Assessment of Media Literacy Levels Among Secondary School Students in Kano State

This study assesses the media literacy levels of secondary school students in Kano State, North West Nigeria, examining their ability to access, analyse, evaluate, and create media content. Media literacy is increasingly recognised as a fundamental life skill in an era of information abundance and misinformation proliferation, yet formal media literacy education is largely absent from Nigerian secondary school curricula. This study uses a survey design supplemented by practical media analysis tasks, collecting data from 340 secondary school students in Kano Municipal, Ungogo, and Dala local government areas from both public and private schools. The media literacy assessment instrument covers four domains: access and navigation, content analysis, credibility evaluation, and content creation awareness. Performance is compared across gender, school type, and socioeconomic status. Findings reveal that overall media literacy scores average 48 percent across the sample, indicating low to moderate levels. Credibility evaluation shows the weakest performance, with only 29 percent of students able to correctly identify misinformation in sample social media posts. Private school students score significantly higher than public school students (56 versus 41 percent average). Gender differences are minimal. Students from higher socioeconomic backgrounds show better access and navigation skills. The study concludes that media literacy among Kano secondary students is inadequate for navigating today's digital media environment. It recommends integration of media literacy into the national secondary school curriculum and teacher training programmes across the North West.

Keywords: media literacy, secondary school students, Kano State, digital media, misinformation.