It's National News Literacy Week and Scripps News is partnering with The News Literacy Project to help educate America about what is fact and what is fiction. This past week, ABC15's Kaley O'Kelley had the chance to sit down with some bright, young students in the Litchfield Elementary School District who are proving to be savvy when it comes to misinformation online.
"I think it's like useful to know what's going on around the world and, like, locally," eighth-grader Rowan Chavez tells us.
He and his classmates are part of a journalism club at school and are already actively consuming news not only on TV but also online.
"I usually watch the World News with David Muir — a lot of local news," Chavez tells O'Kelley.
CJ Hiatt has a different approach: "Sometimes I just go on social media and I see, like, something that's happening and I do like research and information on it because I find it very interesting on how things can happen."
While talking with them it became clear this group of teens already understands what misinformation is.
"If it were not reliable, it could be misinformation, like persuading you towards something that isn't true," says Chavez.
These teens also realize they cannot always trust what they see online and they're learning about what's true and what's not true from their parents, teachers and even peers online.
"I do see certain accounts that are dedicated to like, 'is this true?' All this information in the news, all of these things that are happening? What's true about it? What's false about it? Obviously, because it is social media that I'm getting this from, I have to re-check it," Keira Smith says.
These kids say it's important to know where and who you get your information from, and they have some tips to make sure what they're reading is accurate.
"I would have to make sure that their information is consistent a lot across sources that may say the same thing. Or if it's even just like this, one thing is saying this, and I can't find it anywhere else. It's probably not true," says Smith.
You can be like these students and learn more about spotting misinformation on NewsLiteracyWeek.org.
