Teacher Motivations for Digital and Media Literacy in Turkey

Renee Hobbs and Sait Tuzel

National Association for Media Literacy Education (NAMLE) ConferenceFriday, June 26, 2015

PEER-TO-PEER FILE SHARING

What really motivates teachers to care about digital and media literacy

Research on motivations of Turkish teachers

Implications for professional development and teacher education

Goals for Today’s Session

1

2

3

LOVE HATE

PRINT VISUAL SOUND DIGITAL

Educators’ attitudes about media, technology and popular culture shape their work with learners

ACCESS

Theoretical foundations

open access

multitasking

transmediation

curation

play

data ownership

identity

representation

privacy

addiction

propaganda

Theoretical foundations

Empowerment

Theoretical foundations

ProtectionTheoretical foundations

Motivations for Using Media & Technology in Education

12

Motivation Themes

Tools, Genres and Formats Message Content and Quality Community Connectedness

Texts and Audiences Media Systems Learner-Centered Focus

TECHIEYou’re the educator who loves tablets, apps, programs, plug-ins, widgets, websites, and other types of educational technology because you have a passionate curiosity about new tools. You see much potential to engage students with the technology tools they love and use in their everyday lives.

PROFESSIONALYou have high standards for your students’ work, and you may be seen as the go-to media professional in your school. You know how to push your students to understand and emulate the professional conventions that is important to being taken seriously in the world of media creation. To help students enter the real world of media creation, you bring other authors, professionals, and media-makers into your classroom to enrich the learning experience.

Focu

s on

Too

l, G

enre

or F

orm

at

TASTEMAKERYou want to broaden your students’ horizons. You want them to have exposure to the kinds of media experiences that put them in touch with historical, aesthetic, and critical appreciation. You know that a key component of students’ future interactions will require them to draw from a variety of cultural sources both classical and popular.

PROFESSOR You balance your interest in media and technology with a clear connection to academic standards. You want to be sure that media and technology are not used in the classroom for their own sake, but to gain content knowledge. Multimedia presentations, engaging websites, and educational technology serve the purpose of helping you deliver the core content and skills students need to master.

Focu

s on

Con

tent

and

Qua

lity

ACTIVISTAs an educator, you want to make society more just and equitable by promoting democratic participation. You use media in the classroom as a catalyst for students to understand how they might have a voice in improving the quality of life in their communities and in the world.

TEACHER 2.0You understand that participation in digital media and learning cultures requires flexibility to new formats, modes of expression, and participation in and out of school. You use online or interactive versions of classic literature to explore meaning behind texts. Teacher 2.0 teachers always trying new things in the classroom and finding new ways to connect learning to children’s culture.

Focu

s on

Com

mun

ity C

omm

nect

edne

ss

TRENDSETTERYou’re tuned into pop culture and curious about kid culture. Maybe your own most-loved popular culture isn’t too far removed from that of your students. You are inquisitive about the trends and hot topics that make up a crucial component of the fabric of your students’ everyday lives. You want school culture to meet kids where they live with the popular culture they know and love.

ALTYou are an inventive, perhaps “DIY,” teacher. You’re always ready to challenge students with alternative ways of finding, using, thinking about, and making media in the classroom. Whether you use open source programs on school computers, encourage students to start alternative clubs or magazines, or introduce students to media that’s “off the beaten path” of mainstream and mass media, you are likely a key proponent of broadening students’ understanding of the many different ways that people can communicate in the world.

Focu

s on

Tex

ts a

nd A

udie

nces

DEMYSTIFIER As a teacher, you “pull back the curtain” to help students see how various forms of information and knowledge are constructed. You emphasize the practice of critical thinking, helping students ask good “how” and “why” questions.

WATCHDOGYou are a natural critical thinker, aware of how economic systems and institutions influence our everyday lives, particularly through the media we use. You want your students and your peers to be more mindful of the ways that things are bought and sold. Who owns and controls the media content that we see, hear, read, and play with? You feel responsible for giving your students a “wake-up call” about the economic and institutional inner-workings of the technology and the world that surrounds them.

Focu

s on

U

nder

stan

ding

Med

ia S

yste

ms

MOTIVATORYou are an inspiration, a catalyst for your students’ creative energy. Students who have never felt comfortable speaking up in class, participating in activities, or contributing to class dialogue find it easier to speak their mind when you’re leading the classroom. You see your role as helping students be the best they can be.

SPIRIT GUIDEYou are a listener. You have a dedication to the social and emotional well-being of your students, and want to make sure that everything you do in the classroom connects to their immediate needs to understand themselves and their lives. Students likely find you trustworthy, and may even confide in you in ways that they do not for other teachers. You know media is just one facet of student life, and you want to engage with it to help them through the highs and lows of life in all of its challenges and opportunities.

Lear

ner C

ente

red

Focu

s

www.powerfulvoicesforkids.com

Research Context: Media Literacy in Turkey

Turkey has embarked on one of the world’s largest educational technology projects by putting interactive whiteboards and tablets in thousands of classrooms but without providing consistent levels of teacher training.

Turkish Adaptation of the Instrument

• Translation Process

• Language Equivalence Process

Learn your own motivation…

http://www.medyaegitimilab.org/

Purpose of the StudyThe study investigates the digital

learning motivation profiles of a large sample of Turkish teachers in relationship to

• their subject-area specializations• access to media and digital tools• frequency of use of different types

of media and technology tools

Sampling

January 2014- June 2014

Online survey

2,820 Teachers

1-5 1519 53.9

21-25 689 24.4

26-30 1052 37.3

13.486.640.2

41.0

45.0

61.5

Model x2 = 72.46 p= .000x2 = 1501.90; df=33; p=.000Source: Hobbs, R. & Tuzel, S. (in press) Teacher Motivations for Digital and Media Literacy: An Examination of Turkish Educators. British Journal of Educational Technology.

205 39.3

78 15 219 30.2

182 25.1

80 11.5

328 47

Sensitivity to teacher motivations may contribute to the design of PD with greater impact

Consider the variety of teacher motivations when designing professional development in digital and media literacy

Instructional Practices may be Associated with Motivations

Find, comprehend and interpret content

Gain knowledge and information

Examine the quality of educational resources

Share ideas through dialogue & discussion

Create, build or make something

Reflect on expected and unanticipated consequences

Develop and implement a plan of action

Critically analyze how messages are constructed

Reflection on one’s own motivations may increase metacognition about instructional practices

PEER-TO-PEER FILE SHARING

The measurement of digital learning motivation profiles can help assess teachers’ perception of the relevance of six conceptual themes including:

• attitudes towards technology tools, genres and formats• message content and quality• community connectedness• texts and audiences• media systems and institutions• learner-centered focus Teachers’ digital learning motivation profiles reveal distinctive identity positions that differentiate social science, language arts, and ICT teachers in Turkey. 

Key Ideas

1

2

PEER-TO-PEER FILE SHARING

 Professional development programs should assess teachers’ digital learning motivation profiles and design learning experiences that expand upon teachers’ beliefs, values and attitudes and the conceptual themes of most importance to them.

Key Ideas

3

Renee HobbsMedia Education LabHarrington School of Communication and MediaUniversity of Rhode Island USAhobbs@uri.edu Twitter: @reneehobbshttp://mediaeducationlab.com

Sait TuzelAssociate ProfessorVisiting ScholarMedia Education Lab Harrington School of Communication and MediaUniversity of Rhode Island USAsaidtuzel@gmail.com@saidtuzel