Two New Media Literacy Essays

David Considine (Appalachian State University) has contributed two new essays in two curriculum journals. In "Teaching and Reaching The Millennial Generation Through Media Literacy," (in March issue of the Journal of Adolescent and Adult Literacy), he argues "that because of the availability of digital technologies, today's teenagers bring to school a rich and different set of literacy practices and background that is often unacknowledged or underused by educators.....it is the(ir) responsibility to build a bridge between the knowledge students already have and the content they need to learn to be successful inside and outside of school." In "From Guttenberg to Gates: Media Matters" (Social Studies, March/April 2009) he says both media consolidation and convergence have increasingly changed the way individuals as both consumers and citizens access, process, and communicate information at the local, national, and global levels. He discusses how media literacy is also compatible with several of the major strands identified by the National Council for the Social Studies (NCSS) and can be facilitated by the growing range of resources available to teachers.(Neither is currently online, but may be available via library/subscription databases.)