According to Dr. Seema Yasmin, we’re living through a misinformationdemic. I’ve always thought that media literacy should be a mandatory subject for kids, but it’s never been more evident than today — so I’m incredibly grateful for Seema’s wonderfully helpful, engaging, and important new YA handbook. What the Fact?!: Finding Truth in All the Noise.
It’s not a book about what to think, but how to think, especially in a world saturated with false news and sketchy info.
If you don’t know Seema, she’s a journalist, researcher, CNN contributor, and professor at UCLA and Stanford University’s Department of Medicine; here, she tackles the subject with facts, a decided lack of judgment, and a huge dose of compassion for the shortcomings of our own brains.
Take a listen to our discussion on this week’s episode of Spawned right now and learn how we can BS-proof our brains (it’s possible!), how to teach our kids to separate fact from fiction, and how they can be part of the solution, too.
Topics include
-how to teach kids to discern truth from untruth
-how to look for reliable sources
-the difference between misinformation, disinformation and malinformation
-why we should stop saying “fake news”
-the physiology and evolutionary science behind gullibility
-how to change your mind (and why our brains make it so hard!)
-how to have evidence-based conversations to debunk a myth
-how kids can find a way to be part of the solution and change other people’s minds while maintaining their relationships.
Be sure to subscribe to Spawned wherever you get your podcasts.
Follow Seema: @DoctorYasmin on Twitter, @DrSeemaYasmin on Instagram
Download: The free What the Fact?! Teaching Guide from the Pulitzer Center.
Seema’s Cool Pick of the Week: The new YA novel Eden’s Everdark by Caren Strong. Her description had me adding it to my queue immediately!
Liz’s Cool Pick of the Week: CountOnMothers.org has created an app to unite mothers around policies that impact our families. They share information about issues being debated and bills up for votes, poll us on our views, then share our views with policy makers who can make a difference.
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