This book takes an interesting deep dive into fake news in the media today. This book would be a great resource for middle and high school English and social studies courses and a great jumping off point in education in general about finding good, reliable sources. I will be purchasing this for our media centers!

Useful and necessary guide to sorting through what's real and what isn't!
Thanks to Lerner Publishing Group and NetGalley for the opportunity to read and review Fake News: Separating Truth From Fiction by Michael Miller!
This helpful guide to fake news and what to watch out for covers the basics and more! Explanations and descriptions of real news and fake news help us to see that fictional information can be harmful and how to tell what’s real from what isn’t real. Fake news isn’t a new idea created from social media; it dates back to Ancient Rome. Propaganda is a way to spread false information and fake news and it was well used by Hitler during World War II. To keep your intake of information on the real side, there are certain things you can watch out for, such as exaggerated claims, misspellings in URLs and only using a single source for information. Snopes is a great site for checking questionable news posts and PolitiFact is available to check political news for truthfulness. Everyone can help the spread of fake news by checking for reliability and trustworthiness of posts before sharing. 5 stars for this beneficial guide to fake news!

This is a great book to use in the classroom for a unit on journalism or on checking source material. It covers the difference between actual news and lies. It also discusses Trump's rhetoric.

This is a great book for librarians and computer teachers who teach digital citizenship and information literacy. Honestly, it should probably be THE textbook for the subject,. In the span of just over 100 pages, this concise book explains the origin and psychology of fake news.



Even better, it offers practical solutions to combat it. I was particularly impressed with the comprehensiveness of the subject considering the small size.



WIth photos and graphics, it is an easy read for upper elementary through high school. While I especially appreciated the index, glossary, and annotations, it would be easier to encourage students fact checking if URL shortners or QR codes were included to link readers to resources.



I hope that this will become the first in a series on information literacy topics and will be offered at affordable prices so that school librarians are able to employ it in their classes.

#NetGalley #FakeNews

This term is so prevalent in all forms of media and so often used incorrectly it's vital to provide young readers with a guide. Miller very carefully draws the line between satire, errors, blatant falsehoods, and responsible journalism. We get plenty of facts, largely unbiased. Most importantly, there are chapters on recognizing falsehood in news and checking sources in reports for validity. And because this is aimed at young readers, it's accessible to most reading levels.

“Fake news undermines public confidence in legitimate news sources. It sways people to believe things that aren’t true--and to disbelieve things that are. It feeds on and promotes prejudice and paranoia, and it derails rational discussion Fake news harms individuals and institutions and is a threat to democracy itself.” (72)

I received a Netgalley ARC of Fake News: Separating Truth from Fiction by Michael Miller, and while I was expecting to learn something new in my reading, I was not prepared for how I ended up speeding through this nonfiction title, enjoying every minute of explanation, example, and definition. As a high school librarian, I work with students on inquiry-related projects where validating sources is a major concern. I appreciated that this book defined terms (including those that were unfamiliar to me but that I wish I had been using for years, such as illusory truth effect) alongside anecdotal evidence, such as the conspiracy theory that “chemtrails” from airplanes cause cancer, that made the terms come alive to the reader. The treatment of political bias in reporting, alongside the discussion of which news outlets offer more opinion and analysis than hard news, made the subject feel straightforward and nonpartisan. Miller doesn’t stop at defining terms and providing examples, though; he also explains why his readers should care, explaining that healthy democracy depends on solid journalism and then drawing connections between fake news and the Communist China of today and the Nazi Germany of World War II. His discussion of the origins of fake news and why we as citizens must combat it gave me new words to use when discussing epidemic of false information on the internet, and it did so in a way that would be appealing to both teachers and students.

In the end, Miller sums up the history of fake news, its implications in today’s society, and what readers of any age can do to combat it in 101 pages before providing extensive source notes, glossary, and suggestions for further reading. Short enough to not bore young adult readers but filled with need-to-know information in the age of unreliable sources, Fake News: Separating Truth from Fiction is a primer for anyone wanting to know how to sort through the detritus of the internet; school libraries looking to support inquiry and digital citizenship should purchase for both student and instructor use.

FAKE NEWS by Michael Miller is subtitled "Separating Truth from Fiction." Unfortunately, I think it attempts to perpetuate a rather biased view and oversimplifies a huge issue, using a format that is not very appealing to teens. There are so many other informative works on this subject. If you are an educator, look instead at Teaching Information Literacy Reframed by Joanna Burkhardt or perhaps some ALA-affiliated titles like News Literacy by Michelle Luhtala or Fake News and Alternative Facts by Nicole Cooke, just for starters. Excellent resource are provided by The Sift from the News Literacy Project by Newseum and its ESCAPE graphics and by KQED Teach. Both Harvard and IFLA have wonderful graphics to use (we crafted the IFLA posters as bookmarks). Joyce Valenza produced a helpful Toolkit about 2 years ago which will lead to more ideas. This is just a brief start to many valuable resources; links appear below:
https://newslit.org/educators/sift/
https://newseumed.org/medialiteracy
https://teach.kqed.org/
https://guides.library.harvard.edu/fake
https://www.ifla.org/publications/node/11174
http://blogs.slj.com/neverendingsearch/2016/11/26/truth-truthiness-triangulation-and-the-librarian-way-a-news-literacy-toolkit-for-a-post-truth-world/

This book does an EXCELLENT job of outlining the problem of Fake News. It is a very reader-friendly book, (complete with pictures and charts,) and would make a great supplemental textbook for high school and college students in journalism, media, library, and communication courses.. As a librarian who teaches Research Skills to community college students, I include Fake News in my unit on Media Literacy. I also teach a unit on evaluating sources, including the standards and ethics of journalism, something the book addresses in the chapter, "How to Tell Fake News from Real News." I particularly like the chapters, "Who Believes Fake News, and Why? and "How Harmful is Fake News?" These chapters provide very specific information about the intended audience for fake news, and details how we can identify our own susceptibility to falling for less-than-factual information. The final chapter, "You Can Help Fight Fake News" provides simple and easy methods that everyone can take to stem the spread of fake news. Highly recommended reading for every citizen on the planet.

While popularized by President Donald Trump, the term "fake news" actually originated toward the end of the 19th century, in an era of rampant yellow journalism. Since then, it has come to encompass a broad universe of news stories and marketing strategies ranging from outright lies, propaganda, and conspiracy theories to hoaxes, opinion pieces, and satire—all facilitated and manipulated by social media platforms. This title explores journalistic and fact-checking standards, Constitutional protections, and real-world case studies, helping readers identify the mechanics, perpetrators, motives, and psychology of fake news. A final chapter explores methods for assessing and avoiding the spread of fake news.

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This is a short overview on the history of fake news, why it is important to distinguish fact from fiction, how it can be harmful, and what we as individuals can do to slow its spread. I think this book is important for young people to read as they spend so much of there time online. Media literacy, or information literacy in general, is a very important skill to own. This book breaks down the subject in easy to understand language and provides ample examples and sidebars for further understanding.

*I was provided access to this book through netgalley for an honest review. Thank you!