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Ad Fontes Media’s Interactive Media Bias Chart web app.

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You're not going to believe what I'm about to tell you (classroom-friendly version) - The Oatmeal

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This is a classroom-friendly (no cuss words) comic about the backfire effect.

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Helping Students Identify Fake News with the Five C's of Critical Consuming

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Students answer questions in an informational poster to gauge the value of a news story and decide whether it deserves to be linked, shared or retweeted. (Poster also available for download in Spanish, Japanese and Ukrainian.)

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The Role of Media Literacy in Combating Misinformation

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The Role of Media Literacy in Combating Misinformation

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Media literacy is not just about understanding the media's role in society; it's about being an informed and critical consumer of media in all its forms. This video explores the key skills needed for media literacy, emphasizing how it can protect against misinformation and contribute to a healthier public discourse.

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Media Skills: Crash Course Media Literacy #11

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

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A Project of The Annenberg Public Policy Center

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Fake news stories can have real-life consequences. On Sunday, police said a man with a rifle who claimed to be "self-investigating" a baseless online conspiracy theory entered a Washington, D.C., pizzeria and fired the weapon inside the restaurant.

So, yes, fake news is a big problem.

These stories have gotten a lot of attention, with headlines claiming Pope Francis endorsed Donald Trump in November's election and sites like American News sharing misleading stories or taking quotes out of context. And when sites like DC Gazette share stories about people who allegedly investigated the Clinton family being found dead, the stories go viral and some people believe them. Again, these stories are not true in any way.

Stopping the proliferation of fake news isn't just the responsibility of the platforms used to spread it. Those who consume news also need to find ways of determining if what they're reading is true. We offer several tips below.

The idea is that people should have a fundamental sense of media literacy. And based on a study recently released by Stanford University researchers, many people don't.

Sam Wineburg, a professor of education and history at Stanford and the lead author of the study, said a solution is for all readers to read like fact checkers. But how do fact checkers do their job?

Alexios Mantzarlis, director of the International Fact-Checking Network at Poynter, says fact checkers have a process for each claim they deal with.

"You'll isolate a claim that has something that can be objectively verified, you will seek the best primary sources in that topic. Find whether they match or refute or prove the claim being made, and then present with all limitations the data and what the data says about the claim being made," Mantzarlis says.

That's the framework for professionals, but there are ways for everyone to do a bit of fact checking themselves.

Melissa Zimdars is an assistant professor of communication and media at Merrimack College in North Andover, Mass. When she saw her students referencing questionable sources, she created and shared a document with them of how to think about sources, as well as a list of misleading, satirical and fake sites.

Both Mantzarlis and Zimdars agreed there are a few best practices people can use when reading articles online.
Pay attention to the domain and URL
Established news organizations usually own their domains and they have a standard look that you are probably familiar with. Sites with such endings like .com.co should make you raise your eyebrows and tip you off that you need to dig around more to see if they can be trusted. This is true even when the site looks professional and has semi-recognizable logos. For example, abcnews.com is a legitimate news source, but abcnews.com.co is not, despite its similar appearance.
Read the "About Us" section
Most sites will have a lot of information about the news outlet, the company that runs it, members of leadership, and the mission and ethics statement behind an organization. The language used here is straightforward. If it's melodramatic and seems overblown, you should be skeptical. Also, you should be able to find out more information about the organization's leaders in places other than that site.
Look at the quotes in a story
Or rather, look at the lack of quotes. Most publications have multiple sources in each story who are professionals and have expertise in the fields they talk about. If it's a serious or controversial issue, there are more likely to be quotes - and lots of them. Look for professors or other academics who can speak to the research they've done. And if they are talking about research, look up those studies.
Look at who said them
Then, see who said the quotes, and what they said. Are they a reputable source with a title that you can verify through a quick Google search? Say you're looking at a story and it says President Obama said he wanted to take everyone's guns away. And then there's a quote. Obama is an official who has almost everything he says recorded and archived. There are transcripts for pretty much any address or speech he has given. Google those quotes. See what the speech was about, who he was addressing and when it happened. Even if he did an exclusive interview with a publication, that same quote will be referenced in other stories, saying he said it while talking to the original publication.
Check the comments
A lot of these fake and misleading stories are shared on social media platforms. Headlines are meant to get the reader's attention, but they're also supposed to accurately reflect what the story is about. Lately, that hasn't been the case. Headlines often will be written in exaggerated language with the intention of being misleading and then attached to stories that are about a completely different topic or just not true. These stories usually generate a lot of comments on Facebook or Twitter. If a lot of these comments call out the article for being fake or misleading, it probably is.
Reverse image search
A picture should be accurate in illustrating what the story is about. This often doesn't happen. If people who write these fake news stories don't even leave their homes or interview anyone for the stories, it's unlikely they take their own pictures. Do a little detective work and reverse search for the image on Google. You can do this by right-clicking on the image and choosing to search Google for it. If the image is appearing on a lot of stories about many different topics, there's a good chance it's not actually an image of what it says it was on the first story.

These tips are just a start at determining what type of news an article is. Zimdars outlined these and others in a guide for her students.

If you do these steps, you're helping yourself and you're helping others by not increasing the circulation of these stories.

And you won't be the only one trying to stop the spread of this false content. The company leaders behind the platforms these stories are shared on are trying to figure out how to fix the issue from their side, but they are also trying to make sure not to limit anyone's right to freedom of speech. It's a tricky position to be in, but they've said they'll try. In the end, it really does depend on taking responsibility and being an engaged consumer of news.

Here's one last thing. Satirical publications exist and serve a purpose, but are clearly labeled as exaggerated and humorous by the writers and owners. Some of the more well-known ones like The Onionand ClickHole use satire to talk about current events. If people don't understand that, they might share these articles after reading them in the literal sense.

If this happens or if you see your friends sharing blatantly fake news, be a friend and kindly tell them it's not real. Don't shy away from these conversations even if they might be uncomfortable. As said, everyone has to help fix the fake news problem.
Wynne Davis is a Digital News intern.

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Fake Or Real? How To Self-Check The News And Get The Facts

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Your friend shares a story on Facebook. You read the headline and you think it's too good to be true, but it looks like it's from a news site. Experts offer tips to help you sniff out fact from fake.

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The News Literacy Project works with educators and journalists to give students the skills they need to discern fact from fiction and to know what to trust.

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About | Checkology | The News Literacy Project

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Checkology is a free e-learning platform with engaging, authoritative lessons on subjects like news media bias, misinformation, conspiratorial thinking and more. Learners develop the ability to identify credible information, seek out reliable sources and apply critical thinking skills to separate fact-based content from falsehoods.

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Resource - Mission critical: How educators can help save democracy

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Educators have an important role in promoting online media literacy.

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Fake News | News and Media Literacy | PBS LearningMedia

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This collection, which includes videos, blog articles, student handouts, lesson plans, and tip sheets for families, helps students identify, analyze, and investigate the news and information they get from online sources. Media literacy is an essential skill for all students across a range of subjects, from Science to Social Studies to English Language Arts.

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A school librarian media specialist and computer science coordinator design a hands-on, three-week news evaluation lesson.

"Last week scientists at NASA announced that they will send a manned spacecraft to the moon by the year 2018." "Supermoons can trigger tidal waves and catastrophic earthquakes." "A rare liger cub with a lion dad and tigress mother was born in Russia." Only one of these news headlines is real. Can you tell which one? Can your students? For years, it has been considered best practice to teach students to evaluate online resources for their validity. In elementary school, educators coach students on information and digital literacy basics: Is this a trustworthy URL? What is your source? Who is the author of the article? Is the Web page trying to sell you something?

Fourth graders at St. Anne's-Belfield School in Charlottesville, VA, play Snap Judgment, considering the statement "Peanut butter can be used to diagnose Alzheimer's."

Most middle grade students, with enough time and coaching, can proudly spot the fake article regarding Christopher Columbus's trip to America or tell you when a headline is more science fiction than real science. But as these elementary students grow to become independent online consumers and their trusted online sources push thousands of news articles their way, we wondered: will these verification skills hold up in the snap-judgement world of social media link-sharing? Or will these new contexts cause students to drop their armor and wander, completely vulnerable, into the world of online news sharing?

Using Mozilla's X-Ray Goggles tool, students use code to rewrite a news headline on Newslea.com.

Our idea was to approach the subject of fake news with students before they reached the age of browsing social media independently with their cell phones and laptops (typically around fifth or sixth grade) making them confident and educated digital users from the start. As a school library media specialist and a computer science coordinator, we decided to work together to combine traditional information literacy competencies with innovative digital literacy skills to create a modern, relevant, and engaging unit called Foiling Fake News. The plan was to spend three weeks with fourth grade students, building off of their previously mastered website verification skills and putting these skills into the new context of online current event reporting: blogs, news and fact-checking websites, satirical news sources, and more. The unit spread over three one-hour classes in the school's media lab.
Week one
Image searching to find a photo to accompany their news headline.

We challenged students to show off the online researching and evaluating skills that they had already learned with Kraken the Code, an activity from Mozilla's Web Literacy framework. Kraken the Code asks the guiding question, "Is the Kraken real, fake, or something in between?" The exercise challenges students to think critically about the sources they use for online research by providing a "Legit-o-Meter" for each source students use to research. The Legit-o-Meter poses challenges such as: "Find the Sources: Where did their information come from?," "Looks Matter: Is the site well designed?," and more. After filling in the information about their chosen resource, students are asked to give it a Legit-o-Meter rating from one (least reliable) to five (most reliable). Using the information that they found, and keeping in mind the validity of their resources, students came to their own conclusion about the Kraken. We ended class by returning to our guiding questions-for example: "Is the Kraken real, fake, or something in between?" This gave each group a chance to defend their argument.
Week two
The second week pushed students to sharpen their burgeoning critical thinking skills for greater speed and accuracy. We started the day by showing Common Sense Media's 5 Ways to Spot Fake News video. Then, inspired by Scott Bedley's article "I Taught my 5th Graders How to Spot Fake News. Now They Won't Stop Fact Checking Me," we created a game called Snap Judgement. Snap Judgement included a slideshow of news headlines both real and fake, preceded by one statement: "You will have three minutes to research whether each of the following headlines is real or fake." Each set of partners had one computer-and three minutes-to find their answer. We pulled up our first headline: "Spiders eat as much meat as all seven billion humans on the planet combined," set the timer, and yelled " Go! " Students stared at us in bewilderment. "What do you mean, go?" One girl asked. "What do we do? Where do we search? Is that seriously true?" We smiled and stayed silent, watching as she eventually shrugged and turned to her partner. "I guess we'd better figure it out ourselves."

The final product of an X-Ray Goggles news headline remix by a team of fourth grade students.

At the end of their search, we asked students to stand if they thought that the headline was real-and stay seated if they thought it was fake. Most classes started with an even split. When asked to defend their decisions, they said things like, "Spiders are tiny. I know they can't eat that much." Or, "It has to be real because I found it on Google." The truth? This headline is real. Students who got it right high-fived and looked forward to the chance to compete again. Those who were fooled gritted their teeth and hunched over their keyboards, determined to succeed next time. Next, we cut their time down to two minutes, and then gave them only 60 seconds to search. Along the way, students discovered valuable resources such as the kid-friendly Newsela and fact-checking sites such as Snopes; they also started double-checking information from their favorite sources, Wikipedia and YouTube. By the end of the period, most of our classes were reaching unanimous decisions on headlines' legitimacy-and they were right.
Week three
For our final week, we wanted to tackle a statement that we hear far too often from middle school students: "But it was published online, so it must be true." These days, tools exist that allow anyone to build a website to share their ideas, opinions, research, or whatever they choose. We wanted students to get hands-on experience with some of the underlying code that it takes to develop a web page. With Mozilla's X-Ray Goggles, this is a lot easier than you might think. This tool allows students to not only take a peek "under the hood" of a web page and see what makes it tick, but also to "remix" the page to make changes to it. Introducing X-Ray Goggles let us discuss important web literacy topics such as hacking (when is it good? And when isn't it?), sharing appropriate content, and being aware of copyright and usage rights. After demoing the tool, we gave the students challenges that involved remixing elements of the homepage of a news website, such as updating a headline to go with an image. They loved the creative aspect of this project, and it led to great conversations about digital citizenship and kindness online. Students left feeling excited, proud, and with a deeper understanding of how information is published on the Internet.

Another headline remix.

For students to learn how to find the best information online, educators must to be willing to step back and let them take the wheel. Over the course of our three-week mini-unit, we put students in control and let them make mistakes. We started our activities prepared and excited to deal with issues as they arose. It may feel uncomfortable to let young students go "wild" on the Internet-letting them search clearly unreliable sources, get sidetracked by YouTube, or bombarded by advertisements. But by giving them control, we put the learning in their hands. Using current and real-life examples not only keeps students engaged, but also sharpens their skills-and ours-to make them more real-world ready. Starting these digital information literacy practices with students at a young age increases the chances that they will grow up to be conscious, educated consumers. Foiling Fake News is just the tip of the iceberg. The more interesting ways we find to challenge our students to think critically about the world around them, the better. Our goal is to make sure that information and digital literacy skills are constantly practiced and reviewed by our students and ourselves-and this is a great place to start. Sarah FitzHenry is the K-8 Librarian at St. Anne's-Belfield School in Charlottesville, VA, and the voice behind library website Fitz Between the Shelves. Sarah is a proud member of Books on Bikes, a robotics coach, a maker, and an all-around geek. Sarah is passionate about creating school libraries that make every child feel welcome, confident, and safe. Kim Wilkens (@kimxtom, about.me/techkim) is the founder of and the K-8 Computer Science Coordinator at St. Anne's-Belfield School. She is passionate about transforming technology users into technology creators, collaborators, and activists.

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Supermoons Cause Tidal Waves-True or False? Our news literacy program challenges fourth graders to find out.

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A school librarian media specialist and computer science coordinator design a hands-on, three-week news evaluation lesson.

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Free AI Clickbait Title Generator | Easy-Peasy.AI

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Generate attention-grabbing titles that get clicks! Use it for Free.

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Let's Begin...

In previous decades, most news with global reach came from several major newspapers and networks with the resources to gather information directly. The speed with which information spreads now, however, has created the ideal conditions for something called circular reporting. Noah Tavlin sheds light on this phenomenon.

Create and share a new lesson based on this one.

About TED-Ed Animations

TED-Ed Animations feature the words and ideas of educators brought to life by professional animators. Are you an educator or animator interested in creating a TED-Ed Animation? Nominate yourself here "

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In previous decades, most news with global reach came from several major newspapers and networks with the resources to gather information directly. The speed with which information spreads now, however, has created the ideal conditions for something called circular reporting. Noah Tavlin sheds light on this phenomenon.

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Not all scientific studies are created equal - David H. Schwartz

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TinEye is an image search and recognition company. We are experts in computer vision, pattern recognition, neural networks, and machine learning.

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From the authors of the bestselling Fact vs. Fiction, this book offers easy-to-implement lessons to engage students in becoming media literacy "digital detectives," looking for clues, questioning motives, uncovering patterns, developing theories and, ultimately, delivering a verdict.
The current news landscape is driven by clicks, with every social media influencer, trained and citizen journalists chasing the same goal: a viral story. In this environment, where the race to be first on the scene with the most sensational story often overshadows the need for accuracy, traditional strategies for determining information credibility are no longer enough. Rather than simply helping students become savvy information consumers, today's educators must provide learners with the skills to be digital detectives - information interrogators who are armed with a variety of tools for dissecting news stories and determining what's real and what isn't in our "post-truth world."

This book:

Shares meaningful lessons that move beyond traditional "fake news" protocols to help learners navigate a world in which information can be both a force for good and a tool used to influence and manipulate.

Includes resources and examples to support educators in the work of facilitating engaging, relevant (and fun!) instructional opportunities for K-12 learners, in both face-to-face and digital learning environments.

Unpacks the connection between social-emotional learning and information literacy.

Includes access to the Digital Detective's Evidence Locker, an online collection of over 100 downloadable and remixable resources to support the lessons in the book.

As the authors state: "Remember, the detective's job is NOT to prove themselves correct. Their job is to detect the truth!" This statement reflects the way they approach the lessons in this book, providing clear and practical guidance to help educators address and overcome this ever-expanding issue.
Audience: K-12 educators and library media specialists

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Booktopia has Developing Digital Detectives, Essential Lessons for Discerning Fact from Fiction in the "Fake News" Era by Jennifer LaGarde. Buy a discounted Paperback of Developing Digital Detectives online from Australia's leading online bookstore.

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There is no substitute for diligent research when a journalist fact-checks a story.

But if you, the reader, suspects an article, video or image might be fake, there are some simple tools you can use to help decide whether what you're looking at is real or phony.

As journalists working for an organisation that verifies social media content, we spend our time monitoring the depths of the internet, trying to sort fact from fiction on behalf of news providers, including the Australian Broadcasting Corporation.

These are some of the low-cost tools we use to do our work - which are also available to you, at the astounding price of absolutely free.

Digital products can change drastically over time - sometimes for the worse - and are often replaced by better ones, so we're not saying these tools are fool-proof. But they're a good place to start if you're looking to do some digital detective work.

Reverse image searches

You'd be forgiven for seeing this tweet and believing it was real. In the wake of the Paris attacks in November 2015, this image was shared on various social media platforms and showed the bolstering image of a crowd holding illuminated letters stating they were "not afraid".

Terrorists had killed 130 people late at night on November 13, in a series of coordinated attacks at the Bataclan Theatre. The world was reeling and needed something beautiful to hold onto.

A heartfelt image usually does the trick, right?

Shame it wasn't as it seemed.

Despite its hopeful veneer, the image was from earlier in the year in the immediate aftermath of the Charlie Hebdo attack in January. It was taken as Parisians mobilised in the Place de la Republique, holding aloft their hopeful message.

But how to work it out? It's not much harder than a few clicks: reverse searching.

It's a simple process: logging into Google Chrome, right-clicking on an image and selecting "search Google for image". Downloadable tools like TinEye or Reverse Image Search will do the same job.

All three quickly parse the web for earlier instances in which the image, or something resembling it, has been used.

In this case, it showed a tweet from January 8 bearing the image, proving it was not from that evening, but from the time of the attack at the Charlie Hedbo offices.

Wayback Machine

One of the best ways to monitor changes online is through archiving repositories. One particularly popular one is Wayback Machine. It's existed since 1996 and is a virtual library of the changes to billions of pages across the web. Crawlers add live grabs of webpages at a series of points throughout the year, saving them exactly as it appeared in that moment, and some people even volunteer their time to regularly archive pages.

Unfortunately, Wayback doesn't index social media pages or anything that requires a log-in and password, but it's still extremely useful. If an organisation tries to erase certain content from the face of the internet during a crisis, Wayback is often used as an accountability measure.

In 2017, when the US Department of State published a blog post that seemed to be an advertisement for President Donald Trump's property Mar-a-Lago, it was promptly pulled amid the backlash. But not before it was archived. That link now shows a short statement about the article and its reason for deletion.

At its core, Wayback is a great way of capturing the world at a point in time. Having the extension installed also notifies the user if there are previous instances of the page that have been archived.

For example, if you wanted to check the changing views of the Salvation Army about same-sex relationships, Wayback will show you that in 2006, their website stated "Homosexual practice, however, is, in the light of Scripture, clearly unacceptable".

This is no longer the case in the current day, and that link is dead. The church has even gone so far as to remove the page in its entirety.

Another example is pm.gov.au - the official website for the ever-changing role of prime minister. On August 24, it shows two captures. At 1:49am, Malcolm Turnbull beamed out of pm.gov.au. Just 12 hours later, the page was under construction, stating Scott Morrison had been sworn in that day.

Botometer

A bot on social media is a profile or account whose posts are automated or scheduled. It would be inaccurate to describe all bot accounts as fake, as some are managed by real people, but not in the way a typical user on Facebook or Twitter would use them.

While they often get a bad rap, not all bots are malicious - and some automated scripts can be helpful, educational and creative.

For example, on Reddit there are automated bots programmed to read headlines on news articles and provide alternative sources on the same story to promote a diverse media diet.

But "good bots" generally don't try to hide their intentions and it's often the ones disguising their programming that are most problematic.

Bots commonly exist as scam accounts on Facebook and Twitter, using photos of attractive and scantily clad women to lure people into clicking malicious links or surrendering financial information with the promise of erotic encounters. These accounts are also prevalent on dating apps such as Tinder and Bumble.

Then there are the accounts designed to bolster visibility or promote a particular message and are used to spam out favourable news stories and broadly influence a political conversation.

Bots can also be used to artificially boost an account's popularity, allowing thousands of "followers" to be purchased for as little as $5. The major social media platforms announced a massive purge of automated accounts this year, leading some profiles to lose half their follower base in efforts to promote transparency and authentic discourse.

But they're still prevalent and harder than ever to spot.

Limitation in language and machine learning used to give bots a sense of uncanny valley, and automated accounts would typically post with an utter contempt for basic grammatical rules. But now, the wealth of data available to bots has allowed their posts to appear more sophisticated and avoid the flags that would previously get them auto-banned. The new generation of bots sound more human, even if the logic of their content is cooked.

It's possible to analyse an account manually to determine the probability it is automated by employing a series of checks; such as whether their name appears to have been randomly generated in a machine, if they're posting too frequently, if they use a generic profile picture or if there is no originality in their language.

However, more than once journalists have been disappointed to find an account they believed was a bot was actually very real, if poorly managed.

Botometer, a tool developed by the Observatory on Social Media, attempts to do most of the heavily lifting by analysing over 1,200 features of an account to provide a probability rating on its authenticity. It's far from perfect and it will often produce false positives (for example, it will read organisation accounts belonging to Australian and American politicians as being bots) but it's easier than counting thousands of tweets yourself.

Optical character recognition

Google Translate is one of the more reliable free translation services available, but it requires a direct copy of the information to function. You have to be able to copy and paste your information into the webpage, which isn't always possible if you're trying to translate something directly off an image and it's not in a Latin-based language.

Optical character recognition, or OCR, refers to the mechanical or electronic conversion of an image of text into a usable format. Think of it as text-to-speech, but with pictures.

In our newsroom, when we're trying to geo-locate an image or read in a foreign country, online OCR tools allow us to take a screenshot of a road sign or store front and convert it into a readable format. This often gives us clues as to where the video originated from and can help us to distinguish whether a car explosion occurred in Damascus or Homs in Syria.

A search for online OCR will provide an ample list of tools with multilingual support, but none of them are even close to optimal. Handwritten notes or obscured text are difficult for the reader to identify and extract.

Copyfish, for example, has a high-degree of reliability with very clean text, like subtitles in a video, but has difficulty in reading anything not cleanly printed.

So, whenever an OCR is used, a repeated attempt with numerous programs and tools is advised.
Amy Lees and Kevin Nguyen are journalists at Storyful Sydney, providing editorial consultation for News Corp and ABC in Australia.

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Spot fake news online with these free tools for fact-checking bogus stories

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There is no substitute for diligent research when a journalist fact-checks a story. But if you, the reader, suspects an article, video or image might be fake, there are some simple tools you can use to help decide whether what you're looking at is real or phony.

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How to Use Google Reverse Image Search to Fact Check Images

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For Year levels 9-12

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PODCAST Teaching Critical Thinking in the age of Fake News, Disinformation and CRAAP

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PODCAST Teaching Critical Thinking in the age of Fake News, Disinformation and CRAAP

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Our guest unpacks the ways the fake news pandemic undermines our efforts to teach critical thinking and offers strategies to help students discern fact from fiction in the information at school and on the devices they carry in their pockets.

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Join a game of kahoot here. Kahoot! is a free game-based learning platform that makes it fun to learn - any subject, in any language, on any device, for all ages!

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This is the New York Times blog for students. They offer classroom resources (from lesson plans and writing prompts to news quizzes, student contests and more). All the resources are based on the articles, essays, photos, videos and graphics published on NYTimes.com.

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Teach and learn with The Times: Resources for bringing the world into your classroom

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Make a newspaper clipping with your own headline and story. Surprise friends and colleagues, send a birthday greeting or give your next blog post a special look.

To download your newspaper, use the link at the bottom of the generated image. You can use the images as you wish ie. put them on your own website or blog. Please note, that direct linking to the newspaper clippings doesn't work; the images are deleted from the server after a short time span.

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Make a newspaper clipping with your own headline and story. Surprise friends and colleagues, send a birthday greeting or give your next blog post a special look.

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Fake News Generator - Online Newspaper Generator

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Fake News Generator - Online Newspaper Generator

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Funny Newspaper Generator with Your Own Picture | Fake News Generator

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Use this free newspaper generator to create your own spoof newspaper articles. Just upload a photo and add your own text, or choose from one of our pre-written silly articles.

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Create a Fake Headline with this Generator

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Mighty media literacy resources powered by inquiry-based approach

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Featured Lesson

Arguing For Freedom

Media literacy and critical thinking lesson using diverse media imagery to teach about the history of the movement to abolish slavery in the United States in the early and mid-19th century.

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Description for Project Look Sharp website

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Up-to-date, expert-backed news literacy program builds needed skills

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Up-to-date, expert-backed news literacy program builds needed skills

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Welcome to Newsably, a fictional social media site focused on news and information. Your mission? Maintain the site, grow traffic, and watch out! You’ll also need to spot fake posts that try to sneak in through hidden ads, viral deception, and false reporting. For the best play experience, click “Play Fullscreen” in the upper right area of the screen.

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PODCAST The Importance of Developing Digital Detectives in a cesspool of mis, dis, and mal information (with Darren Hudgins)

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PODCAST The Importance of Developing Digital Detectives in a cesspool of mis, dis, and mal information (with Darren Hudgins)

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The Importance of Developing Digital Detectives in a cesspool of mis, dis, and mal information (with Darren Hudgins)

Episode Summary

In this podcast, Darren Hudgins (@dhudgins) shares the importance of helping our young people understand the value in being digital detectives.

Episode Notes

In this podcast, Darren Hudgins (@dhudgins) shares the importance of helping our young people understand the value in being digital detectives.
Episode Notes:
Guest Name: Darren Hudgins

Guest work information/location: Founder/CEO of Think Do Thrive | Portland, Oregon

Guest social media:

Twitter & IG | @dhudgins

Any other information: Darren Hudgins is a passionate advocate for creating learning experiences that drive educators of all kinds and their students to think, do, and thrive. He believes in this mission so much that he conceptualized and directs Think | Do | Thrive, LLC. He uses his 20+ years in education, edtech, and coaching to inspire critical thinking, champion active learning, and create opportunities for educational communities to improve. He is also the co-author of two books, the bestselling Fact VS Fiction: Teaching Critical Thinking In The Age of Fake News (ISTE 2018) and the newly released Developing Digital Detectives: Essential Lessons for Discerning Fact from Fiction in the 'Fake News' Era (ISTE 2021). Let's untangle this world together: thinkdothrive.org

Future Ready Schools Website: https://all4ed.org/future-ready-schools/

Twitter: @FutureReady, @ShannonMMiller

Instagram: @FutureReadySchools, @ShannonMMiller

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/FutureReadySchools

Future Ready Schools is a registered trademark of All4Ed, located in Washington, D.C.
#FutureReady

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The Importance of Developing Digital Detectives in a cesspool of mis, dis, and mal information (with Darren Hudgins)

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In this podcast, Darren Hudgins (@dhudgins) shares the importance of helping our young people understand the value in being digital detectives.

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Reality Check / Au-delà des faits! - Media Smarts

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Can you spot the fakes on your feed? Test yourself on these stories - some are the real deal, and some are misleading, questionable, or just plain false. So pick your favourite eyebrow and get ready to raise it.

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Put your inner skeptic to the test with this fake news quiz. How many can you catch?

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Online Survey | Built with Qualtrics Experience Management™

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Health officials right now aren't just having to battle an illness with no known cure or vaccine - they're having to fight back against Internet trolls and conspiracy theorists. The World Health Organization has labeled the current moment an "infodemic."

"While the virus spreads, misinformation makes the job of our heroic health workers even harder. It diverges attention of our decision-makers and it causes confusion and spreads fear to the general public," says the WHO Director-General Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus.

You've probably come across a piece of bad information online, and you might not even know it. The virus was not created in a lab as a bioweapon, for instance, and inhaling hot air from a hair dryer is not a cure.

Experts say this outbreak may be the biggest source of Internet misinformation ... ever.

Life Kit wants to help. Here's a comic to help you sharpen your misinformation Spidey senses:

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Comic: Fake News Can Be Deadly. Here's How To Spot It : Life Kit

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Experts say the coronavirus outbreak may be the biggest source of Internet misinformation ever. Fake cures, unscientific tips, and conspiracy theories about COVID-19 are flooding the Internet - but there are ways to sniff out misinformation.

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BBC iReporter may be the single best online resource for learning about how real-world journalism works.

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BBC iReporter may be the single best online resource for learning about how real-world journalism works.

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Play the role of a journalist covering a breaking news story in the BBC iReporter game.

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Remember - always stop, question, check decide before believing or sharing a story you read online. Download our handy News Navigator tool to help.

Cracked this quiz? Test your skills on our other fake or real headlines quiz.

Want to develop your fake news detective skills even more? Try our lesson on spotting fake news and our family-friendly activities on looking out for fake news.

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Fake or Real? The all-new NewsWise headlines quiz!

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All of these stories were published online, but only some of them are real - some of them are made up! Can you use your Fake News Detective skills to identify which stories are real and which are fake? NewsWise for families: looking out for fake news

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Harmony Square is an online game in which you’re the bad guys, posting fake news and sowing disharmony. It’s silly and fun and it has quite a bit of reading to it.

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Harmony Square is an online game in which you’re the bad guys, posting fake news and sowing disharmony. It’s silly and fun and it has quite a bit of reading to it.

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Inoculation Science - Games - Harmony Square

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A short, free-to-play online game in which players learn how political misinformation is produced and spread.

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“Go Viral!” is a game with a medical misinformation game. You are the fake news creator. You win by going viral with lies and fake news. 

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“Go Viral!” is a game with a medical misinformation game. You are the fake news creator. You win by going viral with lies and fake news. 

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On a daily basis, news organisations call out facts versus lies told by people on different sides of controversial issues. And our social media feeds are likely flooded with real news and misinformation that look exactly alike. So the key question is - how to spot fake news from the real stories?

Turns out, most people find it difficult sometimes. An experiment conducted by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology found that adults believed false "news" reports about 20 percent of the time. Meanwhile, a poll by Common Sense Media found that less than half of kids surveyed said they could tell false stories from real ones.

It's challenging for kids to figure out how to spot fake news when even adults sometimes struggle. So, we're here to help!

The following tips from the Nat Geo book Breaking the News offer simple steps kids can follow to tell the difference between authentic news and misinformation. Plus, they'll help encourage children to think independently and become responsible digital citizens-so kids are not only responsible for themselves, but also for what they share with others.

Stop before you click.

Studies show that people are much more likely to click on a headline or share a post if it makes them feel happy, angry, or excited. This is especially true among young people, who are some of the most likely to read clickbait. And yet the most provocative headlines often turn out to be the most misleading.

The best advice for kids and adults is that when we feel a strong, knee-jerk reaction, we should resist the urge to share the post immediately.

Stop, breathe, and think about what's making you feel that way. Is it a shocking headline or image? Does the language make wild statements without facts to back it up? These are tell-tale signs the post may be fake.

And because headlines can be deceiving, kids should remember to read the whole article or post before sharing.

Go to the source.

Children might not be glued to the daily news, but they've probably absorbed some conflicting information. If your child feels confused, encourage them to ask the one question that will lead to the truth: What's the source of the information?

Authentic news will include sources for all information presented. (And if anonymous sources are used, the story should explain why their information is withheld.)

Explain that a reliable news story will provide sources for different sides of an issue, then work together to identify the sources in the story. Look for names of the people quoted as well as the organisations that provide the facts and figures.

And if sources aren't provided? That's a major red flag that the news report isn't legitimate.

Here at National Geographic Kids, we strive to help young readers engage with accurate news from around the world. That's why every issue of National Geographic Kids magazine contains Cool News stories - informative updates about real-world discoveries, actions and more!

Plus, in the UK, our Junior Explorers' Club members receive a weekly 'Good News' email, packed with positive news from the worlds of science, nature and conservation. We hope this helps our readers and their families combat eco-anxiety and feel hopeful for the planet's future. Find out more.

Fact-check suspicious stories.

Young people don't always know not to believe everything they read. Here are a few easy tricks that kids can use to tell if a fishy-sounding story could be a hoax, a wild conspiracy theory or misinformation.

- Do an internet search on the article's headline or the title of the post to see if the story has already been identified as false. If the story is real, other reliable sources will likely have written stories about the same topic.

- If the post includes a photo, check for signs that the photo could be a fake. Is the image blurry in places? Are any shadows out of place? Do you see duplicated images in the background, or does it look like different images have been pasted together? Kids can also do an online image search to see if the photo has been identified as fake.

- If the article includes a video, search its title to see who created it. Does the person seem legitimate?

- If the story comes from an organisation or a famous person's social media account, make sure the account is real. For example, some platforms put blue ticks next to the verified accounts of well-known people.

- Check the date of the story. If it isn't recent, the facts could be out of date.

- Go back to the original question: What's the source of this information?

Most importantly, if something seems too far-fetched to be true, or it just feels wrong, trust your instinct - don't share it. ( But if something scary is true - here's how to talk to kids about frightening news.)

Know how to spot propaganda.

Throughout history, propaganda has followed a tried-and-true formula that's simple yet remarkably effective - and at times, very destructive.

See if your child can identify any of these common propaganda techniques used by people or organisations covered in the news...

- Playing to people's emotions - such as their hopes, fears, anger or sympathy - rather than relying on facts.

- Sticking to simple messages and catchy slogans, rather than providing complex or in-depth information.

- Speaking to a specific audience. For example, politicians craft their messages to appeal to the people whose support they want to win.

- Blaming someone else for problems. One of the most harmful forms of propaganda is when people scapegoat other individuals or groups - often people of colour or immigrants - blaming them for society's problems. This stirs up fears, spreads racism and can put members of those groups in danger - but unfortunately, it's also an effective way of getting people to rally behind a certain point of view.

- Repeating the same idea over and over again. The more people hear a certain message, the more likely they are to believe it.

Fess up if you make a mistake.

One survey found that about a third of kids who shared a story later found out it was fake or inaccurate. If your child accidentally shares a false story, they don't need to be embarrassed. After all, adults (and maybe you) have done this, too!

But the responsible action is to try to stop the spread of false information by posting a note that explains that the post turned out to be fake. Your child can also encourage their friends to do the same if they've shared it with others.

If you're looking for positive news stories to read with your kids, look no further! Sign up to the free National Geographic Kids newsletter to receive good news stories, family-friendly activities, articles and more straight to your inbox.

For more tips to help kids navigate the online world safely, read our article about cyberbullying.

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How to spot fake news: tips to teach kids | Parents | Nat Geo Kids

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Worried the news will confuse or frighten your kids? In this quick guide, find out how to spot fake news - and how to teach your family, too.

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A ClickView original series

Fake news - a danger to health, social cohesion and democracy or just a quick and entertaining way to learn about what's happening in the world?

This important new series helps students to spot fake news and understand its risks by analysing examples of hoaxes, scams, sensationalism, spin, satire, and clickbait in six informative videos. Discover 5 videos with teaching resources, plus an interactive video to test student understanding.

Why focus on digital literacy?

We know that young people of all ages prefer to get their information online, not from books. There's a disconnect between how they research for school, and what they consume at home or during their leisure time. Yet, many young people don't have the skills they need to critique and decode the news media they interact with online.

More than ever, young internet users need to be equipped with particular knowledge and skills to navigate digital platforms, especially social media communities, in an informed, safe and responsible way.

Free cross-curriculum series:
'The Digital Literacy Series: Fake News'

In an era of uncertainty, where social media and influencers have replaced traditional media as many peoples' source of news, ClickView's Fake News series will arm students with skills that they can carry into adulthood and their careers.

Digital literacy is an essential, everyday requirement for all young people, which is why this series is designed to be integrated across all subject areas. Students from 12-15 years are among the most prolific internet users, as well as being some of the most vulnerable and impressionable. It's important for them to understand the psychology of fake news and how it manipulates emotions.

Discover all 6 full-length episodes, free to share with your students. Each episode comes with a pack of printable supporting resources for your lessons.

Try out the Fake News interactive video

See for yourself how ClickView interactive videos work. By incorporating a layer of inbuilt questions or problems to a video, interactives help test and track student understanding. Different question types include cloze activities, writing a short answer or identifying true or false options.

episode 6

Can You Spot Fake News? (interactive)

This engaging video tests what students have learned from the 'Fake News' series by checking their ability to distinguish real news from fake news. It includes 'news' such as clickbait from ELLE magazine, Russia releasing lions into the streets and the use of misleading images by news outlets. An essential resource for consolidating the knowledge about digital literacy that secondary students have gained from the rest of the series.

Play interactive Download lesson resources

What the research tells us

Recent Ofcom research reports revealed some of the following key findings:

Nearly a third of 12-15 year olds (28%) expressed concern of fake news when using the internet.
(2020 Internet users' experience of potential online harms report)

Among 12-15s, 55% consume news from social media and by talking with friends.
(2019 Children and parents: Media use and attitudes report)

Half of 12-15 year olds said it was difficult to tell whether news on social media is accurate or not.
(2019 News consumption in the UK report)

What are the post-viewing outcomes for my students?

By watching and interacting with this series, your students will be better equipped to:

Digest news and information for their life beyond the classroom.

Identify and analyse different types of fake news.

Understand how persuasive and emotive language devices are used to spread false claims.

Consider the validity of various news sources such as apps and websites to make sure they don't fall for fake news, or spread it.

How can I use the Fake News series in my classroom?

'The Digital Literacy Series: Fake News' is appropriate for all secondary year groups. The clips and resources will help you deliver lessons on analysing and interpreting persuasive texts. Designed as an important cross-curricular resource, the fake news series is relevant to all subject areas.

About ClickView

ClickView is the world's leading video content resource for primary schools, secondary schools and further education settings. Founded in 2003 and now with offices across the UK and Australia, ClickView supports over 4,500 schools, colleges and universities around the world. The platform provides access to visually stunning, curriculum-aligned video content and teacher resources, plus contextual on-demand TV, video library and interactive question layers for formative assessment. ClickView puts the highest quality contemporary video content for effective teaching and learning at the fingertips of educators and students. Learn more about ClickView.

Try ClickView for free

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The Digital Literacy Series: Fake News | Teaching Resources | ClickView

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Teach your students how to identify fake news and understand its risks. Access all videos and teaching resources for free.

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QCAA  Guidance for students and parents/carers

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QCAA  Guidance for students and parents/carers

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CTRL-F is a digital media literacy program from CIVIX developed to help students identify false and misleading information online, and locate credible sources. Named for the keyboard shortcut for ‘find,’ CTRL-F teaches quick, evidence-based strategies for evaluating the reliability of sources and claims.

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CTRL-F is a digital media literacy program from CIVIX developed to help students identify false and misleading information online, and locate credible sources. Named for the keyboard shortcut for 'find,' CTRL-F teaches quick, evidence-based strategies for evaluating the reliability of sources and claims.