Try this at home: Example of teaching your kids media literacy

[Hahn_Bikey]

Thom Hartmann recently had a post about how other countries are teaching media literacy to kids.
https://hartmannreport.com/p/how-does-america-solve-its-fake-news
Until that time comes, I thought we can do a little home schooling on the subject.

So I picked a recent right wing post (found through therighting.com), picked it apart, and before giving away the answer to my son. I had him think critically about it too.

I think my logic is correct here, but if anyone finds flaws in it then I'd appreciate the feedback/correction.
So here's the post I decided to pick
https://noqreport.com/2021/06/29/newest-covid-lie-fear-delta-variant-and-get-vaccinated/
Ask "OK, so if you just believed what you just read, what is it that you think you learned?"
If you got vaccinated, then you are three times as likely to die from the delta variant as unvaccinated people. Therefore vaccinations are bad.

OK, so now let's scrutinize it a bit further. It references a study. Let's use a search engine to find that study and other articles that talk about it, and see where they got their numbers from.
Here's the study:
https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/996740/Variants_of_Concern_VOC_Technical_Briefing_17.pdf
First off, who published it? Public Health England. OK let's look them up and see if it is a reputable organization.
A few more checks with the search engine confirms this.
Therefore the right wing article must be doing something misleading with the numbers. OK so that's what we need to focus on.

Table 4 is the key. At the last few lines of the table, the numbers seem to suggest that death rate was three times higher for vaccinated people (1+19+50=70 out of 27192=0.26%) than the unvaccinated people (44/53822=0.08%). This is the data that the right-wing article used to come to this conclusion. Reputable organization. The data are the facts. Ooooh, vaccine baaaad...

Wait... think about that denominator again (first row of table 4), in other words, out of what population?
It's out of the people who got infected with the delta variant (92,029).
Aha... so there's the catch. It's out of people who already got infected.
If you think back, the article was carefully worded to make you think it was out of the whole population without saying it explicitly: "vaccinated people are three times more likely to die from infection by the delta variant than unvaccinated people".
If you're vaccinated, then it decreases the chances that you get infected in the first place, so the chances of dying from the delta variant are MUCH lower than unvaccinated.

But wait, there's more: If you look again at the bottom of table 4, those 70 vaccinated people who died include 20 people who didn't get their second dose. So we should really be comparing that 44 with 50, not 70.
But the article conveniently doesn't mention that does it?

My son was so amused and empowered by seeing through this misleading article that he asked for more examples to practice on

I wish I had more time to do this for him. It took a long while to go through this particular example myself. It would be great if more people did stuff like this and posted them so we would all have more practice material. Or maybe it exists already somewhere? A blog or something? If so, someone please let me know.

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

1. Thank you for that.

The underlying mechanism of your fact-checking is asking questions. And then double-checking the article or points put out there.

Too many people -- and I see it here far too often -- don't ask basic questions.

[LearnedHand]

2. Well done!

An excellent exercise in taking apart an argument! A few other information hygiene tools Hartmann’s article hinted at but didn’t make explicit:

Be skeptical first, even if it’s something you agree with. Especially if you agree with it. It’s very easy to fall into confirmation bias otherwise.
Always ask who funded the research, even if the conclusions agree with your world view. The research conclusions can be contaminated the money.
Notice whether research is primary or a “review of the literature.” A review of the literature literally produces statistics about what other people are writing (which isn’t necessarily wrong, but you should keep it in mind).

You get the idea.

[treestar]

3. That's great

I recall doing this kind of thing - you often find the source is not disinterested.

[TimeToGo]

4. Good job

[burrowowl]

5. Kick!

[pandr32]

6. Checking sources and hidden agendas

...should become a way of life. I read the article and I agree that we should begin to get children thinking critically as early as possible. I can just imagine the right-wing outrage.

[NNadir]

7. That may be a good idea, but it would be a better idea to teach it to adults.

The internet has become a vast tool for not only spreading information, but disinformation as well.

Humanity clearly doesn't understand how to handle information and it's hardly limited to children. Without the internet, they'd be no MAGA and similar celebrations of deliberate ignorance.

[NNadir]

8. Welcome, by the way, to DU. You're off to a great start here. n/t.

[mjvpi]

9. Critical thinking. It's a solvable puzzle. Kids, and us really old kids, love it.

Autocracy always attacks the intellectuals first.

[cbabe]

10. I would ask my students

'how do you know that?' and 'prove it'.

Arguments are like math. They need to add up.

[alphafemale]

11. kids are pretty swift at smelling b-shit. Your parents might need this, though.

follow the money is always valid.

[paleotn]

12. Well done. Very well done.

Critical thinking must be taught and learned.

[FakeNoose]

13. This is a high quality post - Kick and Recommend

Thanks Hahn Bikey!

I'm looking forward to great things from you.

[TomWilm]

14. You ask for more practice material ...

... but you already seems to know how this is done. When your BS-detector start to tingle, check it out - and normally there is problems to be fund. The very seldom times where their math checks out, is when the world get's even more interesting .

Snopes.com is still one of the best for inspiration.

Also remember to teach your kid when to share such knowledge, and when not to do it!

One day when your student really need a big challenge, you could look into the work of EUvsDisinfo.eu. It is the European Union Disinfo Watch, and the fun thing there is to debunk their debunking. It is surprisingly easy - their main problem is that they use NATO briefs as facts to solve political disputes, and never go for real sources.

[Pepsidog]

15. Righties read headlines and accept as them as fact.

[LearnedHand]

16. Ooh you are SO RIGHT

and headline writers are almost never the content writers. Headlines exist to draw eyes, not to summarize the content.

[Duppers]

17. My motto...

Skepticism is a virtue.

Good job, Hahn_Bikey!

[dreamland]

18. You should be teaching this as a college course

This was a great post something all students should learn.

[Delphinus]

19. Bookmarking.

Thank you!