I teach a lot of avid readers, plus a healthy number of kids who do not really love reading much. One thing that the savvier non-readers and readers have in common is a sense of page layout in non-fiction books. After all, books have become such a visual feast compared to when I was a kid—which is wonderful for our children, but is changing how kids approach reading for information.
For data-mongers and reluctant readers alike, one of the first things they learn is to look to margin boxes, those stripes in a contrasting color down the outer margin of the page, to find the most intense concentration of information.
(Source: Doherty, Gillian, et
al. "Australia and Oceania—Political." The Usborne Internet-Linked
Encyclopedia Of World Geography with Complete World Atlas. London: Usborne
Publishing, 2004. 284-285.)
I find, as a result, that my students tend to identify the stripe down the side of many web pages right away, and go looking there first for information. As adults, we recognize that these are often ads.
However, ads can appear to match a student’s information need very closely. So, a student looking at a page on the Titanic may see links to “The Passengers of the Titanic” and “1912 Titanic (1000s of Products—Sale!),” which can appear highly relevant and entice the student to click.
To the experienced book-reader, the location of these links on the page suggests that they are the “good stuff.” They get confused and frustrated very quickly as they try to access it.
One of my favorite examples recently is a local high school teacher who tells me that his students cite Amish Fireplace ads as sources in their history papers, and do not recognize even more explicit advertisements for what they are—instead thinking of them as information that is “easy to read.”
Unless we actively teach kids about page layout online—where they might expect to find ads and vocabulary that will help identify them (“ads,” “sponsored links,” "sponsored results," "sponsored sites," "preferred partners," etc.), even strong readers will be missing a critical component of their online literacy.
My take away: Teach kids to distinguish ads from content.
What’s yours?
