S2 Ep4: How can your family separate fact from fiction on the internet? This and more on our latest podcast episode.

Photo above by Sara Kurfeß via Unsplash.

The latest episode of the Kidsburgh Podcast has dropped and it’s full of great info for parents and kids. You’ll hear our conversation with Jennifer Ehehalt from Common Sense Media, who shares about what “media literacy” is and why it’s more important than ever.

To prep for this episode, Kidsburgh’s executive editor searched online to find out how much media the average person consumes each day. What I found was a great example of just how important media literacy is: Her Google search offered up an AI summary that quoted statistics on how many hours of screen time the average person consumes.

But when she dug into where those stats came from, the source was a New York Times article from 2009 — 15 years ago! So though the data may have been accurate when the article was first published, that was before many of today’s streaming and social media platforms even existed. So the data that Google offered was likely very incorrect today.

She also was served up blog posts and essays by people who may or may not be sharing accurate information, and also random answers by people who posted on quora.com. So where does a parent or a kid start when they try to make sure the flood of information they take in each day is accurate? And how do we all make sure that we stay mentally and physically healthy as we’re consuming media?

“I think about kids and adults and how much media they consume these days,” says Yu-Ling Cheng, Kidsburgh’s director. “It could be an endless stream of videos, posts in our social media, TV shows we watch, articles we’re reading, podcasts we’re listening to, right? The list is endless, and we know that algorithms are designed to keep people scrolling or watching.”

How do we know what’s true and what isn’t, and how much consuming is actually good for us?

Listen to this Kidsburgh Podcast episode, recorded by SLB Radio Productions, to hear all the advice from Common Sense Media. You can find us on Apple Podcasts, Pandora, Spotify, at the SLB website or you can also listen right here:

S2 Ep4: Children’s Theater Festival, Jennifer Ehehalt on healthy media consumption, and teens talk about which news they trust

This week, join hosts Yu-Ling Cheng, Melissa Rayworth, and Kristine Sorensen as they talk with Common Sense Media’s Jennifer Ehehalt about raising media-savvy kids and improving the whole family’s media literacy. You’ll also get the scoop on the upcoming theater festivals for kids and hear from the local Tea with Teens crew about how they navigate the media landscape.

Links: Common Sense Media 

Download episode | Play in new window | File size: 33.9 MB