Parenting in the age of fake news: 5 things you can start doing today

When I was in 7th grade, we did a unit in English class about how to read the newspaper. We learned where the most important stories were placed (to the right) and about how the stories were written so that the most important points were covered first (before the reader lost interest). They didn’t teach us how to figure out if the stories were true, because back then it just didn’t occur to us that anyone would publish fake news. Now, it happens all the time. It’s not that there have never been untrue stories published. But with the rise of the Internet, where anybody can post anything — and in an age when, in the race to present new content on a 24/7 news cycle, fact-checking doesn’t always happen — the number of fake stories has skyrocketed. As if parenting weren’t hard enough these days, parents now have a new task: to teach their children to be savvy consumers of news. This is very important; if the next generation can’t tell fact from fiction when it comes to news, the future of our country and world could be in real jeopardy. Here are five suggestions for giving children the skills they need to navigate the new reality of news: Teach them not everything they read or hear is true. Most of it will be, and you don’t want to turn them into suspicious conspiracy theorists. But it’s important that they get this basic concept—and learn to be thoughtful and careful before making any decisions or assumptions based on a news story. Teach them to evaluate s...
Source: Thrive, Children's Hospital Boston - Category: Pediatrics Authors: Tags: Health & Wellness Parenting Teen Health Adolescent Medicine Claire McCarthy Source Type: news