up disruption of our attention-and it's in Google's economic interest to make sure we click as often as possible.

Every single person who has ever spent time on the web knows how addictive the flow of stimulating information can be. No matter how disciplined we otherwise are, we cannot resist clicking related articles or scrolling through newsfeeds. There is a reason for this, as Pariser writes:

Personalized filters play to the most compulsive parts of you, creating "compulsive media" to get you to click things more.

In an attention economy, filter bubbles assist search engines, websites, and platforms in their goal to command the maximum possible share of our online time.

The Impact of Filter Bubbles

Each new technology brings with it a whole host of costs and benefits. Many are realized only as time passes. The invention of books led people to worry that memory and oral tradition would erode. Paper caused panic as young people switched from slates to this newfangled medium. Typewriters led to discussions of morality as female typists entered the job force and "distracted" men. The internet has been no exception. If anything, the issues presented by it are unique only in their complex intensity.

In particular, the existence of filter bubbles has led to widespread concern. Pariser writes:

Democracy requires citizens to see things from one another's point of view, but instead we're more and more enclosed in our own bubbles. Democracy requires a reliance on shared facts; instead we're being offered parallel but separate universes.

... Personalization filters serve a kind of invisible autopropaganda, indoctrinating us with our own ideas, amplifying our desire for things that are familiar and leaving us oblivious to the dangers lurking in the dark territory of the unknown.

Pariser quotes Jon Chait as saying:

Partisans are more likely to consume news sources that confirm their ideological beliefs. People with more education are more likely to follow political news. Therefore, people with more education can actually become mis-educated.

Many people have debated the impact of filter bubbles on the recent US election and the Brexit vote. In both cases, large numbers of people were shocked by the outcome. Even those within the political and journalistic worlds expected the inverse results.

"We become, neurologically, what we think."
- Nicholas Carr

In the case of the Brexit vote, a large percentage of those who voted to leave the European Union were older people who are less active online, meaning that their views are less visible. Those who voted to remain tended to be younger and more active online, meaning that they were in an echo chamber of similar attitudes.

Democracy requires everyone to be equally informed. Yet filter bubbles are distorting our ideas of the world. In a paper for Princeton University, Jacob N. Shapiro revealed the extent of the influence on our voting:

The results of these experiments demonstrate that (i) biased search rankings can shift the voting preferences of undecided voters by 20% or more, (ii) the shift can be much higher in some demographic groups, and (iii) search ranking bias can be masked so that people show no awareness of the manipulation. We call this type of influence, which might be applicable to a variety of attitudes and beliefs, the search engine manipulation effect. Given that many elections are won by small margins, our results suggest that a search engine company has the power to influence the results of a substantial number of elections with impunity. The impact of such manipulations would be especially large in countries dominated by a single search engine company.

Filter bubbles do not just occur on the internet. Shapiro provides an example from a decade ago of TV shifting the results of elections:

It is already well established that biased media sources such as newspapers, political polls, and television sway voters. A 2007 study by DellaVigna and Kaplan found, for example, that whenever the conservative-leaning Fox television network moved into a new market in the United States, conservative votes increased, a phenomenon they labeled the Fox News Effect. These researchers estimated that biased coverage by Fox News was sufficient to shift 10,757 votes in Florida during the 2000 US Presidential election: more than enough to flip the deciding state in the election, which was carried by the Republican presidential candidate by only 537 votes. The Fox News Effect was also found to be smaller in television markets that were more competitive.

However, Shapiro believes the internet has a more dramatic effect than other forms of media:

Search rankings are controlled in most countries today by a single company. If, with or without intervention by company employees, the algorithm that ranked election-related information favored one candidate over another, competing candidates would have no way of compensating for the bias. It would be as if Fox News were the only television network in the country. Biased search rankings would, in effect, be an entirely new type of social influence, and it would be occurring on an unprecedented scale. Massive experiments conducted recently by social media giant Facebook have already introduced other unprecedented types of influence made possible by the Internet. Notably, an experiment reported recently suggested that flashing "VOTE" advertisements to 61 million Facebook users caused more than 340,000 people to vote that day who otherwise would not have done so.

In the US election and the Brexit vote, filter bubbles caused people to become insulated from alternative views. Some critics have theorized that the widespread derision of Trump and Leave voters led them to be less vocal, keeping their opinions within smaller communities to avoid confrontation. Those who voted for Clinton or to Remain loudly expressed themselves within filtered communities. Everyone, it seemed, agreed with each other. Except, they didn't, and no one noticed until it was too late.

A further issue with filter bubbles is that they are something we can only opt out of, not something we consent to. As of March 2017, an estimated 1.94 billion people have a Facebook account, of which 1.28 billion log on every day. It is safe to assume that only a small percentage are informed about the algorithms. Considering that 40% of people regard Facebook as their main news source, this is worrying. As with cognitive biases, a lack of awareness amplifies the impact of filter bubbles.

We have minimal concrete evidence of exactly what information search engines and social platforms collect. Even SEO (search engine optimization) experts do not know for certain how search rankings are organized. We also don't know if sites collect information from users who do not have accounts.

Scandals are becoming increasingly common, as sites and services are found to be harvesting details without consent. For example, Evernote came under fire when documents revealed that staff members can access documents, and Unroll's nasty habit of selling details of user email habits led to criticism. Even when this information is listed in user agreements or disclaimers, it can be difficult for users to ascertain from the confusing jargon how their data are being used, by whom, and why.

In his farewell speech, President Obama aired his personal concerns:

[We] retreat into our own bubbles, ... especially our social media feeds, surrounded by people who look like us and share the same political outlook and never challenge our assumptions. ... And increasingly, we become so secure in our bubbles that we start accepting only information, whether it's true or not, that fits our opinions, instead of basing our opinions on the evidence that is out there.

Filter bubbles can cause cognitive biases and shortcuts to manifest, amplifying their negative impact on our ability to think in a logical and critical manner. A combination of social proof, availability bias, confirmation bias, and bias from disliking/liking is prevalent. As Pariser writes:

The filter bubble tends to dramatically amplify confirmation bias-in a way, it's designed to. Consuming information that conforms to our ideas of the world is easy and pleasurable; consuming information that challenges us to think in new ways or question our assumptions is frustrating and difficult. This is why partisans of one political stripe tend not to consume the media of another. As a result, an information environment built on click signals will favor content that supports our existing notions about the world over content that challenges them.

Pariser sums up the result of extensive filtration: "A world constructed from the familiar is the world in which there's nothing to learn."

Filter Bubbles and Group Psychology

We have an inherent desire to be around those who are like us and reinforce our worldview. Our online behavior is no different. People form tribes based on interests, location, employment, affiliation, and other details. These groups - subreddits, Tumblr fandoms, Facebook groups, Google+ circles, etc. - have their own rules, conventions, in-jokes, and even vocabulary. Within groups (even if members never meet each other), beliefs intensify. Anyone who disagrees may be ousted from the community. Sociologists call this behaviour "communal reinforcement" and stress that the ideas perpetuated can have no relation to reality or empirical evidence.

"When you're asked to fight a war that's over nothing, it's best to join the side that's going to win."
- Conor Oberst

Communal reinforcement can be positive. Groups geared towards people with mental health problems, chronic illnesses, addictions, and other issues are often supportive and assist many people who might not have another outlet.

However, when a group is encased within a filter bubble, it can lead to groupthink. This is a psychological phenomenon wherein groups of people experience a temporary loss of the ability to think in a rational, moral and realistic manner. When the members of a group are all exposed to the same confirmatory information, the results can be extreme. Symptoms include being excessively optimistic, taking risks, ignoring legal and social conventions, regarding those outside the group as enemies, censoring opposing ideas, and pressuring members to conform. As occurred with the US election and the Brexit vote, those experiencing groupthink within a filter bubble see themselves as in the right and struggle to consider alternative perspectives.

For example, imagine a Facebook group for Trump supporters in the months prior to the election. Members share pro-Trump news items, discuss policies and circulate cohesive information among themselves. Groupthink sets in, as the members selectively process information, fail to evaluate alternative viewpoints, fail to consider risks, haze any members who disagree, and even ignore the possibility of a negative outcome. From the outside, we can see the issues with a combination of filter bubbles and groupthink, but they can be hard to identify from the inside.

How Can We Avoid Filter Bubbles?

Thankfully, it is not difficult to pop the filter bubble if we make an effort to do so. Methods for doing this include:

Using ad-blocking browser extensions. These remove the majority of advertisements from websites we visit. The downside is that most sites rely on advertising revenue to support their work, and some (such as Forbes and Business Insider) insist on users' disabling ad blockers before viewing a page.

Reading news sites and blogs which aim to provide a wide range of perspectives. Pariser's own site, Upworthy, aims to do this. Others, including The Wall Street Journal, the New Yorker, BBC, and AP news claim to offer a balanced view of the world. Regardless of the sources we frequent, a brief analysis of the front page will provide a good idea of any biases. In the wake of the US election, a number of newsletters, sites, apps, and podcasts are working to pop the filter bubble. An excellent example is Colin Wright's podcast, Let's Know Things (http://letsknowthings.com/), which examines a news story in context each week.

Switching our focus from entertainment to education. As Nicholas Carr writes in The Shallows: "The Net's interactivity gives us powerful new tools for finding information, expressing ourselves, and conversing with others. It also turns us into lab rats constantly pressing levers to get tiny pellets of social or intellectual nourishment."

Using Incognito browsing, deleting our search histories, and doing what we need to do online without logging into our accounts.

Deleting or blocking browser cookies. For the uninitiated, many websites plant "cookies" (small text files) each time we visit them; those cookies are then used to determine what content to show us. Cookies can be manually deleted, and browser extensions are available which remove them. In some instances, cookies are useful, so removal should be done with discretion.

Fish don't know they are in the water and we don't know we are in a filter bubble unless we take the effort to (as David Bowie put it) leave the capsule - if you dare.

In shaping what we see, filter bubbles show us a distorted map and not the terrain. In so doing, they trick our brains into thinking that this is the reality. As technology improves and the ability of someone like the NYT, say, to show the same story to 100 different people using 100 different ways, the filter bubble becomes deeper. We lose track of what's filtered and what's not as the news becomes tailored to cement our existing opinions. After all, everyone wants to read a newspaper that agrees with them.

Systems - be they people, cultures, or web browsing, to name a few examples - naturally have to filter information and thus they reduce options. Sometimes people make decisions, sometimes cultures make them, and increasingly algorithms make them. As the speed of information flowing through these systems increases, filters will play an even more important role.

Understanding that what we see is not all there is will help us realize that we're living in a distorted world and remind us to take off the glasses.

For more information on filter bubbles, consider reading Filter Bubbles by Eli Pariser, So, You've Been Publicly Shamed by Jon Ronson, The Shallows by Nicholas Carr or The Net Delusion by Evgeny Morozov.

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How Filter Bubbles Distort Reality: Everything You Need to Know

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Filter Bubbles exist everywhere. From Google searches to information flow in organizations. Here's everything you need to know about this mental model.

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What Is Confirmation Bias? | Psychological Explanation & Examples

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Fake news is a popular term and a matter of heated debate today, especially in politics.

So, what is fake and what is real? And how do we protect our students from misinformation?

Those are questions all of us teachers have asked at some point or another.

As we've seen first hand, fake news and manipulating information online can not only shape public opinion but also affect the outcome of national elections.

Examples of fake news for elementary or high school students can include clickbait news, apps, games, vlogs and photoshopped/altered images. But that's just scratching the surface.

That's why teaching media literacy skills has quickly become a top concern for K-12 educators.

As students increasingly access news online from social media, teachers are tasked with helping their students recognize bias in the media and teaching them to exercise healthy skepticism with what they consume on social media.

Are our students digitally naive?

A recent Stanford study showed that digitally-savvy students lack in the critical thinking and digital literacy skills needed to weed out fake news stories from real ones.

The study concluded that "overall, young people's ability to reason about the information on the Internet can be summed up in one word: bleak. Our 'digital natives' may be able to flit between Facebook and Twitter while simultaneously uploading a selfie to Instagram and texting a friend. But when it comes to evaluating information that flows through social media channels, they are easily duped."

As a teacher, you can use many strategies and techniques to teach your students the media literacy skills they need to distinguish fact from fiction and combat the growing problem of fake news.

Here are some tips to help your students navigate the current media landscape and discern what online information is legitimate or fake:

1. Make fake news a teachable moment for you, as well as your students.

2. Bring social media into the classroom.

3. Teach your students effective Google search skills.

4. Show your students how to evaluate the source.

5. Foster an atmosphere that encourages open communication.

Make fake news a teachable moment for you, as well as your students.

You don't have to be a media expert to teach media literacy to others.

Technology and media are concepts that are often unfamiliar territory for many teachers, and this is totally understandable. Our digital world is changing by the minute, making everyone a student.

Organizations like The News Literacy Project have begun to create a curriculum that responds to this growing problem.

There is also a great digital literacy training course designed to help teachers update their teaching practice for the 21st-century classroom.

Fake news is becoming harder to detect, even for adults, so teachers must be open to learning along with their students.

Bring social media into the classroom.

Discussing current events that students are interested in is a great opportunity for extra analysis.

Trending topics on social media is a key to engaging your students in an active discussion about what's happening online and decoding what could be spin, bias or outright lies.

Teach your students effective Google search skills.

While the internet can be a source of misinformation, it can also be a great fact-debunking tool.

There are many useful fact-checking resources online, like FactCheck.org and PolitiFact.

Teach your students how to do a Google reverse image search, as well, so they can quickly verify for themselves which images are real and which have been manipulated in some way.

Show your students how to evaluate the source.

Help your students spot fake news by encouraging them to ask questions and critically evaluate what they read and see online.

Before they can determine whether a source is credible, they need to know the right research techniques to evaluate online media.

Some questions they should ask when students are evaluating sources are:

Is the media outlet a well-known source of traditional news?

Is the site secure?

Does the formatting look off?

Are there grammatical errors?

Can you find reports of the same event on other news outlets?

Do the dates match up?

Who wrote the news piece?

How credible is the author?

Does the piece cite primary sources?

What personal reaction is the news piece attempting to elicit in the reader (remember, propaganda is usually written with the intent of making the reader feel strong emotions)?

Is it pushing a narrow point of view in an overt, or subtle, way?

Students can begin to reach their own conclusions on what is satire, clickbait, biased news or entirely fake by asking these questions first.

Foster an atmosphere that encourages open communication.

On top of promoting their reasoning skills, providing students with opportunities to acquire media literacy will also prepare them to make informed judgments on the issues that will shape their lives.

First, though, students need to feel comfortable sharing their thoughts and questions when analyzing media and decoding fake news.

When discussing political or controversial issues in the classroom, for example, conversations may get heated. Our brains are wired to seek out information that agrees with our current beliefs.

Everyone is likely to have their own conscious or unconscious bias around certain issues (including yourself!), so make sure you keep an open mind and encourage your students to do the same.

If a student doesn't feel comfortable, they may think twice before bringing up an important point that will help them challenge a news piece's validity.

It's vital that teachers keep the classroom atmosphere lighthearted and positive. Looking at the media through a clear lens is the only way to come to a real conclusion on its validity.

It's official - fake news is here to stay. Now, more than ever, students need our help to better navigate the web and be able to detect what is fake and what's real. Please share your top teaching strategies and tips for helping your students develop essential media literacy skills in the comments below!

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5 ways teachers can help their students easily spot fake news | Teach Away

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Fake news is a popular term and a matter of heated debate today, especially in politics. So, what is fake and what is real? And how do we

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One of the great educational conundrums of the moment is how to help Americans navigate a digital landscape filled with fake news, dubious claims, and rank disinformation. Educators, like the rest of us, are searching for practical strategies. That's what makes Stanford University's Sam Wineburg so interesting.

The usual methods teachers use for addressing online credibility are mostly unhelpful. Stanford's ... [+]
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Wineburg, Stanford's Margaret Jacks Professor of Education, studies how people judge the credibility of digital content. A former history teacher with a PhD in education psychology, he's perhaps the nation's leading scholar when it comes to helping people figure out what's actually true on the Internet. I recently had the chance to talk with him about his work and the practical lessons it holds.

Wineburg approaches his work with a simple guiding principle: "If you want to know what people do on the Internet, don't ask them what they would do. Put them in front of a computer and watch them do it."

He recounts a 2019 experiment studying how high school students evaluate digital sources, in which 3,000 students performed a series of web tasks. One task asked students to evaluate a website about climate change. Wineburg notes, "When you Google the group behind it, you learn that they're funded by Exxon-a clear conflict of interest. Yet, 92 percent of students never made the link. Why? Because their eyes remained glued to the original site." In other words, looking into the source of information is essential to judging its veracity-and yet, students didn't make that leap.

In another study, Wineburg compared how a group of PhD students and Stanford undergraduates stacked up against fact-checkers at leading news outlets in New York and Washington when it came to assessing the credibility of unfamiliar websites. He says that fact-checkers speedily "saw through common digital ruses" while trained scholars "often spun around in circles."

Why? Wineburg concludes, "The intelligent people we've studied are invested in their intelligence. That investment often gets them in trouble. Because they're smart, they think they can outsmart the Web." The result is that when they see a professional-looking website with scholarly references, they conclude it's legitimate. "Basically," he says, "they're reading the web like a piece of static print-thinking that they can determine what something is by looking at it . . . On the Internet, hubris is your Achilles heel."

Fact-checkers employ a different approach, one that Wineburg terms "lateral reading." This involves only briefly looking at a website, then leaving it to search for background information on the organization or group behind the original site to determine if it is worth returning to. "In other words," he says, "they learn about a site by leaving it to consult the broader Web."

The problem for educators, according to Wineburg, is that this goes against the grain of how teachers usually teach students to evaluate a text. Usually, students are taught to read carefully and fully, and only then render judgment. "Yet, on the Web, where attention is scarce, expending precious minutes reading a text, before you know who produced it and why, is a colossal waste of time," Wineburg says.

In fact, the usual methods teachers use for addressing online credibility are mostly unhelpful. Wineburg laments that we often approach the subject like a game of twenty questions. We ask, "'Is the site a .org?' If so, 'It's good.' 'Is it a .com?' If so, 'It's bad.' 'Does it have contact information?' That makes it 'good.' But if it has banner ads? 'It's bad.'" The problem, he says, "is that bad actors read these lists, too, and each of these features is ludicrously easy to game."

To help teachers wrestling with all this, Wineburg and his collaborators have created a "digital literacy curriculum" with 65 classroom-ready lessons and assessments, a complementary set of videos, and an online course on "Online Civic Reasoning" done with MIT's Teaching Systems Lab. Wineburg notes that all of these materials are free and can be downloaded by registering at sheg.stanford.edu.

Wineburg thinks we should be teaching these skills from "the moment we give [kids] a smartphone" and that "we're deluding ourselves" if we imagine that schools adding "an elective" will be enough to "drag us out of this mess." Rather, he wants educators to ask: "How, in the face of our current digital assault, do we rethink the teaching of history, science, civics, and language arts-the basics?"

Ultimately, Wineburg says, "On every question we face as citizens-to raise the minimum wage, to legalize marijuana, to tax sugary drinks, to abolish private prisons, you name it-sham sources jostle for our attention right next to trustworthy ones. Failing to teach kids the difference is educational negligence."

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How Can Educators Teach Students To Spot Fake News?

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The usual methods teachers use for addressing online credibility are mostly unhelpful. Stanford's Sam Wineburg offers a better approach.

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By Sierra Filucci | March 5, 2021

This just in! Breaking news! You don't want to miss THIS!

If you get your news online or from social media, this type of headline sounds very familiar. What's real? What's fake? What's satire? Now that anyone with access to a phone or computer can publish information online, it's getting harder to tell. But as more people go to Facebook, Snapchat, Twitter and other online sources for their news and information, it's even more crucial that all of us -- especially kids -- learn to decode what we read online. (Learn more about how kids get their news and how they feel about it in Common Sense Media's report, News and America's Kids: How Young People Perceive and Are Impacted by the News.)

When fake news, such as false claims about the coronavirus, has threatened people's safety, tech companies have joined forces to crack down on the misinformation super-spreaders. But ad-supported networks are in somewhat of a bind, since they get money when users click on these stories -- so the crazier the headline, the more money they make. Most kids and teens get their news from their feeds, so they need to learn how to view stories critically (and they should learn that skill anyway!). Even little kids can start to think about some key media-literacy questions. And as kids get older, parents can help kids become more sophisticated critical thinkers. (If your kid's school is tackling media-literacy issues, consider sharing this with their teachers.)

Here are a few basic questions to consider whenever you and your kids encounter a piece of media:

Who made this?

Who is the target audience?

Who paid for this? Or, who gets paid if you click on this?

Who might benefit or be harmed by this message?

What is left out of this message that might be important?

Is this credible (and what makes you think that)?

(Thanks to Project Look Sharp for these questions.)

Older kids especially might enjoy learning tricks to spot fake news. Here are a few things to watch for:

Look for unusual URLs or site names, including those that end with ".co" -- these are often trying to appear like legitimate news sites, but they aren't.

Look for signs of low quality, such as words in all caps, headlines with glaring grammatical errors, bold claims with no sources, and sensationalist images (women in bikinis are popular clickbait on fake news sites). These are clues that you should be skeptical of the source.

Check a site's "About Us" section. Find out who supports the site or who is associated with it. If this information doesn't exist -- and if the site requires that you register before you can learn anything about its backers -- you have to wonder why they aren't being transparent.

Check Snopes, Wikipedia, and Google before trusting or sharing news that seems too good (or bad) to be true.

Consider whether other credible, mainstream news outlets are reporting the same news. If they're not, it doesn't mean it's not true, but it does mean you should dig deeper.

Check your emotions. Clickbait and fake news strive for extreme reactions. If the news you're reading makes you really angry or super smug, it could be a sign that you're being played. Check multiple sources before trusting.

(Thanks to Professor Melissa Zimdars of Merrimack College for some of these tips.)

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How to Spot Fake News (and Teach Kids to Be Media-Savvy)

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Clickbait, hyper-partisan opinion, and completely false information are running wild across the internet. Advice from Common Sense Media editors.

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The definitive Internet reference source for researching urban legends, folklore, myths, rumors, and misinformation.

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Downloadable Lesson Documents

Key Vocabulary

1. Echo chamber - an environment where a person only encounters information or opinions that reflect and reinforce their own

2. Algorithm - set of rules used to rank, filter and organize the content for users within certain social media platforms.

3. Confirmation Bias - the tendency to seek out or give greater weight to information that supports our pre-existing beliefs and expectations.

Before You Watch

Why is it often important to listen to more than one side of an issue?

While You Watch

Preview the questions. Then answer them while you watch the MediaWise Teen-Fact Checking Network (TFCN) video. According to the video...

1. The main goals of social media algorithms are to keep you _______________ so you stay on the platform for as long as possible, _______________ with the content by sharing or commenting and come _______________ to it later.

2. What are the positive aspects of social media echo chambers?

3. What are some negative aspects of echo chambers that can lead to bad consequences?

4. How can you avoid echo chambers on social media?

Follow left and right-leaning information sources to _____________ your news sources.

_______________ interacting with controversial posts-the algorithm will stop feeding them to you

_______________ political, scientific or conspiratorial posts

_______________ everything to confuse the algorithm

After You Watch

Watch this teen CBC reporter explain how algorithms work . Use the words provided to fill in the blanks on the " Student Handout".

Coming Up Next

Be MediaWise Lesson 7: Evaluating a scientific claim-Students will learn how to combat online science misinformation using lateral reading by investigating a post about an NFL football player's collapse on the field.

Standards

Common Core ELA CC.8.5.6-8; CC.8.5.9-10.A; CC.8.5.11-12.A
Citing informational text.

College, Career, and Civic Life (C3) D3.1.6-12

Gather relevant information from multiple sources while using the origin, authority, structure, context, and corroborative value of the sources to guide the selection.

ISTE 6-12.1.4.a
Students: know and use a deliberate design process for generating ideas, testing theories, creating innovative artifacts or solving authentic problems.

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Be MediaWise lesson 6: How social media algorithms create echo chambers

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Learn how algorithms work and how they can create echo chambers

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Talk of fake news is everywhere but how do you begin to teach about it in the classroom? Start with an exploration of the rise of fake news, and why kids should care. Then, delve into the media literacy skills that students need to evaluate news critically. Teaching your students about fake news and how to identify it has never been more important.

What is Fake News and Why is it a Problem?

Dictionary.com recently added a definition for the term fake news:

Fake news: false news stories, often of a sensational nature, created to be widely shared online for the purpose of generating ad revenue via web traffic or discrediting a public figure, political movement, company, etc.

Fake news is created in order to influence public opinion about an issue or an election and for some it is about making money - it's meant to be spread and be clickbait for online users.

In this amazing NPR interview, students can hear directly from a man who creates fake news for a living. He talks about both why and how he makes fake news: Hearing from a Fake News Creator.

What Makes Fake News a Problem?

The internet has changed the way we view and create our own news and information. Fake news has been part of America's media landscape since the colonial period, but the sheer volume of information at our fingertips today, thanks to social media, has changed the dynamics.

A recent Stanford Graduate School of Education report shows that many students have trouble judging the credibility of information online. The results showed that 80-90 percent of high school students had a difficult time judging the credibility of news.
Listen to this story about the research called "How Can Students Become Prepared to Spot Fake News" with your students.
How Does Social Media Help Spread of Fake News?

Teaching your students about fake news goes hand-in-hand with taking a critical look at the role of social media. Social media plays a major role in the spread of fake news by fueling the sharing of fake news- often without people realizing they are becoming part of the problem.

Research shows that Facebook is one of the main ways people are accessing political news online. These resources illustrate for students how and why a story can be fake or inaccurate but still widely shared.

Here are some Listenwise lessons that address the connection between social media and the spread of fake news:

How to Teach Your Students About Fake News

1. Teach students to think like fact checkers.

Students can use these checklists and strategies to learn how to fact check and vet information to know which sources to trust and which to reject.

Fact Checking Websites

Chrome Browser Extension

2. Familiarize Students with REAL news

In order to spot fake news students need to understand what real news looks and sounds like. Here is a great list of news sites to find lessons and resources to build media literacy skills with your K-12 students:

3. Guided and independent practice in the classroom

Still looking for more fake news lessons and classroom activities? Here are other resources for combating fake news in your classroom:

Lessons

Resources

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Teaching Your Students About Fake News -

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Explore Listenwise's classroom resources and lesson plans on teaching your students about fake news and media literacy.

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Fake news is nothing new. But bogus stories can reach more people more quickly via social media than what good old-fashioned viral emails could accomplish in years past.

Concern about the phenomenon led Facebook and Google to announce that they'll crack down on fake news sites, restricting their ability to garner ad revenue. Perhaps that could dissipate the amount of malarkey online, though news consumers themselves are the best defense against the spread of misinformation.

Not all of the misinformation being passed along online is complete fiction, though some of it is. Snopes.com has been exposing false viral claims since the mid 1990s, whether that's fabricated messages, distortions containing bits of truth and everything in between. Founder David Mikkelson warned in a Nov. 17 article not to lump everything into the "fake news" category. "The fictions and fabrications that comprise fake news are but a subset of the larger bad news phenomenon, which also encompasses many forms of shoddy, unresearched, error-filled, and deliberately misleading reporting that do a disservice to everyone," he wrote.

A lot of these viral claims aren't "news" at all, but fiction, satire and efforts to fool readers into thinking they're for real.

We've long encouraged readers to be skeptical of viral claims, and make good use of the delete key when a chain email hits their inboxes. In December 2007, we launched our Ask FactCheck feature, where we answer readers' questions, the vast majority of which concern viral emails, social media memes and the like. Our first story was about a made-up email that claimed then-House Speaker Nancy Pelosi wanted to put a "windfall" tax on all stock profits of 100 percent and give the money to, the email claimed, "the 12 Million Illegal Immigrants and other unemployed minorities." We called it "a malicious fabrication" - that's "fake news" in today's parlance.

In 2008, we tried to get readers to rid their inboxes of this kind of garbage. We described a list of red flags - we called them Key Characteristics of Bogusness - that were clear tip-offs that a chain email wasn't legitimate. Among them: an anonymous author; excessive exclamation points, capital letters and misspellings; entreaties that "This is NOT a hoax!"; and links to sourcing that does not support or completely contradicts the claims being made.

Those all still hold true, but fake stories - as in, completely made-up "news" - have grown more sophisticated, often presented on a site designed to look (sort of) like a legitimate news organization. Still, we find it's easy to figure out what's real and what's imaginary if you're armed with some critical thinking and fact-checking tools of the trade.

Here's our advice on how to spot a fake:

Consider the source. In recent months, we've fact-checked fake news from abcnews.com.co (not the actual URL for ABC News), WTOE 5 News (whose "about" page says it's "a fantasy news website"), and the Boston Tribune (whose "contact us" page lists only a gmail address). Earlier this year, we debunked the claim that the Obamas were buying a vacation home in Dubai, a made-up missive that came from WhatDoesItMean.com, which describes itself as "One Of The Top Ranked Websites In The World for New World Order, Conspiracy Theories and Alternative News" and further says on its site that most of what it publishes is fiction.

Clearly, some of these sites do provide a "fantasy news" or satire warning, like WTOE 5, which published the bogus headline, "Pope Francis Shocks World, Endorses Donald Trump for President, Releases Statement." Others aren't so upfront, like the Boston Tribune, which doesn't provide any information on its mission, staff members or physical location - further signs that maybe this site isn't a legitimate news organization. The site, in fact, changed its name from Associated Media Coverage, after its work had been debunked by fact-checking organizations.

Snopes.com, which has been writing about viral claims and online rumors since the mid-1990s, maintains a list of known fake news websites, several of which have emerged in the past two years.

Read beyond the headline. If a provocative headline drew your attention, read a little further before you decide to pass along the shocking information. Even in legitimate news stories, the headline doesn't always tell the whole story. But fake news, particularly efforts to be satirical, can include several revealing signs in the text. That abcnews.com.co story that we checked, headlined "Obama Signs Executive Order Banning The Pledge Of Allegiance In Schools Nationwide," went on to quote "Fappy the Anti-Masturbation Dolphin." We have to assume that the many readers who asked us whether this viral rumor was true hadn't read the full story.

Check the author. Another tell-tale sign of a fake story is often the byline. The pledge of allegiance story on abcnews.com.co was supposedly written by "Jimmy Rustling." Who is he? Well, his author page claims he is a "doctor" who won "fourteen Peabody awards and a handful of Pulitzer Prizes." Pretty impressive, if true. But it's not. No one by the name of "Rustling" has won a Pulitzer or Peabody award. The photo accompanying Rustling's bio is also displayed on another bogus story on a different site, but this time under the byline " Darius Rubics." The Dubai story was written by "Sorcha Faal, and as reported to her Western Subscribers." The Pope Francis story has no byline at all.

What's the support? Many times these bogus stories will cite official - or official-sounding - sources, but once you look into it, the source doesn't back up the claim. For instance, the Boston Tribune site wrongly claimed that President Obama's mother-in-law was going to get a lifetime government pension for having babysat her granddaughters in the White House, citing "the Civil Service Retirement Act" and providing a link. But the link to a government benefits website doesn't support the claim at all.

The banning-the-pledge story cites the number of an actual executive order - you can look it up. It doesn't have anything to do with the Pledge of Allegiance.

Another viral claim we checked a year ago was a graphic purporting to show crime statistics on the percentage of whites killed by blacks and other murder statistics by race. Then-presidential candidate Donald Trump retweeted it, telling Fox News commentator Bill O'Reilly that it came "from sources that are very credible." But almost every figure in the image was wrong - FBI crime data is publicly available - and the supposed source given for the data, "Crime Statistics Bureau - San Francisco," doesn't exist.

Recently, we've received several questions about a fake news story on the admittedly satirical site Nevada County Scooper, which wrote that Vice President-elect Mike Pence, in a "surprise announcement," credited gay conversion therapy for saving his marriage. Clearly such a "surprise announcement" would garner media coverage beyond a website you've never heard of. In fact, if you Google this, the first link that comes up is a Snopes.com article revealing that this is fake news.

Check the date. Some false stories aren't completely fake, but rather distortions of real events. These mendacious claims can take a legitimate news story and twist what it says - or even claim that something that happened long ago is related to current events.

Since Trump was elected president, we've received many inquiries from readers wanting to know whether Ford had moved car production from Mexico to Ohio, because of Trump's election. Readers cited various blog items that quoted from and linked to a CNN Money article titled " Ford shifts truck production from Mexico to Ohio." But that story is from August 2015, clearly not evidence of Ford making any move due to the outcome of the election. (A reminder again to check the support for these claims.)

One deceptive website didn't credit CNN, but instead took CNN's 2015 story and slapped a new headline and publication date on it, claiming, "Since Donald Trump Won The Presidency... Ford Shifts Truck Production From Mexico To Ohio." Not only is that a bogus headline, but the deception involves copyright infringement.

If this Ford story sounds familiar, that's because the CNN article has been distorted before.

In October 2015, Trump wrongly boasted that Ford had changed its plans to build new plants in Mexico, and instead would build a plant in Ohio. Trump took credit for Ford's alleged change of heart and tweeted a link to a story on a blog called Prntly.com, which cited the CNN Money story. But Ford hadn't changed its plans at all, and Trump deserved no credit.

In fact, the CNN article was about the transfer of some pickup assembly work from Mexico to Ohio, a move that was announced by Ford in March 2014. The plans for new plants in Mexico were still on, Ford said. "Ford has not spoken with Mr. Trump, nor have we made any changes to our plans," Ford said in a statement.

Is this some kind of joke? Remember, there is such thing as satire. Normally, it's clearly labeled as such, and sometimes it's even funny. Andy Borowitz has been writing a satirical news column, the Borowitz Report, since 2001, and it has appeared in the New Yorker since 2012. But not everyone gets the jokes. We've fielded several questions on whether Borowitz's work is true.

Among the headlines our readers have flagged: " Putin Appears with Trump in Flurry of Swing-State Rallies" and " Trump Threatens to Skip Remaining Debates If Hillary Is There." When we told readers these were satirical columns, some indicated that they suspected the details were far-fetched but wanted to be sure.

And then there's the more debatable forms of satire, designed to pull one over on the reader. That "Fappy the Anti-Masturbation Dolphin" story? That's the work of online hoaxer Paul Horner, whose "greatest coup," as described by the Washington Post in 2014, was when Fox News mentioned, as fact, a fake piece titled, "Obama uses own money to open Muslim museum amid government shutdown." Horner told the Post after the election that he was concerned his hoaxes aimed at Trump supporters may have helped the campaign.

The posts by Horner and others - whether termed satire or simply "fake news" - are designed to encourage clicks, and generate money for the creator through ad revenue. Horner told the Washington Post he makes a living off his posts. Asked why his material gets so many views, Horner responded, "They just keep passing stuff around. Nobody fact-checks anything anymore."

Check your biases. We know this is difficult. Confirmation bias leads people to put more stock in information that confirms their beliefs and discount information that doesn't. But the next time you're automatically appalled at some Facebook post concerning, say, a politician you oppose, take a moment to check it out.

Try this simple test: What other stories have been posted to the "news" website that is the source of the story that just popped up in your Facebook feed? You may be predisposed to believe that Obama bought a house in Dubai, but how about a story on the same site that carries this headline: " Antarctica 'Guardians' Retaliate Against America With Massive New Zealand Earthquake." That, too, was written by the prolific "Sorcha Faal, and as reported to her Western Subscribers."

We're encouraged by some of the responses we get from readers, who - like the ones uncertain of Borowitz's columns - express doubt in the outrageous, and just want to be sure their skepticism is justified. But we are equally discouraged when we see debunked claims gain new life.

We've seen the resurgence of a fake quote from Donald Trump since the election - a viral image that circulated last year claims Trump told People magazine in 1998: "If I were to run, I'd run as a Republican. They're the dumbest group of voters in the country. They believe anything on Fox News. I could lie and they'd still eat it up. I bet my numbers would be terrific." We found no such quote in People's archives from 1998, or any other year. And a public relations representative for the magazine confirmed that. People' s Julie Farin told us in an email last year: "We combed through every Trump story in our archive. We couldn't find anything remotely like this quote -and no interview at all in 1998."

Comedian Amy Schumer may have contributed to the revival of this fake meme. She put it on Instagram, adding at the end of a lengthy message, "Yes this quote is fake but it doesn't matter."

Consult the experts. We know you're busy, and some of this debunking takes time. But we get paid to do this kind of work. Between FactCheck.org, Snopes.com, the Washington Post Fact Checker and PolitiFact.com, it's likely at least one has already fact-checked the latest viral claim to pop up in your news feed.

FactCheck.org was among a network of independent fact-checkers who signed an open letter to Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg suggesting that Facebook "start an open conversation on the principles that could underpin a more accurate news ecosystem on its News Feed." We hope that conversation happens, but news readers themselves remain the first line of defense against fake news.

On our Viral Spiral page, we list some of the claims we get asked about the most; all of our Ask FactChecks can be found here. And if you encounter a new claim you'd like us to investigate, email us at editor@factcheck.org.

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Fake news is nothing new. But bogus stories can reach more people more quickly via social media than what good old-fashioned viral emails could accomplish in years past.

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Teaching Students About the Echo Chamber Phenomenon

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Spread the loveAs digital technologies continue to evolve and expand their influence on our lives, it becomes progressively vital for educators to address the potential pitfalls of online information consumption. One such issue that warrants attention is the echo chamber phenomenon, a term used to describe environments where individuals are exposed only to opinions that align with their existing beliefs, leading to confirmation bias and polarization.

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We constantly consume media - whether television, internet, or radio. According to Pew, a whopping 62% of adults get their news from social media. This is troubling, considering the pervasive filter bubble; depending on our interests, social media and search engines filter their results to match our preferences. Hence the bubble. The Wall Street Journal has illustrated this phenomenon.

Why does this matter? The media we consume can define almost every aspect of our lives - from who we associate with, the books we read, and even our moods. You can imagine that, very quickly, people's world views become polarized. The filter bubble offers few opportunities for self-reflection. We learn a whole lot about why we're right and, very quickly, the opposite viewpoint becomes incomprehensible. Information contradicting our positions simply do not appear on our social media - where most of us get our news.

Learning Objectives

Students should learn about filter bubbles; how they work and why they exist. They should explore the effects of filter bubbles and challenge their own views on a particular subject.

This activity teaches students to move from being passive consumers of media (by reading what they find on social media) to active consumers (by seeking out information that may not correspond to their perspectives).

This does not have to be political in any capacity. In fact, students would likely be more receptive to this lesson plan if it is not politicized. For example, students may have a filter bubble that highlights the release of science fiction novels or romantic flicks. Any type of media emphasis will do in order to make this point. This could manifest in personal advertisement, literature or films overrepresented in one's feed, ethnic or religious groups that lead to various page suggestions, etc.

"Understand the filter bubble"

Seek out and evaluate different media in order to expand one's scope of knowledge"

Learn an opposing argument (for example, if a student is interested in jazz, then that student could seek out hip hop websites to discover the value of another genre of music)"

Assignment Length

One class session

Required Materials

A computer or smartphone with a personalized search history

Skills Necessary

Some knowledge of how filter bubbles work

Access and Adaptability

Students should have a smartphone or laptop that they use often. Their filter bubble should reflect their own search terms. They should also have a Facebook account that they regularly use.

Assignment Description

1. Students should come to class having read the introduction of Filter Bubble: What the Internet Is Hiding From You by Eli Praiser.

2. During class, students discuss the problems with a filter bubble.

3. The instructor should then ask students to examine the Wall Street Journal Blue Feed/ Red Feed comparison.

4. Students will discuss the WSJ comparison in groups. What is the value of personalized filter bubbles for search engines and advertisers? They should then describe the subjects they feel strongly about - perhaps the expense of university, perhaps the superiority of jazz to hip hop. Then they should plot what websites they would approach to learn about those topics.

5. They should discuss what outlets they would read to learn the perspective of the opposing viewpoint.

6. After this group discussion, they will review their own social media search bubbles individually. What websites appear? What perspectives dominate? At home, they will seek out other websites for the other side's perspectives. Is the other side monolithic? Where do they get their news? What arguments do they offer?

7. At home, students will compose an essay about the filter bubble and what one may learn from seeking information from outside that bubble. (AND/OR) Students will produce an advertisement for themselves, based on the information advertisers may glean from their online profiles

Instructor Preparation

Know how the filter bubble works

Prepare a series of topics for students that do not include politics

Read the article assigned to students and review the WSJ website

Student Preparation

Bring laptop or smartphone to class

In-Class or Assignment Instructions

Discussion of article

Compile data from social media platforms

Discussion of strategies to escape the filter bubble

Skills Workshop

Producing an advertisement is a good way of synthesizing the information social media platforms maintain about each individual user. What kind of advertisement would appeal to your profile, including your interests, hobbies, location, and demographic group? To create an advertisement, I encourage instructors to use Canva. Here, you may drag templates (seen on the left) to the center and edit the content.

Assessment Suggestions

Another option is producing an advertisement for a specific audience. Ask students to consider their Facebook preferences and their demographic. Ask students to tailor an advertisement that would appeal to their profile on Facebook. For this assignment, use the Skills Workshop above. Students should also demonstrate analysis and self-reflection. Instead of (or in addition to) the advertisement activity, students may also write an essay playing the "devil's advocate". In the persuasive essay, the student argues on behalf of a position she does not personally hold. I, for example, consider classical Persian music to be far superior to contemporary Persian pop. In escaping my filter bubble, I would read about contemporary pop, listen to new songs, understand the way Iranians engage with this music, and write an essay about why Persian pop is an important genre of music with my newfound knowledge.

Their persuasive essay will utilize specific rhetorical skills developed throughout the semester, to convince the reader - and the writer - of a particular argument. It will also demonstrate their effort to escape the filter bubble and learn new information they did not previously know.

Students may produce an online record of the sites they visited, what they learned from them, and why filter bubbles have made access to those sites more challenging. This is self-reflective and engages directly with the purpose of this activity - to interrogate filter bubbles. The advertisement they produce will distill the information advertisers may glean from their online platforms.

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We constantly consume media - whether television, internet, or radio. According to Pew, a whopping 62% of adults get their news from social media. This is troubling, considering the pervasive filter bubble; depending on our interests, social media and search engines filter their results to match our preferences. Hence the bubble.

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When we get news from our social media feeds, it often only tells us part of the story. Our friends -- and the website's algorithms -- tend to feed us perspectives we already agree with. Show students ways to escape the filter bubble and make sure their ideas about the world are being challenged.

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Filter Bubble Trouble | Common Sense Education

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How can filter bubbles limit the information we're exposed to? Check out Filter Bubble Trouble, a free digital citizenship lesson plan from Common Sense Education, to get your grade 12 students thinking critically and using technology responsibly to learn, create, and participate.

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Confirmation bias is the original sin of cognition. In seeking proof for only what we've already decided is true, we open ourselves to unlimited errors of thought. Maybe I'm amazed at my horoscope's accuracy. That seems innocuous enough. But maybe I'm also disgusted, yet not surprised, by the behavior of a particular ethnic or religious group, or convinced that mounting casualty rates prove the imminence of victory in a war my nation is waging. Confirmation bias is a serious subject. That doesn't mean, however, that you can't have fun teaching about it. In fact, a bit of fun may be just what your students need to loosen its hold.

A (good-natured) dirty trick. Confirmation bias usually gets a big assist from "not me" thinking. Begin this lesson, then, without appearing to. Casually mention how you went to the store the other day and got stuck in the slow line. Grumble about the other line always moving faster, then stand back and watch. Most if not all students will have a story about the same thing happening to them. Nod sympathetically and move on; you'll come back to this later.

"Paul is dead." Today's students love The Beatles, whose music now has all the fuzzy warmth of things associated with (gulp) grandparents. Vinyl records will make this lesson even more retro and cool. Play "Strawberry Fields Forever," in which John Lennon remembers the park where he played as a child. At the very end, we hear a distorted and barely audible voice. Play this brief segment several times and ask the class what the voice is saying. Answers will likely range from "I'm very bored" to "cranberry sauce" to a declaration that it's just gibberish. Wrong. The voice is saying, "I buried Paul."

Some students will hear it; some won't. The key thing is that millions of people did, and for good reason: Paul McCartney, who had given the world such brilliant and beloved songs as "Yesterday" and "Eleanor Rigby," died in a car crash in 1966. The surviving Beatles tried to keep it a secret, and even put an imposter in his place. But by 1969 the truth began to leak out, largely because The Beatles themselves, out of guilt-driven loyalty to their fans, had been planting clues.

If a few class members already know this legend, they can help you reassure the rest not only that Paul is still very much with us but also that The Beatles never dropped any hints about his death. What then gave this rumor such widespread acceptance? Once this question is on the table, so is an examination of confirmation bias.

The "proof." There's a wealth of sources you can draw on (a representative list follows this article). Begin with the cover of the Abbey Road album. In this iconic image, we see the four of The Beatles crossing a London Street. Invite the class to view it as a funeral procession. In the front is John, whose white suit marks him as God. Ringo follows, wearing a preacher's old-fashioned frock coat. After him comes Paul - or the Paul lookalike, wearing the kind of conservative suit you'd see on a corpse dressed for burial. He's out of step with the others (aha) and shoeless (the dead don't need shoes) and holding a cigarette (often called a "coffin nail") in his right hand (Paul was left-handed). George is last, appropriately, because his work shirt and jeans indicate he's the gravedigger.

Nearby, a Volkswagen has a license plate that reads LMW 28IF, which means "Linda McCartney Weeps" (Linda was Paul's wife) and that Paul would be 28 if he were still alive. The police car on the other side of the road symbolizes the law enforcement officials at the scene of the fatal accident. How do we know Paul died in a car crash? Look at the car parked ahead of the Volkswagen and imagine a line connecting its two right tires; when extended, that line goes through Paul's head.

By now, you should be hearing comments ranging from "Aren't you just finding what you want to find?" (which is good) to "Yeah, I sort of see it" (which is better). Offer more proof: On the album's back cover, some tiles on a concrete wall spell out "Beatles." A cluster of smudges appears to the left. Connect these "dots" and you get the number 3: Only three Beatles are still living. The tile containing the "s" in Beatles has a crack in it, meaning the band is no longer united - and hasn't been for years. Remember the "I buried Paul" line? Now that we know what to look for, we can find clues aplenty, as many fans did when they pored over album covers, parsed song lyrics and played Beatles songs faster or slower or even (and most notoriously) backwards.

Fact and reason. Hopefully, your students will point out that it's possible to hear just about anything when the words are distorted enough, just as it's possible to find proof if you've already decided what's true. Try passing out the words to any Beatles song. For example, "Love Me Do" expresses a wish for "somebody new" and "someone like you" - clearly a reference to the band's need for a lookalike replacement. Except for this problematic fact: The song was composed years before Paul's "death."

More facts: the rumor began as a prank article in a college newspaper. The Abbey Road cover came about because The Beatles, having increasing trouble working together, decided on a simple shot of them crossing the street near their recording studio. Paul was barefoot because it was a hot day. The LMW 28IF license would encode no message about Linda McCartney weeping because Paul and Linda hadn't even met in 1966, the year he supposedly died. Plus he was 27 in 1969, and the "I" in "28IF" is a one.

How about some reasonable criteria for an imposter? Looking like Paul would be the easy part. He would also have to sing like Paul, and walk and talk and smile in that adorable way like Paul and compose instantly hummable tunes like Paul. Oh, and play bass. Left-handed. Which returns us to the key question: Why did so many people put so much faith in something so unfounded?

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Teaching confirmation bias using The Beatles

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Help your students understand and avoid cognitive errors.