Media literacy for everyone
06 Feb, 2025
3 minute read

Media literacy for everyone

We live in an age when spreading misinformation online can be a career, AI deep fakes drive the rise of identity fraud, and celebrity crypto scandals are a familiar story. 

Media literacy has never been more important. 

Despite this, media literacy as a ‘thing’ has struggled to make cut-through in education, policy and public awareness. 

We define it as ‘the ability to access and critically evaluate different media and environments, protect personal information, participate positively and responsibly, and to identify and respond to negative content and behaviour’.

OK, it doesn’t exactly roll off the tongue, but its principles couldn’t be more relevant for children, young people and families. 

 

This is where Parent Zone Programmes come in.

Simple, proven solutions

We know digital family life is complicated. So to make quality media literacy programmes for families at scale, the concepts must be clear, the benefits obvious, and the activities simple enough to fit into messy family life. 

More often than not, parents are the first responders when children run into problems online. Building good media literacy skills can help shift the focus from cure to prevention. 

Our Everyday Digital programme, funded by the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology (DSIT), aims to do this. 

Through our research and evidence base, we know that parents want simple, proven, practical solutions. Supported by a network of trained family-facing professionals and organisations, the programme promotes easy media literacy habits that can be used by parents in their everyday lives. 

The Everyday Digital January broadcast campaign is doing this at scale, through a widget embedded across many organisation websites, offering bite size ways to boost family media literacy. 

Expertise and evidence base

Research and work with experts across the public, private and third sectors underpins our programme development and delivery. It can sometimes also highlight where more evidence is needed.
 

Our work supported by the Nuffield Foundation explores what digital media literacy interventions for Early Years children (ages 0-5) currently exist. 

 

Through this, we are also looking to understand what support parents and educators need, so that they can help young children develop the foundations for digital media literacy. 

 

The final report will outline our findings, and will go further into shaping the development of media literacy skills in the youngest age group.

 

We want media literacy to be for everyone – and often it is about meeting people where they are at. 

Our Talk:Tech programme supports young people with speech, language and communication needs (SLCN) to have conversations about the online world. Developed in collaboration with young people, parents, teachers, and specialists, it offers a range of visual and spoken resources. 

Innovation and responsiveness

Every family is different – and we recognise these differences through our programmes, whether researching, planning, testing, or delivering. 

 

Constant digital developments require responsive and innovative media literacy solutions, so we’ve always got an ear to the ground when it comes to technology and family life. 

 

This is why we’re always looking to work with new partners, organisations and experts to help us reach more families. Together, we hope to make sure media literacy really is for everyone. 

 

Everyday Digital: book a free media literacy session for parents

If you are a school or a family-facing organisation, we are offering a free media literacy session for parents at your setting.

If you’d like to host a session, or would like to know more about our work, please contact programmes@parentzone.org.uk