Teaching kids to fact-check is not enough to prepare them to navigate social media and a world increasingly powered by artificial intelligence.
It’s important to help students be aware of their emotions when processing online information, and ask questions about counterclaims and evidence.
But teachers often miss a critical step when it comes to helping students develop media literacy skills that will stick: They should have students test those skills and knowledge against their peers’ opinions and the output of AI chatbots.
“If the goal is independent thinking, you have to be able to test your thinking with others” and against AI chatbots, said James Damico, a professor of curriculum and instruction at Indiana University. “How do we structure an opportunity for that to happen in an authentic way?”
That’s the focus of a talk Damico, who studies digital literacy, is presenting today at the ISTELive 26 + ASCD annual conference, which is being held this week in Orlando, Fla.
The three steps to evaluate claims from social media or AI
Students need to approach online claims with self-awareness and the ability to ask themselves questions about the veracity of what they’re seeing, said Damico.
After seeing something on social media, students must learn to first pause to examine how they are reacting.
“I need to name whatever [the] emotional response is to that content, and I need to check in with any beliefs or experiences that I’m bringing to this—does it resonate with those beliefs and values or not?” he said. “And I need to assess what I actually know about this topic.”
Recognizing and naming emotions is a core social-emotional skill, and one that’s important for students to use social media responsibly. That’s because social media algorithms are often designed to promote content that elicits emotional reactions that keep users engaged on the platforms for longer periods of time.
After students take a pause, assess their emotions, and anchor themselves in their knowledge and belief systems, they should move on to the second step: reflecting on questions that are at the heart of digital media literacy, said Damico.
- What is the evidence for the online claim?
- Does it hold water?
- What do other sources say?
- What are the counterclaims?
- And how is this post trying to influence me?
These critical thinking skills apply to assessing AI outputs as well.
But once students make a judgement about the value of online information, whether it comes from social media or an AI tool, they must engage with external views to really cement the opinion they’ve arrived at, Damico said.
The third and final step, one that Damico says is often overlooked, is independent thinking. Even when students go through the fact-checking process, they can easily be persuaded by peers or an AI chatbot to abandon what they’ve learned, he said. This is the point when teachers must encourage and foster opportunities for students to engage with peers and AI and “stress test” their judgements.
“Social media is a great example of that,” he said. “Youth are much more likely to share something even though they might not trust it or even believe it. There’s a real pressure in that space to conform.”
That doesn’t mean sticking to the opinion they’ve landed on no matter what their peers say or what they learn from a chatbot, he said.
“It’s possible for me to be persuaded by my peers, and if I can support why I’m persuaded based on evidence, then that makes sense,” Damico said. “But if I’m being persuaded based on their rhetorical approach, or my relationship with them, or fears about different social threats, as educators, we want to be mindful of that.”
Students need repetition when it comes to learning media literacy skills
Creating opportunities for students to practice this final stage in the classroom can be tricky, said Damico. But he has some ideas for how educators can go about it in real life.
One is an exercise in which a teacher picks an issue for students to debate. Students stand in designated corners based on the opinion they hold (or are assigned to defend). Then students must persuade their peers to come over to their side.
Another exercise is more directly tech-connected: Students are asked to both critically analyze an individual AI chatbot’s outputs and compare the information delivered by a variety of chatbots, discussing how they differ, and what they miss.
Teachers don’t need to devote large amounts of class time to teaching digital literacy skills, said Damico. What’s most important is that students get regular practice honing their media literacy, and that teachers are well-positioned to provide that support.
In addition to the classroom exercises he identified, Damico says, teachers can make a habit of having students fact-check or identify red flags in images and video clips from social media on topics they’re teaching about or topics of interest to students—such as health, finance, and technology.
Media literacy shouldn’t be limited to one, isolated unit crammed in at the end of the school year.
“You don’t learn to play the piano by doing it once a month or once a semester—it takes the reps,” he said. “If there’s one thing to start with, it would be just practicing those habits, those skills.”
