Topic # 19 The Role Of Mass Media In the Modern World. Express Your Opinion Of Different Sources Of Information In The Life Of Contemporary Teenagers.

Topic # 19 The Role of Mass Media in the Modern World. Express your opinion of Different Sources of Information in the Life of Contemporary Teenagers. 

The mass media is a collective name for newspapers and magazines, radio, television and the Internet. Newspapers and magazines are the oldest of mass media. The mass media play an important part in our lives. Newspapers, radio and especially TV inform us of what is going on in this world and give us wonderful possibilities for education and entertainment. They also influence the way we see the world and shape our views. Of course, not all newspapers and TV programmes report the news objectively, but serious journalists and TV reporters try to be fair and provide us with reliable information.

It is true that the world today is full  of dramatic events and most news seem to be bad news. But people are not interested in ordinary events. That is why there are so many programmes and articles about natural disasters, plane crashes, wars, murders and robberies. Good news doesn't make headlines. Bad news does. The main source of information for millions of people is television. People like TV news because they can see everything with their own eyes. Still, many people prefer the radio. It's good to listen to in the car, or in the open air, when you do something about the house.

The Internet has recently become another important source of information. Its main advantage is that news appears on the screen as soon as things happen in real life and you don't have to wait for news time on TV. 

As for teenagers, most of them are not regular listeners to radio. They may occasionally tune in, but they do not try to listen to a programme specifically. The main reason teenagers listen to the radio is for music. Most teenagers watch television. Teenage boys watch more TV when it is the football season. No teenager regularly reads a newspaper, as most do not have the time and cannot be bothered to read pages and pages of text while they could watch the news summarized on the Internet or on TV.

Every teenager has some access to the Internet, be it at school or home. Home use is mainly used for fun (such as networking) while school (or library) use is for work. Outside of social networking, the Internet is used as a source of information for variety of topics. For searching the web, Google is the dominant figure, simply because it is well-known and easy to  use. Many teenagers use YouTube to watch videos and some use it as a music player by having a video with the music they want to listen to playing in the background.

But I'd like to mention cyber addiction which has become common with some teenagers. The Internet offers benefits in developing a teen's ability to grow with modern technology, helping them to get new knowledge and acquire other skills. However, using the Internet unsafely puts the teenagers at very high risk for many problems. When children spend more than enough or agreeable time online they tend to be cyber addicts. Cyber addiction can be just as harmful as addiction to drugs or drinking alcohol. I believe parents should talk to their children and agree on a list of rules that clearly say when to use the Internet, which sites they should visit and what safety measures they should follow.

New Words:

1. the mass media  - средства массовой информации

2.  shape our views - формируют наши взгляды

3. objectively - объективно, беспристрастно

4. fair - честный, объективный

5. provide - снабжать, обеспечивать

6. reliable - достоверный, надёжный

7. natural disasters - стихийные бедствия

8. crash - крушение

9. murder - убийство

10. robbery - ограбление

11. make headlines - попасть в заголовки

12. bother - причинять беспокойство

13. summeris/ze - суммировать

13. networking - сеть

 14. benefit  - преимущество

15. agreeable - приемлемое

16. cyber addict - кибер зависимый

17. addiction - зависимость

18. harmful - вредный

19. drugs  - наркотики

20. list - список

21. safety measures - меры безопасности