Six years ago, I went shopping with my daughter in a local department store. While browsing down an isle in the children’s clothes department, we bumped into the mother and a kindergarten playmate of my daughter. It was the first time I had met the girl’s mother and we stood around exchanging small talk, which was somewhat of a laborious process, since the woman only spoke rudimentary German.

I asked her, at some point in our conversation, if she was looking for something specific in the store. No. she was just in the store doing her “homework”. It turned out that this woman was taking an intensive German as a second language course at the community college and her weekly assignment was to “converse” with three Germans by the end of the week. The task was to have “real” conversations and not brief encounters (e.g. How much does a pound of meat cost?).

The woman resourcefully chose to go to a department store, where she was, more or less, guaranteed the opportunity to ask numerous questions of the salespersons and receive full-sentenced answers. She had already made, she confided, an appointment with the doctor and dentist. We shared a belly laugh at her description of going to the doctor with fictitious symptoms and how she panicked when the doctor wanted to give her a shot right then and there.

It turned out that this woman had immigrated to Germany, from Iran, six years previously. Her husband, relatives, and circle of friends all spoke Persian. When she first arrived in Germany, she just let everyone else translate for her. Then she became pregnant with their first child. After her daughter was born she lived even more isolated from German society than before.

Her isolated existence contrasted greatly from my experience after becoming a mother. Motherhood, for me, had definitely opened up new doors, experiences, and friendships. Her experience, being a mother of small children and not speaking German, was completely different. She literally, knew no German well enough to spend five or ten minutes in friendly conversation.

Eventually, once her children were of kindergarten age, she began to learn German. Thus the meeting in the department store. We eventually became friends and spent a great many hours, with other friends, in conversation, until her family moved away to another town. The level of her German proficiency remained admittedly bumpy at best, but the exchange of ideas was fascinating.

You might be asking yourself what this story has to do with acquiring media literacy. Please be patient, for certain parallels can be drawn.

Many of you might also be shaking your heads, wondering how someone could live for five years or more in a country of her choice and not learn to speak the language. How can someone function in that society without being able to read, write, or speak the language? It is simple. It can be done. Now, ask the same question of yourself, but let the concept of media literacy flow into your question.

In the research project I work in, where we endeavor to introduce constructive and creative use of digital media in primary and secondary schools, we define media literacy as,

"Media literacy is an essential skill you need to succeed actively and participate constructively in social, technological interaction."

Many people, and at the risk of making myself unpopular, often women, are so overwhelmed by the rapid forward pace and diversity of technological trends, they live a digitally isolated existence. It is simple. It can be done.

There are even intelligent arguments that explain the lack of success, intrinsic interest, resources an individual is willing to invest in developing such skills. Yet, the bottom line is, we are talking about functioning “successfully” in our society. It is a challenge we have to learn to embrace.

Only through active participation, can we change our role from one of a niche market to one of being leaders or being the persons who determine or define future trends. This switch is important politically, ecologically, socially, and, for those of you who have children, as role models.

The way you can go about this (here comes the curve, at long last) is take baby steps, and like my friend from Iran, use the resources available in our “media-saturated” society. Use them to help you to become a media savvy person.

The object or vision of this column in the next months is to give advice and assist you in your journey to acquire a certain level of media literacy: and make the journey as painless and as much fun as possible.