“It is no accident that Media Smart and Ofcom are roughly the same age. We are joined together in this task of bringing media literacy to audiences and we hugely value and support the practical work that Media Smart is doing”
Tim Suter, Partner, Content and Standards, Ofcom, 7 February 2006
Tim Suter, Partner, Content and Standards, Ofcom, 7 February 2006
Media literacy core skills and advertising
Media Smart aims to teach children core media literacy skills, using advertising as a vehicle. In Media Smart’s teaching materials, the four pillars of media literacy education are applied to advertising in the following way;
Core pillars of media literacy education |
How the core pillars are addressed in Media Smart’s lessons on advertising |
| Production | |
| Who produced this text, and why? | Production processes; economics; functions of advertising in the media |
| Language | |
| How does this text create meaning? | Use of images, sounds, language; branding and product image; rhetoric and persuasion |
| Representation | |
| How does this text portray its subject? | Realism and fantasy; stereotyping, values; images of different social groups |
| Audience | |
| How do people interpret this text? | Targeting of audiences; appeals and responses |
The critical thinking skills that the Media Smart programme teaches can be applied to all areas of daily life and help to equip children as active citizens of modern society.
