Documentary Modes

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Post of Ideas

Although these ideas don't really tie into the final unit that our group is doing, I thought they could be used as another unit.

My first idea inspired by Buckingham would be to have students research and compare the three largest daily newspapers in Utah, the Salt Lake Tribune, the Daily Herald and the Deseret News (or ones from the area in which I teach if it's not in Utah). The goal would be to have students compare and contrast the different papers according to Buckingham's four key concepts: production, language, representation and audience. Students would begin by researching how the different newspapers compare when they write about similar topics or news stories. They would do this by using both the daily newspapers AND looking at the newspaper's websites.
We would also look into the different audiences that the newspaper is appealing to. This information would be found through student research and I could also contact a reporter or editor from one or more of the papers to come and talk to my classes or at least answer some questions via e-mail. We could also look a little bit at how these Utah papers do things compared to larger papers like the New York Times or the Washington Post. I could read excerpts from the book Page One or the Kingdom and the Power about the New York Times.
The final part of the unit would be to research the difference in production for all the papers. We could research how papers are generally produced and I could even show the first few minutes of the documentary Page One: Inside the New York Times and then we could contact the three newspapers and ask for information about how they produce their papers. Finally, we would take a field trip to the offices of one of the papers and take a tour. The final assignment would be for students to write a reflection on what they learned about the newspaper world and what they think will happen to newspapers in the future. This would be a good way for students to learn about the news that they consume - especially because one of the main text types that adults are exposed to is the news. This assignment would help them to be aware of how reporters and the news industry goes about finding and reporting on news stories. As adults, this would help them to decipher the hidden spin that is a part of a lot of news stories and it would help them to learn how to find credible news in their own lives.

My other idea would be to have students compare a play with it's movie adaption or multiple movie adaptions. We wouldn't necessarily have to watch all of the movies but we could read the play as a class and then as we read a scene we could watch a movie adaption about it. That way we get to see how things are altered to make sense for a movie versus a play on a stage. We could talk about how different things work for each type of media. I would also utilize individual and group work to have students analyze each interpretation and compare it to the other ones we have seen. The final project would be for students to write a persuasive essay about which interpretation they feel was most accurate to the author's intentions and why. Or for a theater class, I would have students perform a monologue from one of the characters in the play, but they would have to perform it as the character is presented in their favorite interpretation. Instead of writing a five paragraph essay, I would have them turn in a well-written paragraph when they do their monologue that explains why they chose the interpretation that they did. They would also have to provide a quick explanation for the class. E.g. "I'm _______ character from ________ interpretation. I chose this because ____________." You could do more activities to help students with their monologues, but the ultimate goal would be for them to perform using the information they glean from a particular interpretation of the play. Also, if their favorite interpretation is the actual play itself, unfettered from other people's ideas, that could work too. I hope that all makes sense.
Neither of those really have to do with Whirligig, but they could be used as other units that incorporate media and Buckingham's ideas.

Blog Post #7 - Media and the Self

I think that two of the most important things we can do to help our students navigate in a media-oriented world are to help them understand their own place in different types of media and the effect of their media consumption. I remember being a teenager and using different types of media every day, and I can only imagine how much more teenagers nowadays use the media. As Hobbs mentioned several times in the reading, the media that teens consume effects them on a personal level and impacts the way that they view their place in the world, even away from the computer screen or TV screen. Part of our job, as educators who utilize media in the classroom, is to help our students look at how their media consumption affects their lives. We can do this by helping them disassemble the different types of media that they consume and analyze the different appeals and components of those sorts of media. This involves students participating in the media they consume in an entirely new way. Instead of just consuming media, they are consuming it critically. This is really essential, I think, because it’s important for students to be able to recognize when media is helping or hindering them. Helping them to understand the effects of their media consumption, whether positive or negative, can help students to realize the roles media plays in their life and then make healthy decisions when it comes to the media they watch and engage in. In addition, I think analyzing media helps students to realize what role they play in the media, for example, are they a customer being sold a product, are they looking to media as an instruction manual for life or relationships, are they part of a community of learners and thinkers who are engaging in meaningful tasks, etc. Part of understanding the effects media has on their lives is the realization that their roles change and that they have control over what they consume and how they choose to approach various forms of media.
Even before I read this chapter, I thought it was really important to help students understand how media can have both negative and positive effects, but there were a few things that Hobb mentioned that I didn’t even think about. For example, the part where she talks about how there may be an emotional fallout when you have students examine media that they use or enjoy and then critique its negative aspects. This really stuck out to me because it’s something I would have never even considered and planned for if I hadn’t read this chapter. It makes a lot of sense though because I think we are very connected to and even protective of the media that we consume. I know that in situations where people have criticized a radio show I listen to or a television show that I like to watch, I do have a defensive emotional response and I feel like I have to explain away the criticism of that particular piece of media. I think this is something we’ve probably all experienced in one way or another, but it is not something I had previously attributed as a possible response my students could have. I know realize that when I’m helping my students navigate their way through media analysis and understanding their place in the world of media, I need to be aware of how to best approach and plan for how my students will perceive and react to different activities. In order to do this, I need to be aware of my students and what their wants and needs are and how they feel about media use in their own lives. Only then will I be able to help them learn what is relevant and important to them in regards to media.
When I was reading the Hobbs article and reading/looking through the Seeing and Writing readings, I kept thinking about how important it is for students to be aware of what they are gaining (good and bad) from a piece of media. For example, if students looked at the migrant mother picture, they might be learning about history or they might be gaining other things like a depiction of what motherhood is like or a depiction of depression or disinterest. In any case, I think it is important for students to realize how a piece of media affects them. An activity that I think would help students to do this would be to have them choose 3 different examples of one type of media that they consume (e.g. three musicians they like, 3 blogs that they read, and 3 social networking sites that they use) and then do a comparison/contrast project. You could have them investigate the three different pieces of media that they chose and then record information about them like: what aspects of the piece of media do you like or dislike, how do each of these pieces of media make you feel, what is the purpose of this piece of media, etc. After they investigate their chosen media sources, students will then create a Venn diagram with three circles for each piece of media they researched. They can compare the aspects of the media that are similar as well as record the differences. Students will then use the different aspects of the media examples that they have in their Venn diagrams to write a short essay on how each of the pieces of media affects them. For example, if I was a student and I chose to research 3 radio shows I like, I might talk about in my essay how a radio show that I like discussed financial information which makes me feel worried about my own finances. In this way, students are not only investigating the types of media that they enjoy and consume on a regular basis, they are also analyzing the effects that those pieces of media have on them personally. This activity would be great if you paired it with in class discussions of different topics relating to media (like ethics of media, common media appeals, etc). Pairing it with other activities like this would help students to be more effective in explaining how their chosen pieces of media affect them in their final essays.

Critical Questions and the Construction of Knowledge

I really liked this section from Hobbs book because I think that critical questions are a huge part of good teaching pedagogy. One of the things that we have discussed in some of my English Education classes is that students need to build their own knowledge at least somewhat because then the knowledge that they gain is more transferrable (meaning that they are more likely to use it in the future). I think that critical questions allow students to build their own knowledge and work together as a class to analyze and synthesize the ideas they have about any given text or media. In my classroom, I will use critical questions to inform my conversations by identifying key points about the text my class is looking at and then I will form questions that will guide my students towards a better understanding of those key points. For example, if I was teaching the text, To Kill a Mockingbird, I wouldn’t just tell students that the book talks about racism because of examples a,b, and c in the book, instead I would identify moments in the book where the theme of racism comes up and then I would ask critical questions about that specific scene or moment in the book. I might ask questions like: 1) What do the characters reactions in this scene tell us about the author’s intention? 2) What information is missing from the scene (e.g. is there a character in the scene who we don’t hear from)? 3) Could there be more than one perspective about this scene and if so, what are some examples? 4) What does the author define as good or valuable in their message from this scene and do you think that perspective is accurate?
Using questions like these can generate a really good discussion and then from there I can even ask critical questions that are more in tune with the way the conversation goes, as long as I keep the conversation in focus. Another really great way to use these in a classroom chalk talk. For those of you who don’t know what a chalk talk is, here is a brief explanation: the teacher writes an open-ended, critical question on the board before students arrive to class, when it’s time for the chalk talk, the teacher tells the students that they should use whiteboard markers to write short answers to the question by creating a web of ideas (lines connect responses like in a brainstorming web), students have to comment a specific number of times and they can answer the question and comment on other people’s answers. Students are not allowed to talk at all during the exercise, everyone is completely silent. If you want to, you can even add more questions to the conversation as you feel like your students are ready to move onto more analysis and synthesis. I hope this explanation is clear. I remember doing a lot of these in high school and they were really fun because they get students writing, they allow students to do their own analysis and synthesis and scaffold their understanding with their peer’s comments. Also, when you have two or three markers up there and people are commenting at a rapid pace, it really allows for a larger discussion because essentially more than one person can comment at a time.
As for modifying the critical questions, I would want to format them in a way that linked to the text I was covering in class, like I did in the first paragraph. That way I am helping to guide the discussion without asking closed questions that can’t spark a conversation. I may also want to modify or avoid some of these questions if I was using them for a peer edit. For example, I may want to avoid questions like, “do you think the author’s perspective is accurate?” and instead use questions like “does the author support his or her claim effectively?” In doing so, I can still use critical questions when peers are critiquing themselves, but the phrasing allows for constructive analysis instead of destructive criticism that leads to arguments instead of learning.
I think that the texts from this Seeing and Writing chapter could be great examples of texts that can be used with critical questioning. All of the essays are very idea-driven and they are short enough for the whole class to read one and discuss it. Or you could read different essays in small groups and then have discussions in the smaller groups. Besides that, you can also talk about how the texts themselves analyze or utilize different types of media and how that affects the overall message of the text. For example, in the article that we read, the author cites and/or discusses several ulterior media sources (like Salman Rushdie’s book or the quote from Thich Nhat Hanh). Students could find those instances where the author supports his claim with other texts and then they can analyze and criticize how he uses them within his own text. Students could then go to those texts and read them or look at them or watch them and then see if they glean the same meaning from them as the author of this essay. From there, you could have a great discussion about perspective and how it shapes the way we understand and connect to media forms. You can also use the photos in the section to get students thinking about how an image can represent or mislead a viewer as you discuss whether the images really represent the photographers “home” or an important place to them. You could also talk about different values when it comes to places. Like the photo of the old building that is falling apart, some people value places with history while others value places that are new and cutting edge. Again, this could lead to a very interesting discussion if you utilize some form of the critical questions in the Hobbs text.

Multi-tasking and distributed cognition

I really enjoyed this article because I think that the evolution of education and technology is really interesting and I think this offers a good discussion of where we’re headed. I read the sections on multi-tasking and distributed cognition. The multi-tasking section was very interesting because it brings up the issue of distraction versus actual multi-tasking. The article suggests that we teach our students how to tell when they are really multi-tasking or not. I think a great way to do this is to help our students recognize relevancy in what they’re doing. For example, checking facebook probably isn’t helping them with the homework they’re supposed to be doing. However, if the tasks they are switching back and forth from, complement each other, I think that’s a good sign of multi-tasking. Often when I am writing something I have the internet up and music playing, but if I’m reading, I can’t have the music on. I mention this because I think the issue of distraction and multi-tasking is one that might be different for each of our students. Perhaps our goal should be to give them a variety of different situations in which we present information and learning takes place.
The second section that I read about talked about something called distributed cognition which is basically when a person uses tools to expand their knowledge or complement what they already know. I saw a great example of this the other day in the news; a teenage girl built and patented a new kind of prosthetic arm, but she didn’t do it on her own. The girl always loved building things, but she didn’t really have the expertise to build a prosthetic arm, so she sought out experts from local colleges and other people who build prosthesis. In doing so, she was able to combine their knowledge into a vast collective, from which she chose the best ideas and put them together to come up with a great outline for this new prosthetic arm. After that, she was able to actually build a prototype of her prosthetic at a local university (or it may have been a pharmaceutical company, I can’t remember). In any case, I think that situations like this are rare. It’s not very often that students have access to experts and tools besides what’s available at a regular public school. I know as a teacher it takes added effort to build lessons that allow students to expand their knowledge outside of the classroom and seek out experts in different subjects, but it’s so beneficial and pertinent to the students. The article mentioned that a lot of students learn the skills they use in their future careers, in high school, and in my life, I can definitely see how that is true. I think our society values experts and so we need to expose our students to experts in the fields they are interested in and we need to help our students become experts. In the article there were a lot of ideas mentioned about how we might go about doing so, and one of my favorite examples was to use a class wiki. I have personally done this in several of my classes so far in college and I can’t stress how helpful (and fun!) it is. I’ve also used google docs in almost every one of my classes here at BYU. I think it’s so important that we show our students how to seek out the information that they don’t have from people who do have the tools or information that they need, whether it’s their fellow students or experts in a field. Another great example of this from my own experience as a student is that when I was in high school I wrote for the school newspaper. During my senior year, the local newspaper (which is now defunct) hired me on as a student columnist. It really made me value my writing to write for an actual newspaper and I was able to build up the skills I had learned writing for my school paper. After high school graduation, the local paper hired me on as a news and feature writer and I actually had a couple of my pieces published in daily newspapers, which was a huge break for me. I think that as teachers, the more opportunities we can give students to utilize their skills outside of the classroom, the more relevant they will feel their learning is. Plus, it gives us a great chance to teach students how to seek out the tools and people they need to accomplish a task. The article mentions that we need to move away from solely autonomous learning and move towards distributed cognition and I definitely agree. As an adult, most of the tasks that I complete, I seek out other information to help me or I get help from others. I think if we don’t teach our students how to be an adult who knows where to turn for good, accurate information and how to asses that information and also how to seek out and ask for help from experts, we are ill preparing them to survive in our world. If they can’t learn to work collectively that means that every task they accomplish has to be based on their own knowledge. In my opinion, that stunts the possibilities that they have in life because they have to relearn or find information that could more easily be conveyed to them by someone who already understands or knows that information. It’s why everyone loves Wikipedia – because it’s easier to go to one site and get all types of different information on a single subject rather than researching it all on your own. We just have to make our students aware of how to function in a collective knowledge society in an effective and safe manner by teaching them good research methods and encouraging healthy skepticism that allows them to analyze the information that they find in a collective knowledge situation.

Reading Response 1

I think that the CPMLE standards fit perfectly into the common core for English Education. Granted, some of the specific aspects of the core don’t match up entirely, the major themes of both sets of standards work in tandem to reach the same goal, which is to help students learn how to think about and digest a text; whether students are looking at a written text, a commercial, some sort of online media or anything else that could be considered a text, our goal as Educators should be to help our students learn how to think, not what to think. They should be able to learn skills that they can use outside of our specific classroom that will help them to be successful. I think that the CPMLE standards complement the English core standards because they point teachers in a direction that allows them to create a space for students where they learn to think critically and analytically. The first CPMLE standard says that, “Media Literacy Education requires active inquiry and critical thinking about the messages we receive and create.” This standard pairs perfectly with many of the standards from the English common core for grades 6-12, and more specifically one which says that students should be able to, “read and comprehend complex literary and informational texts independently and proficiently.” Notice that students in English classes aren’t only supposed to learn about literature; rather they need to comprehend a variety of different texts that are oriented towards a menagerie of different purposes.
The best example of this that I can think of was a lesson that my high school English teacher taught in the twelfth grade. One day we spent the entire class period watching commercials from the previous year’s super bowl. As a precursor to this we talked about the advertising industry and how expensive it was to purchase air time for these commercials as well as to produce them. While we watched the commercials we dissected them and discussed each one. We asked questions like: What was the goal of the advertisement? What artistic choices were made? Why did _____ happen? What does that specific thing do in the advertisement? In retrospect this lesson has played a pretty big impact in my life. My teacher had the foresight to teach us how to analyze and interpret a type of text that would (and did even then) have a huge impact on our lives. To this day I look at advertisements differently because I know how to interpret their appeals in an educated way. In other words, I can think critically about what they say and do. This week our class read in Seeing & Writing this that the average person in America witnesses something like two thousand commercial appeals each day. Although my high school English teacher was probably balked at when she told her colleagues that her students would be reviewing super bowl commercials in class, what she realized was that using super bowl commercials allowed her to teach us tools of interpretation and analyzing that we could use to assess other commercial appeals as well as many other types of texts. After all, a book or an art piece or a photograph, are all examples of texts that usually carry a message or point, just like a Super bowl commercial does. Perhaps this explanation is too convoluted, but what I mean to say is that English class or Theatre class or whatever doesn’t always have to focus on the obvious curriculum. Media is such a huge part of our lives and using it as a means to help students understand difficult concepts can be a lifesaver. I know that in my experience it was much easier to analyze a 30 second commercial and learn the concepts I needed to learn before I jumped into Dostoyevsky and some of the other difficult texts we looked at over the course of that year. I think if we use the CPMLE standards to complement the concepts we need to teach for our subject areas, we can find a happy medium between both sets of criteria. In the process, we’ll be able to help students use media in positive, powerful ways that help them to shape their lives and experiences in meaningful ways.
Another thing that I found interesting when I compared the two sets of standards is that on the front page of the English common core it says that they include standards for, “literacy in … technical subjects.” As an increasingly technical society I think it’s interesting that the creators of the common core took that into consideration and realized that today being literate means more than just being able to pick up a book and read, it also involves an individual’s ability to glean meaning from a variety of sources and formats I think that there has to be a balance in the classroom, one that allows students to learn about new types of media as well as the more traditional types of curriculum. In real life, students will depend on their ability to understand a news article or a memo just as much as a YouTube video or a novel. Using the CPMLE standards in tandem with the English common core standards will guide teachers through that process and will allow them to prepare their students for a variety of situations in the future.

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Although this doesn’t have to do with the CPMLE or common core, I thought this video about using video games in a positive, productive way was really interesting so I thought I’d post a link in case you’re interested:

http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/en/jane_mcgonigal_gaming_can_make_a_better_world.html