HomeInternational Journal of Advances in Education, Social Sciences and Innovationvol. 1 no. 1 (2022)

Enhancing Students? Digital Media Literacy through Project REAL NEWS (Reliable E-content and Authenthic Linkages for Nimble-minded, Efficacious, and Watchful Students)

Flordeliza Addatu | Marianne Jane B. Addatu | Annaliza Bunagan | Darwin Caronan | Ethel Joyce Layus | Reichelle Santiago

Discipline: Education

 

Abstract:

In the Philippines, education has transitioned to remote and digital platforms, with teaching now conducted virtually. Consequently, social media and the internet have become the source of information, allowing them to share ideas, information, and thoughts. However, this has affected the quality of information being shared among individuals and the broader community. The Project REAL NEWS, which stands for Reliable E-Content and Authentic Linkages for Nimble-Minded, Efficacious, And Watchful Students, is an assessment tool that determines students' ability to discern factual events, pictures, quotations, and information in History, Economics, and Contemporary Issues in the Philippine setting. In this quasiexperimental study, all Grade 10 students in the Science Curriculum of the University of Saint Louis Tuguegarao with Full Online and Blended Learning modalities answered the pretest. Subsequently, students with a percentage of 74 and below were taught to utilize the suggested digital media literacy program. The pre-test and post-test questionnaires comprised 20- item multiple-choice divided into three parts, each pertaining to the factual information of three disciplines taught in Social Studies at the Junior High School level. This study followed three phases of data gathering: First, a pre-test was administered to the 418 participants before implementing the proposed digital media literacy program to determine the target participants and assess their initial abilities in discerning factual information. Second, participants with a percentage of 74 and below during the pre-test were engaged in the proposed digital media literacy program. Third, a post-test was administered after the implementation of the Project REAL NEWS. Frequency and percentage were used to interpret the pre-test and post-test scores of the participants, while a paired-sample T-test was used to test the significant difference between the pre-test and posttest scores of the participants. Results showed that the post-test scores of the students were higher than their pre-test scores. The study revealed a significant difference in the pre-test and posttest scores of the participants. Furthermore, it showed that they have very satisfactorily developed their abilities in online factchecking information. Thus, the program or the intervention effectively enhances the skills in online fact-checking information of the Grade 10 students.



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