Media literacy: How to read a news story like an editor, in four checks

Editors read a story backwards from its claims: who is named as the source, what is attributed, what got checked, and where the argument starts. Run those four checks on any piece and you will know within minutes whether it reports or persuades. That is media literacy in practice. This guide walks through the checks in the order a desk would run them. None of it needs special tools. A source list, a corrections trail, and one minute of outside checking do most of the work. The media news hub keeps more pieces in this vein. Media literacy, on the standard definition, is the ability to access, analyze, evaluate, and create media, and its sharpest habit is lateral reading — checking a source from outside while you read, per the encyclopedia's entry on media literacy. Editors run that loop for a living. You can run a lighter version of it. What does an editor check first? Sources, before sentences.

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