Week Seven DEJ

Why did the authors do this study?
The authors did the study to answer one central question as posed in the study, "How does media-literacy instruction, integrated within a yearlong course in high school English languagearts, affect the development of students’ message comprehension, writing, and critical-thinking skills?

How did the authors do the study?

The authors who conducted the study monitored students who participated in an eleventh grade English media/communication course that incorporated extensive critical media analysis of print, audio, and visual texts . There progress was compared with students from a demographically matched group who did not recieve critical media instruction.

What data/results emerged from the study?
The data that emerged from the study suggested the improvement that media literacy instruction had on the students' ability to identify main ideas in written, audio, and visual media.
Students that were in the media-literacy group scored higher on their reading comprehension scores than the
control group. The media-literacy students also outperformed students in the treatment group of identifying main ideas in radio broadcast.

What do the authors conclude from the data analysis?
The authors concluded that there were weaknesses to their research and that limited the study's value. The authors stated, "Because of the limitations of the research design, it is impossible
to make generalizations to other instructional contexts. A nonequivalent groups design was necessary to employ because the whole grade level was involved in the implementation of the treatment."

What is the significance of the study?
The significance of the study was to see if media instruction in the classroom had any effects on student learning.

How do these findings influence your position on media literacy and school curriculum?
Although there were some weaknesses that the authors ran into. I think that media literacy should be implemented into the school curriculum. Students will learn and media is something that many students take an interest to without regards to age, gender, or ability.