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Media literacy prepares teachers for diversity.

Article Excerpt
Abstract

Today's teachers deal with diversity at every level. Many seem unprepared. Media literacy incorporated into teacher education and professional development may benefit teachers by helping them understand the "other;" by helping them challenge media notions about gender, race, class, etc.; by introducing them to alternative pedagogies; and by offering them resources and techniques to empower their own students.

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America's educators teach a more diverse group of students than ever before--varied nationalities, backgrounds, and abilities are represented at every level of public schooling today. Yet despite mandates to prepare teachers, as NCATE (the National Council for the Accreditation of Teacher Education) requires, and despite occasional in-service workshops, multicultural education for teachers remains problematic. Many teacher candidates plan to return to their white suburbs or small towns, and see no reason for multicultural education, resisting the topic. Then, practicing teachers are often thrown into demanding, diverse classrooms without sufficient instruction, support, or resources. Media literacy is needed in teacher education for many reasons, but media literacy integrated into teacher education and development may specifically offer a means of improving teaching for diversity.

Teacher Education for Diversity

Numerous authorities declare that preparing teachers for diversity remains a problem. Ladson-Billings (2001), for example, maintains that "few teacher education programs prepare teachers to be effective in urban classrooms serving diverse groups of students" and "Similarly, work by feminist teacher educators underscores the problem that our traditional teacher education paradigms have in addressing diversity, equity, and social justice" (pp. 3 & 5). Manning and Baruth (2000) add that teachers "like others in U.S. society, have learned attitudes and behaviors that are ageist, disability biased, racist, sexist, and ethnocentric. Some biases are so deeply internalized that individuals do not realize they hold them" (p. 229). Cushner, McClelland, and Safford (2000) note that fewer than 10 percent of teacher education students in the United States claim fluency in a language other than English, most live within 100 miles of their birthplace, 69 percent report spending most or all of their time with people just like them, and a "substantial number of teacher education students do not believe that" poor and minority learners can learn high level concepts (p. 12). Finally, as Landsman (2001) points out, most white teachers are at best nervous and insecure even talking about such matters as race (p. xi). Teachers often lack the knowledge and resources to serve diverse students. Effective teacher education for diversity is not easy; media literacy may prove key.

Media Literacy and Multicultural Education

Media literacy is defined as the ability to access, analyze, evaluate and create communications in a variety of media (Aufderheide, 1993, p.2). American society is inundated by media images and sounds, from the...

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