These questions explicitly or implicitly guide the classroom practices of the educators who teach with or about the media. Some educators believe that students must experience the creation of photographs, scripts, video programming, web pages or the like to become truly critical of mass media. Some argue that using everyday texts provides the possibility for students and teachers to move beyond the limits of traditional disciplines and subject areas. Yet, a number of policy leaders have voiced their fears that, without an explicit connection between media literacy skills and social and political advocacy, media literacy may degenerate into a substitute for action instead of a spur to it. The question of whether media literacy should be taken outside the classroom to include the home environment as well.
Schools can be, paradoxically, the most radical and the most conservative of institutions.
Media literacy initiatives have been most successful in communities where teachers, parents and students have a shared, common vision about the love-hate relationship with the media, Hobbs notes. Developing successful programs can take two years or so to get of the ground, though. Some see the power of this in teaching science, social studies, history, the arts, and literature. But others are more practical and realize that not all teachers can teach media literacy well. For the doubters, they believe that media literacy should be taught on its own by a well-prepared instructor.