• Alcohol and tobacco prevention with parents and their children integrated into the excitement of hands-on media literacy activities
• Easy implementation for teachers
• Based on state-of-the-art scientific research and theory on media literacy education and effective substance abuse prevention approaches
• Teaches media literacy and media mediation skills to parents
• Reinforces students' media literacy skills
• Helps encourage parental involvement in their children's education both inside and outside of school

Program Structure:

• Grades 3-5
• 1 in-person session plus notebook with extension activities and parent resources
• Approximately 1.5-2 hours

Materials:

• Media Detective Parent Night Teacher Manual
• Multimedia presentation
• Casework Materials:
  • Parent Detective Notebooks
  • Stickers for parent-child teams
  • Activity Cards
  • Posters
  • Media Detective Parent Night magnets (optional)

Team Casework: Students and parents team up as Media Detectives to solve mysteries about the media in a series of cases. Students will be able to demonstrate to their parents their knowledge of the five Media Detective clues by coaching their parents through the interactive activities involved in each case.

Student Media Advocacy Presentation: Parents have the opportunity to view the student media advocacy projects that were created during the MD lessons. Parents will also be asked to deconstruct the original ads with their children and discuss their child’s counter-ads.

Group Practice of Skills: At the end of the Parent Night program, the teacher will gather all of the parents and children together for group practice. Together, they will review the five MD clues; deconstruct an alcohol commercial; and discuss media advocacy opportunities.

Skills Continuation: Teachers will encourage parents and students to continue improving their media literacy skills at home through completing extension activities provided in the Parent Detective Notebook. These activities are presented in an easy-to-read style and the Notebook includes guidance on how to adjust the complexity and content of activities for children of different ages.