| Media Evaluation Guidelines To set the stage to help your students realize their need for a media fast have them consider some of the following questions in a group discussion or actually take a week monitoring their own time with the media. Here are some questions that can really open our eyes if we take the time to consider them honestly. What percentage of your time per week do you spend with the media? List hours spent this last week: Television?_______ Cell Phone? ______ CD Player/Mp3 Player______ Radio_______ Computer________ Movie Theater_______ Newspaper________ According to a recent California study the national average of media attention per week is between 3 and 6 hour per day. Nearly all children live in a home with at least one television. Two-thirds of children have a TV set in their bedroom (Roberts, 1999). Children spend about 50% more time watching TV now than a few decades ago (Gortmaker, 1990). The average youth currently watches 3 hours of TV per day (Nielsen, 1998). If you include time spent watching videotapes or playing video games that number increases to about 5-1/2 hours per day. Children and teens therefore spend about one-third of their waking time watching TV and playing video games (Roberts, 1999). By the time the average person turns 20, nearly 5 years of his or her life will have been spent watching TV and other media, more time in most cases than to any other single activity with the exception of sleeping . Now in contrast compare this time to how much your youth spend with God. Bible reading______ prayer________ worship______ Weekly Mission projects_______ |
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Discussion Questions
After you have taken the time to tally the time
and percentages, ask your students the
following questions?
1)When you compare the following times would
you change your focus?
2) Do you think your time could be spent better
on other things?
3) During this week have you heard any
profanity, seen sexually explicit content or
graphic violence on the media?
When you take the time consider how much
attention the world gets with our time it
becomes more evident why our struggles with
the world are so strong.
After you have taken the time to tally the time
and percentages, ask your students the
following questions?
1)When you compare the following times would
you change your focus?
2) Do you think your time could be spent better
on other things?
3) During this week have you heard any
profanity, seen sexually explicit content or
graphic violence on the media?
When you take the time consider how much
attention the world gets with our time it
becomes more evident why our struggles with
the world are so strong.
For more information and an actual
survey to evaluate your time with the
media. Here are some helpful links.
California Media Review
Christian Answers: TV Review
survey to evaluate your time with the
media. Here are some helpful links.
California Media Review
Christian Answers: TV Review
