Media Bias (Students): Start HERE!

Media Literacy courses by Crash Course: educational YouTube channel started by John and Hank Green covering a variety of topics.

• Introduction to Media Literacy 
• History of Media Literacy part 1
• History of Media Literacy part 2
• Media and the Brain

MediaWise's Teen Fact-Checking Network: learn media literacy skills and use social media to help others sort fact from fiction. 

News Literacy Project: works with educators and journalists to give students the skills they need to discern fact from fiction and to know what to trust.

SIFT: developed by Mike Caulfield the SIFT method helps assess the credibility of online information.

Web Literacy for Student Fact-Checkers by Mike Caulfield. This ebook provides resources and techniques when conducting media literacy fact-checking.  

*Borrowed from Media Bias Libguide (Downers Grove South HS Library)

Types of Bias 

• Bias by selection and/or omission: An editor can express bias by choosing whether or not to use a specific news story.  Within a story, some details can be ignored, others can be included to give readers or viewers a different opinion about the events reported.  Only by comparing news reports from a wide variety of sources can this type of bias be observed.
• Bias by Headline: Headlines are the must-read part of a news story because they are often printed in large and bold fonts.  Headlines can be misleading, conveying excitement when the story is not exciting, expressing approval or disapproval.
• Bias by photos, captions, and camera angles: Pictures can make a person look good, bad, silly, etc.  Which photos a news producer chooses to run can heavily influence the public's perception of a person or event.  On TV, images, captions, and narration of a TV anchor or reporter can be sources of bias.
• Bias by placement: Where a story is placed influences what a person thinks about its importance.  Stories on the front page of the newspaper are thought to be more important than stories buried in the back.  Many television and radio newscasts run stories that draw ratings first and leave the less appealing for later.
• Bias by choice of words: People can be influenced by the use of positive or negative words with a certain connotation. People can also be influenced by the tone that a newscaster uses when saying certain words.

*Borrowed from Media Bias Libguide (Downers Grove South High School)