PhD course - Children's interactions with emerging technologies and media literacy

Organisers
Isabel Fróes
Susana Tosca

Lecturers:
David Buckingham
Susana Tosca

Date(s) of the course:
December 1-3, 2014

Time:
09.00 - 18.00

Course description:
Various technologies have become integrated in the lives and routines of youth worldwide. Smartphones, tablets together with other networked mobile devices populate the hands and pockets of young children. Applications of various kinds, as well as quick access to information and to friends and strangers is at their fingertips. This marks a unique moment in time where the concept of literacy is expanded towards learning beyond the alphabet; children nowadays need to learn to decode and filter information as well as understand the Internet medium and device universe. The unprecedented access to information and knowledge owned by children is an opportunity. However for this opportunity to be grasped, youth require to truly understand and have a critical approach towards the medium.

Educational institutions have quickly jumped on taking advantage of distinct technologies and integrating them in their curriculum. However, a vast majority of teachers and pedagogues have not been prepared to deal with such fast adoption and many lack a critical and technical understanding of the medium. Media literacy is key to inform and equip educators and consequently young learners, in order to provide a grounded knowledge of the technology medium. Therefore media literacy research needs to not only expand but it also carries the responsibility of instructing both educators and policy makers in order to help the general population and youth take informed decisions of their own regarding the latest technologies and media access.

David Buckingham is a Professor of Media and Communications in the School of Social Sciences at Loughborough University. Prior to joining Loughborough in 2012, he was Professor of Education at the Institute of Education, London University, where he directed the Centre for the Study of Children, Youth and Media. His research focuses on children’s and young people’s interactions with electronic media, and on media education. He is currently directing a project on learning progression in media education; and has recently completed projects on childhood, ‘sexualisation’ and consumer culture, and on young people, the internet and civic participation. He recently led an independent assessment for the UK government on ‘the impact of the commercial world on children’s wellbeing’. David is the author, co-author or editor of 25 books, including most recently Beyond Technology (2007), Youth, Identity and Digital Media (2008), Video Cultures: Media Technology and Amateur Creativity (2009) and The Material Child: Growing Up in Consumer Culture (2011).

Susana Tosca is Ph.D. and Associate Professor of digital culture at the IT University of Copenhagen. Her Ph.D. dissertation, a poetics of hypertext literature, was awarded the summa cum laude distinction in 2001. She has worked for many years on electronic literature, the storytelling potential of computer games, and complex reception processes, with a side interest in fan activity and the distributed aesthetic formats of the Web 2 era. She is now involved in a big research project funded by the Danish Ministry of Education, working with digital productivity in primary schools. Her most recent book was the second edition of Understanding Videogames (Routledge, 2013).

The course aims to address media literacy and children from distinct angles and perspectives. More specifically it will cover:

1.  Defining media Literacy
2. Suggested methodologies in this field 
3. Research and Policy: how research relates to public debate and policy-making
4. Danish School system: challenging existing approaches
5. Going public: Communicating our research

Program:
1st day:
09:00 – 09:45 Breakfast
09:45 – 10: 00 Course welcome
10:00 – 11:30 Lecture and Q&A, David Buckingham
11:30 – 13:00 3 project presentations (30’ each)
13:00 – 14: 00 Lunch
14:00 – 15:30 3 project presentations (30’ each)
15:30 – 15:50 Break
15:50 – 17:30 Thematic Discussions: Defining Media Literacy

2nd Day:
10:00 – 11:30 Lecture and Q&A, David Buckingham
11:30 – 13:00 3 project presentations (30’ each)
13:00 – 14: 00 Lunch
14:00 – 15:30 3 project presentations (30’ each)
15:30 – 15:50 Break
15:50 – 17:30 Thematic Discussions: Focus on Methodology

3rd Day:
10:00 – 11:30 Lecture and Q&A, Susana Tosca
11:30 – 13:00 3 project presentations (30’ each)
13:00 – 14: 00 Lunch
14:00 – 15:30 Thematic Discussions: Communicating our Research
15:30 – 15:50 Break
15:50 – 16:50 Continue Thematic Discussion: Communicating our Research
16:50 – 17:00 Conclusion
18:00 Dinner