Impact of Media Literacy
Your Way Inside Media
Media Literacy
Media Literacy
In my opinion, to be media literate means that you are able to understand technology in all formats. Also in my opinion, the media is any sort of technology that includes social media sites and other internet activities. It all links you to the world of media. In many ways being so technologically advanced has its benefits especially when it comes to medicine and research. There have been several cases where a person is sick and doctors can simply “look up” the symptoms on Google and instantly find a solution. Also, for anyone, whether it is a student or someone just trying to find information on a certain subject, researching answers is just a click or tap away on a smart phone. Although there are positives to the advancement of technology, it also has its negatives. I believe that this generation is extremely caught up in all social networking and that it has become a big distraction. Being a teenager, I use some of the social networks such as “Facebook” and “Instagram” and I can speak for those who also agree that it is a distraction when it comes to trying to focus on other work. I constantly find myself side tracked on my phone when I sit down to do school work or even have a simple conversation with friends or family. Such an easy distraction can create many problems for those who have a harder time focusing in the first place. In this generation, almost all kids by the age of six or seven understand how to use an IPhone or IPad. I believe that the amount of distractions that tag along with media can be helpful but also cause an abundance of problems.
Wordle
Social Media
IPhone 5s
Advertising
Coca-Cola's "America the Beautiful"
Coca-Cola in the commercial “America the Beautiful” (2014) suggests that America and its diversity is a positive aspect. Coca-Cola supports their suggestion throughout their commercial by having bilingual American women sing America the Beautiful in their foreign language such as, Spanish and Hindi. Coca-Cola’s purpose in promoting this commercial is to point out how special it is that America has the amount of diversity that it does today in order to convince those who think otherwise. Coca-Cola’s commercial has a compassionate tone and it was specifically meant for those watching.
America the Beautiful
Senioritis Numbers Rise
ATLANTA- As more and more students in the south are being diagnosed with Senioritis, the CDC is rushing to find a cure. They aren't having much success and the symptoms are growing. If you aren't sure what the symptoms consist of, here is a short list:
-You constantly find yourself not completing classwork and homework
-Hard to focus
-Lack motivation/ determination
-Want to sleep excessively
-You find yourself constantly being “literally unable to even” (lazy)
-Rise in appetite, causing you to eat everything all day
-High anxiety levels
-High stress levels
If you have 2 or more of these symptoms, consult your local doctor because you might be severely sick. “The only known cure for now is to stay in bed all day and watch as much Netflix as possible”, says Dr. Ben Dover.
Recent studies have shown that symptoms can occur in students as low as 5th grade. “The youngest child we have recorded with symptoms of Senioritis was in 5th grade, he refused to write his daily diary and demanded more nap time”, says Senioritis Specialist Hugh Janus.
The severity of the case depends on the patient. In some severe cases it can hinder the student from completing any work in and out of the classroom. With no work getting done the patients’ grades plummeted. Other students are lucky and experience lighter symptoms. One patient only showed signs of procrastination.
Senioritis has made its way online with patients constantly tweeting about their illness. This is likely to occur, however nobody is really interested in what they have to say. An example of these posts would be:
“This 2:40 is about to be the death of me”.
This was tweeted by Senioritis patient Carlie Farber, or known by her peers as @carliefarber.
As the semester winds down and the school year is coming to an end, Senioritis patients are all experiencing the same problem; bringing their grades up. There is no easy way to be successful in this aspect, but students manage to get it done. Some attempts include students cheating their way through the finals, doing as much extra credit work as possible, sucking up to the teacher begging them to round your grade up, or, my personal favorite, buying them Starbucks every day. Most students will succeed in this process however, 1 and 10 Senioritis victims will be sitting in that same desk next fall.
"Not in That Way"
I chose the song “Not in That Way” by Sam Smith to be the theme song for the upcoming film of 1984. This song does a good job at representing the two main characters’, Julia and Winston, relationship. The two characters first notice each other during the Two Minutes of Hate and from that moment on Winston has such a hard time not thinking about the girl he saw. Winston finally finds a way to talk to her during the time they ate and they exchanged a few words on where they wanted to meet and when they did she handed him a note that read, “I love you.”. This knocked Winston off of his feet and he noticed he was also in love. This song is about how two people love each other, but one loves the other in a different kind of way. This interpretation describes their relationship very well because at first they are both madly in love with one another and soon afterwards it is mostly Winston that has the majority of the feelings. They tell each other that they love one another, but once the two were separated for an extensive amount of time and then brought back to one another, they realized that their feelings had vanished. This would be a perfect theme song for when the movie 1984 focuses on the relationship between Winston and Julia.
Lyrics
And I hate to say I love you
When it's so hard for me
And I hate to say I want you
When you make it so clear
You don't want me
I'd never ask you cause deep down
I'm certain I know what you'd say
You'd say I'm sorry believe me
I love you but not in that way
And I hate to say I need you
I'm so reliant
I'm so dependant
I'm such a fool
When you're not there
I find myself singing the blues
Can't bear
Can't face the truth
You will never know that feeling
You will never see through these eyes
I'd never ask you
Cause deep down I'm certain I know what you'd say
You'd say I'm sorry
Believe me
I love you
But not in that way
You'd say I'm sorry
Believe me
I love you
But not in that way
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Looking Back
My views on media literacy have remained the same since the beginning of the semester. I believe that it has both positives and negatives to it. Technology and the use of the internet can be extremely helpful when someone is in need of information but it can also be a huge distraction when people, especially students, are trying to focus. Throughout this semester I have learned many new techniques. I believe that learning how to write a précis was a really important tool that will help me a lot throughout college when I need to write a brief summary because they contain good, specific information within only four sentences. Along with other writing techniques, we learned how to read and fully understand reading passages by annotating as we read the work.
This media literacy course was much different than any other language arts class I have taken. Most classes usually focus on writing essays and reading books, but instead we focused on things that were currently happening in our world and had classroom discussions. It was nice being able to watch videos and read articles that would give the class better insight on whatever the topic was. For example, when we were learning about the NSA we watched a “Ted Talk” that allowed us to understand the situation more thoroughly. Overall this class was an interesting course to take and I think I would have enjoyed it more than British Literature. At times it was difficult to keep up with the classroom work and the assignments on schoology. However, if I could take the class over again, I would work more on my time management due to extracurricular activities. Everything that I will take away with me from this class will help me in the future and throughout my college classes.