With misinformation becoming increasingly difficult to identify, the ability to think critically about media is now a core civic skill. Yet research shows that nearly 80% of Australians do not feel confident in their ability to identify false and misleading information online. The Australian Media Literacy Alliance (AMLA) framework provides a clear structure to help educators develop these skills, and tools such as Informit TVNews give students access to authentic Australian television news and current affairs, helping them practise critical analysis in line with the framework.
Traditionally, people relied on the 6pm nightly news broadcast as their main source of information. Today, however, television news is no longer dominant. Most Australians, especially young people, now access news through social media, online platforms, and even generative AI. So why should we focus on television news and current affairs in media literacy education?
The AMLA Framework in Teaching
The Australian Media Literacy Alliance framework provides a structured approach to developing media literacy in students. It defines six key concepts: media relationships, technologies, representations, audiences, institutions, and languages, and ten learning outcomes to guide students to become reflective and capable media participants. Research by educators indicates that using frameworks explicitly in teaching improves student understanding and engagement (Manuell, 2025).
Recent AMLA research (Notley et al., 2024) suggests that over 80% of Australians believe media literacy education should be provided in schools. Yet among adults, confidence in media abilities remains low. Only 39% feel confident checking if online information is true. Just 42% trust their ability to assess whether a website is reliable. These gaps underscore the critical importance of building strong foundations during school years.
Educators have stressed the usefulness of using framework elements explicitly in teaching. The AMLA framework defines media literacy as the ability to critically engage with media in all aspects of life, not just consuming information, but understanding how media shapes worldviews, influences society, and constructs versions of reality. TVNews directly supports every one of these outcomes.
Television News and Current Affairs as Texts
Despite shifting consumption patterns, television news and current affairs offer unique pedagogical advantages that make them invaluable for teaching media literacy. Unlike the fragmented, algorithm-curated content of social media feeds, television news and current affairs stories present complete, professionally produced narratives with clear authorship and institutional accountability. Each story combines visual, auditory, and textual elements in ways that make media construction visible and analysable.
Television news and current affairs come from multiple distinct identifiable sources, different networks, programs, and editorial perspectives. When students compare how Channel 7, Channel 9, the ABC, and SBS covered the same event on the same day, they directly observe how media constructs reality differently depending on institutional context, commercial pressures, and editorial values.
With changes in media ownership, it is more important than ever to preserve and examine examples of diversity in news coverage. Television news and current affairs archives allow students to trace not only how stories have changed over time, but also how the broader media landscape and industry practices have evolved.
Comparative analysis across media forms presents distinct challenges. Social media content is often ephemeral and platform-dependent, while print journalism lacks the multi-modal complexity of television. Television news and current affairs stories, with their consistent format and differing editorial approaches, offer a practical context for developing critical media literacy skills.
Having access to months or years of television news and current affairs coverage enables meaningful longitudinal analysis. Students can explore how reporting on issues like climate change has shifted, how representations of particular communities have evolved, and the ways in which different networks frame political debates over time.
Informit TVNews: A Context for Media Literacy
Informit TVNews provides comprehensive access to Australian television news and current affairs programs dating back to 2007. Over 1.3 million individual news reports from more than 30 leading Australian programs, all searchable with detailed metadata and accessible in the classroom.
Informit has partnered with Australian educational institutions for over three decades, committed to fostering diversity in publishing and promoting critical thinking for better informed communities. Working closely with the Australian Council for Educational Research (ACER) to develop Informit Explore (a curriculum-aligned research database designed specifically for Australian schools), this partnership means educational products are built with pedagogy at their core, informed by deep understanding of how teachers teach and students learn. Informit has also been a long-standing partner with organisations like ATOM, working together to support media education across Australia.
While TVNews was not originally developed with reference to the Australian Media Literacy Alliance framework, it aligns naturally with it.
How TVNews Enables Framework-Aligned Teaching
Understanding Media Institutions: Compare the ABC’s public-service style with commercial networks that rely on advertising. How do funding models and mandates shape story selection and tone?
Analysing Media Representations: Track how particular groups or issues are framed over time, such as coverage of climate activists or refugee policy. Who’s quoted, and how are they described?
Critiquing Media Languages: Pause and unpack the craft: the camera angles, background music, graphics, and voiceover. Students quickly learn how visuals and sound create emotion and authority.
Understanding Audiences: Compare a nightly news broadcast with a late-night current affairs program. Who is each trying to reach? How does the presentation style shift?
Reflecting on Media Technologies: The archive itself shows technological change, from studio-based reporting to smartphone footage to social media references.
Understanding Media Relationships: By exploring these dimensions together, students begin to see media as an ecosystem: stories responding to audience expectations, shaped by institutional interests and technological trends.
In the Classroom
The real power of TVNews emerges in classroom practice. Teachers can create focused case studies examining coverage of significant events: elections, natural disasters, policy debates, social movements. Students compare how different outlets covered these moments, identifying bias, assessing credibility, recognising how framing influences interpretation.
The archive supports genuine inquiry-based learning where students pursue questions meaningful to them. Whether investigating environmental reporting, representation of youth issues, or analysis of political discourse, they engage with authentic Australian media while developing research and analytical capabilities.
More Than News Bulletins
Media literacy cannot focus solely on news bulletins. TVNews includes current affairs programs that blend information and entertainment, allowing discussion of how this hybridity affects audience engagement. Students analyse how storytelling techniques, emotional appeals, and personality-driven presentation influence response to content, developing sophisticated understanding of media’s persuasive power across genres.
TVNews is available now as an addon to Informit Explore. In 2026 we plan a more comprehensive integration that will introduce media literacy activities built directly into curriculum-aligned topics.
Reference
Notley, T., Chambers, S., Park, S., Dezuanni, M. 2024, Adult Media Literacy in 2024: Australian Attitudes, Experiences and Needs. Western Sydney University, Queensland University of Technology and University of Canberra.
Manuell, R. (2021). The conceptual as visual: Using visual reinforcement to make research processes explicit. In Torres, L., Salisbury, F., Yazbeck, B., Karasmanis, S. Pinder, J. & Ondracek, C. (Eds.)., Connecting the library to the curriculum: Transformative approaches that enhance skills for learning(pp. 177-187). Springer. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-16-3868-8_13
Written by Laki Sideris, Head of Product . Laki Sideris will be speaking a the ATOM Victoria State Conference on 31 October.
