Media literacy in the teaching of English in Singapore
Given the extraordinary pace at which especially new media technologies have developed in the last five to ten years, as well as the unprecedented amount of leisure time youth spend engaging with media such as television, Facebook, or games, there has been greater recognition by scholars, educators, and policymakers of the importance of incorporating media education and media literacy in schools and curricula. Current curricular approaches have moved away from a protectionist rationale toward a concern with supporting youth to become active media users (Buckingham, 2002). This shift towards recognizing youth’s agentive role particularly through digital social media has also led to a focus in media literacy programs on both production and consumption; in other words, fostering youth’s critical and reflective capacities in relation to both their consumption and production of media texts/content. Learner-centered pedagogies that draw on students’ everyday understanding, experience, and use of media in and out of school are advocated (Hobbs, 2011b). Recognizing and building on students’ media experiences is a key principle of media literacy curricula that aim to empower students to become active, reflective, and critical users of contemporary media.