Local teacher adds fake news lessons to civics course

ASHEVILLE - News director turned teacher Paul Irvin knew that if there ever was a time to address fake news in his high school civics class, this was the year.

There was a divisive election, a president calling the mainstream press "the enemy of the American people" and a rise in partisan fake news sites on both sides of the political aisle attempting to sway the American public and make money from advertisers champing to get in on the online action.

"People don't have a good idea what media is about," said Irvin. "They have a lot of misinformation. I'm trying to inform the students of how they can determine what's verifiable and think critically so they can make their own decisions about what to believe."

The former behind the scenes TV journalist became an educator after working in the fast-paced news industry for more than a decade. He now teaches social studies at Buncombe County's STEM school, Nesbitt Discovery Academy.

This year he added a series of lessons on fake news to a 10-day unit on media and politics.

There is a lot of potential for manipulation in today's saturated media market, said Irvin. So much of fake news is subtle, and students are processing media at a rapid pace. They need tools to understand how to decipher fact from fiction.

The teens in Irvin's class said they are on their cellphones at least 12 hours a day and use mostly mobile technology to consume their news. Most of it comes from social media sites like Snapchat and Facebook.

"Most of the news that we hear about is political news," said J.R. Moore, 17. "It shapes how we think about the government and what our belief system is."

Just after the morning bell Wednesday, the juniors in Irvin's civics class put their cellphones away to look at news reports on a projector screen. They spent the morning comparing headlines and websites to determine which stories were made up.

Irvin started with two reports under an ABC News banner. One story was titled "Dreamer detained after speaking out may be deported, attorney says." Another was headlined, "Obama Signs Executive Order Banning The National Anthem At All Sporting Events Nationwide."

The class laughed at the second title. Clearly, that was the one that was fake. But, besides its outlandish claim, how could a reader tell? It was, after all, posted on a page posing to be part of ABC News.

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Irvin teaches using lessons from The News Literacy Project, a nonpartisan national education nonprofit that works with teachers and journalists to help middle and high school students understand how media works.

It shows consumers how to look for red flags, such as excessive or unusual punctuation, strange website domains or altered images, like the manipulated ABC News logo on the fake story about President Barack Obama and the national anthem.

Participants learn how to do a reverse image search to see where a photograph came from and use fact-checking websites such as Pulitzer Prize winner PolitiFact.com, FactCheck.org and Snopes.com.

They are taught to critically think about the news they are reading. Are other outlets covering the same story? Does the organization list its mission and editorial standards? Is their a byline? Are a variety of sources cited?

Some of the examples were easy. Others caused the class to pause and seek additional information.

Understanding how to tell what is true is critical to a functioning democracy, they said.

"(News) keeps everyone informed," said Danielle Mathews, 16. "If a news story is biased or whatever then it's going to bring bias into the people who read it."

LEARN MORE

For more information on how to spot fake news, visit The News Literacy Project's website at www.thenewsliteracyproject.org.