Digital media in primary schools: literacy or technology? Analyzing government and media discourses

This article examines the political and the media discourses concerning the Portuguese governmental program responsible for delivering a laptop named “Magalhães” to all primary school children. The analysis is based on the official documents related to the launch and development of the initiative as well as the press coverage of this topic. The main purpose is to recognize the dominant public discourses and to find out what the media select for the debate in the public sphere. This analysis was done with a particular focus on the critical media literacy framework. The results reveal that the press highlighted the negative aspects of that program and that this framing could have a strong impact on how it was accepted and understood by the public opinion. Analysis also reveals that the governmental initiative was predominantly driven by technological objectives, in particular the access to technology, rather than media literacy objectives.The authors disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: This paper is part of a three years project named "Navigating with 'Magalhaes': Study on the Impact of Digital Media in Schoolchildren" funded by FCT - Fundacao para a Ciencia e a Tecnologia (Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology) and co-funded by FEDER - Fundo Europeu de Desenvolvimento Regional (ERDF: European Regional Development Fund) through COMPETE - Programa Operacional Factores de Competitividade (Operational Competitiveness Programme)