Media Literacy
Harborlight Montessori School has developed a Media Literacy Program that is designed to provide students in grades 1-6 with both the technical and the cognitive reasoning skills necessary for them to become informed contributors in the 21st century digital society. Our program is based upon the Massachusetts Technology Literacy Standards, the National Educational Technology Standards (NETS) developed by the International Society for Technology in Education (ISTE), as well as the Information and Communication Technology (ICT) Literacy skills developed by the Partnership for 21st Century Skills.
The Harborlight Media Literacy Program is designed to teach students how to use a wide variety of media tools, while guiding them in the critical thinking process. It assists them in developing the technical skills necessary for effective technology-based communication, and ensures that they will be able to use technology to gather, process, analyze and present information. Through special projects and group discussions, students explore the concepts of safety, ethics and productive citizenship in the digital age. By evaluating various media sources, they come to understand that information may be biased and/or deceiving. They practice deconstructing sources and discover that the Internet, while easy and entertaining to use, is not always the best source of information. During this process, they learn that a critical mind is the cornerstone of an informed society.
