Substack 101
As algorithmic social media feeds become increasingly cluttered with noise and polarization, a growing number of educators and citizens are turning to the "newsletter economy" to reclaim their digital attention. Substack has emerged as a powerful tool in this landscape, offering a space where we can move away from being passive consumers and toward becoming…
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MEL Monthly Meeting
These gatherings are designed exclusively for the 71 people who are currently affiliated with the Lab as core team members, fellows, affiliated faculty, graduate students, or project collaborators.As our work continues to grow in reach, scale, and impact, these monthly meetings give us space to stay connected, share updates, coordinate…
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Together We Rise: December 2025
Dear friends of the Media Education Lab community,Like many of you, we are still processing the school shooting that took place at Brown University last week and the days of fear and anxiety that followed. Many members of the MEL community, including myself, live, work, teach, and study in and around Providence, Rhode Island. Many of you reached out to us in the past days, appreciating the…
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Media & Family Conference
The Catholic University of Croatia (CUC) hosts the "Media and Family in the Age of Artificial Intelligence" conference on December 10, 2025, focusing on media's impact on family life, alongside broader communication conferences addressing disinformation, with participation from international experts, promoting media literacy and digital citizenship, reflecting CUC's engagement in contemporary…
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Media Mindfulness
Media Mindfulness: Building Media Literacy Through Meaningful Discussion  Discover how media mindfulness can be a powerful tool to help people become savvy news consumers by engaging in thoughtful discussions about local and current issues. Through guided reflection, students consider which news stories are meaningful to them and how they make them feel. This approach promotes respectful dialogue…
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New Models for Academic Peer Review: A JMLE Discussion
 What are some alternatives to the double-blind peer review system of academic journals? Not surprisingly, there are quite a few! Each model is trying to fix different weaknesses of traditional double-blind peer review (bias, slowness, opacity, gatekeeping).  Join JMLE Editors for an informal conversation to learn more about the options available as we consider a path forward.  DATE: Thursday,…
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From Disinformation to Empowerment in Belgium and Brazil
From Disinformation to Empowerment: How Fact-Checking Organisations Integrate Media Literacy initiatives in Belgium and BrazilPresenter: Thais Motta, Master's in Digital Communication Leadership (DCLead) at Vrije Universiteit Brussel (VUB)  Date: December 2nd, 2025Time: 12PM EST | 6PM UCTLocation: Register HERE for ZOOM…
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Favorite Podcast Share Out
What are your favorite podcasts and who are your favorite podcasters? How do you share these with others? Finding, sharing, and filtering high quality podcasts is a valuable activity, especially when we engage in this process with others who share common interests like “media literacy.” But it can also be inspiring and invigorating to share favorite podcasts about our personal hobbies and niche…
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Assessing the Evidence for Digital Interventions to Inoculate against Misinformation
Digital Technique-based Inoculation Interventions against Misinformation (DTIIMs) are promising, empirically supported game- and video-based interventions to address susceptibility to misinformation (e.g., the online game: Bad News). However, some research suggests DTIIMs' status as effective psychological inoculation interventions is unclear, which has implications for their development and for…
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Fact Checking (Previously) Invisible History
Fact Checking (Previously) Invisible History: The Charlotte-Mecklenburg Remembrance ProjectIt is important to study and understand our history. This is true for events sometimes perceived as “hard history,” which involved unjust, discriminatory treatment and even violence between different groups and individuals. Researching and fact checking these historical events presents unique as well as…
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Media Literacy in Massachusetts: A Landscape Scan
The first-ever major statewide initiative to document the scope of media literacy education in American public schoolsClick here to read the report To better understand the status, challenges, and opportunities for advancing media literacy education…
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Media Literacy in Action, 2nd edition 2025
The blurring of entertainment, information, and persuasion is reshaping work, life, and citizenship. As a result, our relationship to media has never been so important nor so complex. By asking critical questions about what they watch, listen to, read, and use, students can be better prepared to be responsible communicators who can use a variety of formats and genres for self-expression and…
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When Teens Create the News
Download the Publication When Teens Create the News:  Examining the Impact of PBS/NewsHour Student Reporting Labs Renee Hobbs, University of Rhode Island Abstract The PBS NewsHour Student Reporting Labs program (www.studentre-portinglabs.com) connects middle and high school students…
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The Routledge Handbook of Media Education Futures Post-Pandemic.
Our team from the Media Education Lab is proud to announce the publication of The Routledge Handbook of Media Education Futures Post-Pandemic.This handbook showcases how educators and practitioners around the world adapted their routine media…
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Mind Over Media: Propaganda Education for a Digital Age
Winner of the American Association of Publishers 2021 PROSE Award for Excellence in Social Sciences Media literacy educators have always…
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Your Turn to Talk
Now you can participate in online dialogue with people from across the country and around the world with "Your Turn to Talk," a digital interactive learning experience made especially for Renee Hobbs' book, Media Literacy in Action, 2nd edtion.  CLICK HERE…
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Courageous Conversations
Bring media literacy and active listening to middle school, high school, college and adult learnersWith support from talented educators and experts who participated in the program, we’re proud to bring you the Courageous Conversations Curriculum. This book contains a collection of materials to help you bring media literacy and active listening into your middle school, high school or college…
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Assignment: Media Literacy
After 25 years, it's still the most popular resource from the Media Education Lab!This is the 18-unit curriculum created by Renee Hobbs and colleagues in 1998!  You will be pleased to see how timeless and relevant these lessons continue to be!You can download the PDF files with lesson plans and reproducibles for each unit and use the videos to teach media literacy in conjunction with social…
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Media Literacy Smartphone
Learn how to use the Media Literacy Smartphone with learners of all ages! Download the free Learning Guide to bring the power of media literacy analysis to your learners!These easy-to-use cards, shaped…
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Teachers Guide, Media Literacy in Action
 This Teacher’s Guide will help you get the most out of the new textbook by Renee Hobbs, as it offers practical guidance on using this textbook in the classroom. Whether you are an experienced teacher or teaching media literacy for the first time, this guide…
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Media Literacy in Action
THE SECOND EDITION HAS ARRIVED!The blurring of entertainment, information, and persuasion is reshaping work, life, and citizenship. As a result, our relationship to media has never been so important nor so complex. By asking critical questions about what they watch, listen to, read, and use, students can be better prepared to be responsible communicators who can use a variety of formats and…
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Set Your Motivation
The Digital Learning Horoscope is a 48-item Likert scale instrument that assesses teachers’ perception of the value and relevance of six conceptual themes, namely: attitudes toward technology tools, genres and formats; message content and quality; community connectedness; texts and audiences; media systems; and learner-centered focus. …
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Copyright
It's more important than ever before to understand the scope of your rights and responsibilities as a digital author. That's why Renee Hobbs wrote 2 books about copyright! Copyright Clarity: How Fair Use Supports Digital…
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Mind Over Media: Analyzing Contemporary Propaganda
  www.mindovermedia.us Mind Over Media is the winner of the 2021 PROSE Awards for Social Sciences by the American Association of Publishers, the membership organization of the scholarly and academic press. ORDER THE BOOK!…
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Grandparents of Media Literacy
The Grandparents of Media Literacy is the website companion to a book edited by Renee Hobbs entitled Exploring the Roots of Digital and Media Literacy through Personal Narrative, which was published by Temple University Press in 2016. Read the book online. The Grandparents of…
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