Stream of Scottciousness

A Canvas of the Community

2011-07-16T11:14:00.001-07:00

This morning, as a part of a community effort driven by a coalition of local nonprofit organizations including the Latin American Youth Center which houses my school, I participated in my first ever “Community Canvas.” The objective of the community canvas, beyond simply to collect information about what concerns residents have, what issues they need addressed, and what services they either need or can help provide, is to engage the community in a discussion about what matters to our community and how we can all do our part to build a stronger place to live for all of us. And it was through those discussions this morning that I had one of the most enlightening three hours of my life- learning from neighbors, connecting the dots between services and the people they serve, and coming to understand the differences and changes that bring us together, and sadly, often drive us further apart.

Over the course of those three hours, and covering only about 4 blocks of terrain in South Columbia Heights D.C., I witnessed and heard first hand the effect of a rapidly changing community, and peered through a window into the effects of a country feeling a loss of some purpose and possibility. The questions ranged from what major concerns you have about your community, to what organizations, people, or government agencies are making a positive impact, and what would you be willing to do to help out in your neighborhood. One of the things we talk about in education a lot is crafting questions in a way that allows multiple levels of entry or access points. In other words, no matter what your experiences, you should feel like you can respond to the question in an open way that draws on who you are and what you have to share- not a universal expectation. I didn’t realize how effective these particular questions would be in opening up dialogues that exposed a neighborhood bound by a common sense of responsibility and engagement, but yet in many ways still deeply and dangerously divided.

Through my first set of interviews I encountered mostly well-education, upper middle class or in some cases upper-class individuals who were active in their community and cared deeply about making it better. Some had already established neighborhood or block email lists, organized a neighborhood watch, organized a clean up or block party, and often volunteer or donate money to help local causes. But what they also had in common was a concern about lingering crime, littering, loitering, and fellow citizens not as concerned about the wellbeing of their neighborhood as they were. Asking what could be done to make their neighborhood better, three out of four of them, unprompted, said “bring Adrian Fenty back.” One man told me “He suffered from the successful black man syndrome….if you’re black and successful people see you as arrogant, your own community [turns on you]. So now we’re just going back to the old ways. I’ve been there.I don’t want to go back.”

Some approached the conversation on an individual level- speaking to what we should all do to pitch in and make our neighborhood better. Some approached the conversation on a community level- speaking to what we need to do collectively to improve our common space. And many also approached the conversation on a political level, arguing that while individual action was good and needed, what was really hurting them and their families the most was the lack of real political reform, whether it be health care costs, mortgage payments, or property taxes. I heard a real concern from people that they thought those who could afford to weren’t doing their part to make the country a better and stronger place. As one man of Ethiopian descent but who has been in the United States most of his life told me- “People keep telling us we can’t fix these problems because we’re broke. We’re not.” And yet still others talked about our particularly difficult and unfair circumstance in affecting change. One man who has lived in this neighborhood for many years but is now being forced out by increasing property values and gentrification told me, “ Until we have representation- we can’t affect much,” he said. “We have no right to petition in this city.” The constitution affords us that right, but we don’t have it right here, hr argued. But what stood out to me was an interesting take on gentrification from a victim of it. “I say- mission accomplished,” he said. “I worked hard to make this city a better place and it has happened. I wanted to make this a great place to raise my kids. I did that. My kids are older now and I’ve got to move to Southeast because we were successful. But I see strollers every day passing by on this road and it doesn’t matter what color the parents are…we did that. That’s a success.”

And from his experience began my final set of interviews that stretched beyond the newly gentrified Columbia Heights past Sherman Avenue onto Girard Street where the neighborhood takes a turn into the past- where concerns aren’t about a plastic bottle littered on the sidewalk, but as one man described to me a serious pattern of young people throwing full bags of trash and even feces into his back yard. The man was black and has lived in the neighborhood for a long time. In his mind, he is no perpetrator of gentrification- yet he sees a personal gentrification as his only way out of a situation no one wants to help with. He says he’s saving up to invest in a new porch and a new look for his house so they won’t feel like they can sit around and drink without his permission. The man wanted a free community gym, and some help getting a loan.

As I walked further down Girard St. wondering whether it was time to call it a day and end my route, I saw a group of four young black men (some boys), sitting around smoking pot in front of an apartment building down the road. “I’m not done yet,” I thought to myself. I approached them and asked if they would mind chatting about their neighborhood. They didn’t seem too excited about the idea, but they agreed.

I sat down with them and went through the first few questions…”How long have you lived here?” “All our lives” they answered. I continued, “What are some of your major concerns about the neighborhood?” “The police…police harassment,” one said. “Man, fuck the police,” another responded. But then another, slightly older man with them, fired back. “Man, the problems out here aren’t about the police. Anywhere you go you’re gonna have police, you can’t stop that. The problem here is we being invaded. We’re losing our street, our neighborhood.” “Look,” he said, as he pointed to the end of the block. “Down there we got a new condo building going up, at the end of the block the same. Half these houses been converted into fancy apartments. Before long we’ll be out of here…nowhere to go. That’s the problem we got. You guys talking about the police…come on!”

As I dug deeper I got at something even more intriguing. I asked them what they thought their neighbors were concerned about. They didn’t hesitate. “They’re concerned about us. They’re concerned about crime and drugs.” And they were mostly right. One kid spoke up- “You know they worried about getting their cars keyed and shit stolen, maybe they should say good morning back once in a while, stop acting so damn afraid of us like they can’t look at us in the face. Then they wouldn’t have to worry about no shit...It’s about respect.” They didn’t want problems, but they were also initially short on solutions. They felt that there was no going back and their time was running out in what to them is their city and their block. “Soon this won’t be a black city anymore,” the older said.

“You know, we used to play tag on this block, but now all of them moved in.” I was trying to connect the dots. I thought to myself- why can’t they play tag in a gentrified neighborhood? As they continued talking and my mind began to wander, the lines filled in. It’s about fear. Nobody acts the way they want to act when they feel threatened. We act irrationally when we fear for ourselves, for our family, for what we know and love. Their reaction isn’t a helpful one, but it’s a human one. They want more, but don’t feel like they can get it. “What happened to the Save our Streets program?” they asked. “You know, they have some great conflict resolution classes. I took it. We need that up here, but now they gone.” They told me they had met their councilmember, but they didn’t feel like anyone in government would listen to them. The developers mattered more.

So where does that leave us? Maybe we are a community that is increasingly unified, but not united; a community of purpose and progress, but with problems yet unsolved. But I also had a sense that this is a neighborhood of really great people. All of them cared about their community and wanted better for it. Even in anger they expressed a sense of pride about their city and their community. It was satisfying to hear that everyone could mention critical neighborhood resources and many already use them. And those that might be new to the neighborhood have a real understanding of the burden that being part of that change carries. Most of them want to help out. Many volunteered to tutor or to escort a student to school in the morning, or host a neighborhood discussion on local issues.

Change is never easy, and the frustration that real fundamental change wasn’t happening ran deep. But in the midst of good people, good projects, and most importantly, goodwill, one can have faith that though it may at times seem distant, good shall come.

My classes this fall!

2008-08-15T08:48:00.000-07:00

Aaaand....the blog is back! I am teaching at Parkmont School this year, a private school up on 16th st. NW in Washington DC. It is a small school with small classes and luckily I will have a good deal of freedom with the curriculum. My first session (there are 7 sessions each year I teach one main lesson of 2 hours and one reading class each session)...my main lesson is US Government and my reading class is modern US Foreign Policy. So it's time to throw out the first two topics for ideas and feedback-

1. What are some good novels on US Foreign Policy at a 7th/ 8th grade reading level? Think Cold War, Vietnam and on.

2. We are in DC so US Government should be full of great guest speakers. Here are some of the topics where I'd like guest speakers. (in no particular order) Help me think of some names to invite!

* The Constitution and Bill of Rights
* Free Press
* Civil disobedience vs. rule of law
* The role of the judiciary and activism vs. restraint
* The power to declare war
* State power vs. federal power
* Security vs. civil liberties
* Separation of Church and State
* Taxation
* Habeus Corpus and the torture debate
* The Right to Bear Arms (DC gun debate)
* The debate over torture
* Warantless wiretapping

Thanks y'all!

Political Commercials, wrapping up the unit

2008-04-17T10:24:00.000-07:00

Today's lesson went VERY well with all of the classes. I feel like video is always effective at keeping the attention of the students and keeping them engaged. They understood the concept, from step 4 to step 6, they enjoyed watching the videos, had quick and precise reactions (for the most part), and breezed through the analysis worksheet of a specific ad. They quickly pointed out language choices, color, music, and other things used to influence, and understood the purpose. They were able to quickly spot subliminal messages and immediately identify which type of ad was playing (negative, warm and fuzzy (positive), humorous, or scary). I was very pleased with this lesson and I think it might have equipped them with the most useful media literacy skills of any lesson so far.

We were able to start in each class their final product, their personal media literacy plan. They will continue to work on those tomorrow. These should serve as commitments they are making to be more critical of media messages and learn how to get their information in a smart and savvy way.

Detecting Bias/ Analyzing Political Commercials

2008-04-15T11:03:00.000-07:00

Today was much more productive than yesterday! First, with step four we were able to dissect a full article, answering almost every question on the detecting bias in the news worksheet, and many students who normally struggle answering some of the questions on their own. I thought the article was simple enough for them to understand, which helped a lot. We even got through the whole bias lesson and viewed a couple of political commercials to introduce them to that next topic. In step 6 we had a different group og 4 students today who were much more productive. We got through the whole bias lesson, and added a second analysis exercise where they analyzed editorials about the Iraq war to detect bias, and did so well. In this class we got through about 2 political commercials and will pick up there on Thursday. In step 5 we got through the whole bias lesson analyzing both the longer article and clips from editorials. One of the most effective parts was having them pick out the sentence they agreed with most and the sentence they disagreed with most. I think the point that got across the most in each class was that they don't include every point of view or ask each group that is affected for their opinion. We will pick up Thursday with the political commercials lesson in all 3 classes.

Detecting Bias in the News

2008-04-15T10:57:00.000-07:00

Monday April 14-

Today's classes were a bit scattered as I divided time up between trying to put some finishing touches on their media ownership poster project and start the next lesson on detecting bias in the news. Managing the two of these tasks made transitions difficult and definitely lost some students in that process. Step 6 was also off the walls rowdy today and could not concentrate on their work at all. Students were frequently cursing, leading me to pull one student aside to address the issue. Classroom management became very difficult in this situation where they were all feeding off of each other. After class I discussed this with the other teachers, we shared concerns, and my cooperating teacher talked to them one on one during study hall.

In step 5 I did start the detecting bias lesson, but only briefly got into reading the article. With Wednesday off this week we have essentially 3 more days to finish 3 lesson plans now- detecting bias, analyzing political commercials, and writing their final media plans.

Meida Ownership, Day 2

2008-04-10T11:30:00.000-07:00

Today was the continuation of yesterday's lesson and project. Their is wide disparity here. Many are very into the project and because of that were not able to finish in time, and some who did not want to draw at all (they were then offered the option to copy and paste the logos). There is also a wide disparity in terms of understanding, which concerns me. Many really seemed to understand yesterday (and today in the lesson with step 4), were frequently shaking their heads that they got it, and answered questions that made it clear they understood. Yet today many did not know WHY they were doing this project. I need to find some ways to briefly reinforce WHY it matters that the media is so consolidated and how it effects them. I will try to do that to some extent before we move on to the next topic....detecting media bias.

Advertising Take 2 and Media Ownership

2008-04-09T09:30:00.000-07:00

Step four will now be working on a completely different track than the other classes since I want to limit our objectives there and achieve a basic level of media literacy. I prepared a worksheet for today that allows them to better delve into the world of images and advertising that we see everyday so that they can evaluate online advertisements. They attempted to differentiate between content and advertisement, list words commonly used in advertising, and talk about how advertising can make you feel. They did this analysis on two different ads and then compared and added to our class list. I honestly feel like this focused lesson accomplished more than any other lesson with the students at this level. The lessons provided by this lesson will help them be more critical consumers.

With Step 5 and 6 we started talking about media ownership, consolidation, and why it was a threat to democracy. I used a couple of analogies that I think worked really well. The first compared the situation to a rumor started by one person, spread to twelve classmates, about another one of their classmates. One of those 12 people says "Oh man, it must be true...I heard it from 11 people!!!." Then I asked, but how many people did you ACTUALLY hear it from? And they correctly responded, one. This is how media ownership works I explained. So many of the sources we use report news coming from a single company or single chief executive but they are passed off as multiple sources, which validate the information in our minds. The second analogy was how Banana Republic, GAP, and Old Navy are are the same company, but exist to sell clothes to different groups of consumers, but it is really one company trying to increase profit. These analogies really worked I felt and led into talking about media consolidation.

I gave them some surprising statistics on media ownership, and how the sources keep getting smaller. I spent some time talking about how GE owns not only media, but makes fighter jets, bombers, owns a health care company, and oil and gas. The presentation I think was very successful at getting them to understand how this means they would not want to important news like the war in Iraq or the health care crisis. One student actually came up to me later in the day and said "I couldn't believe that stuff. I was stunned!" We spent a little time talking about why this way bad for our democracy and then started in on their project.

We spent the rest of the class working on their project which will be a big poster in landscape greeting card form that has the logo of the big coporation on the front and when you open it, logos of many of the companies they own. We will continue that project tomorrow!

Day 5: Stereotypes and Race in America

2008-04-08T09:40:00.000-07:00

Today's lesson for both steps 5 and 6 focused on stereotypes. With step 6 I caught them up by introducing stereotypes, giving examples, and doing the balloon activity with them, and the proceeded on to the second day's stereotypes lesson. With both 5 and 6 we viewed clips from the movies "Finding Forrester" and "Bowling for Columbine." In the Finding Forrester clip a young man basketball player is pigeon--holed by his professor who says "maybe your skills do extend a BIT farther than basketball," at which time Jamal corrects him saying it should be "further." The two challenge each other with the student clearly showing up the teacher and the teacher then making him leave the class. This gets to how stereotypes can be harmful. The second few clips were from Bowling for Columbine. The first one "A Short History of the United States" cartoon was engaging for the students and funny. It showed how racial tensions have built in our history and how it contributes to violence. We watched 2 more scenes where Michael Moore examines how the media fixates on black and Latino criminals and demonizes them, trying to create a culture of fear.

With step 5 I also used to illustrative examples. The first was two pictures after Hurricane Katrina where two individuals were taking food from a store for their familes. The picture of the white couple said they "found" food for their family, while the black man was said to be "looting" a store. The second example was about Elizabeth Smart and Alexis Petterson, one a young white girl and the other a young black girl, kidnapped on the same day. The article I passed out reviewed the way the media covered them, and if the racism played a role in the massive national news coverage of Elizabeth and not Alexis. Both of these examples I thought clearly helped the students comprehend media stereotypes.

In step four this morning we evaluated a local news source, the website for Fox 5 DC. This kind of source is more like ones they use, so we went back through yesterday's evaluating a news source worksheet with them. It has been VERY difficult to get through this concept with this class as they need very direct assistance to work through the questions. They are not able to work well on their own even with much prompting, so they need very specific tasks. I tried to do this by asking them to spot two articles on the site that they would read if they were at home, and asked if the site interested them at all. I also asked them what KIND of news this site offered that they normally would not access. What I really want them to get is to be ABLE to navigate a news website and find information that they need or want. I also want them to be thinking critically about what kind of news they are taking in and what the bias might be.

Tomorrow we will start media ownership with steps 5 and 6.

Media Ownership Lesson Planning

2008-04-07T13:50:00.000-07:00

I promised I would use this blog when I needed some help with ideas so here goes:

Anyone have some ideas on how I can teach media ownership and consolidation in a very simple way to my students? I have found some great websites, but not really lesson plan or activity ideas. I would like them all to have one big company and make a poster detailing all of the media outlet that their assigned corporate giant owns, how it shows, and why it matters.

I need more ideas. Also...if anyone knows some fascinating stats on media ownership, that would also be excellent. Post comments below. Thanks!

Day 4: Evlauating Sources, Media Use, and Stereotypes

2008-04-07T11:04:00.000-07:00

For the first two class periods today was a bit of a catch up day. In step four I took the advice of my cooperating teacher and went slowly with the evaluating a news source activity, picking only one site that they could all evaluate and walking through it step by step with them. By choosing only some questions to focus on and using only one website, they were able to get a better grip of some of the questions, such as what kind of news site it was and whether it was reliable as a news source or not, and especially whether they would use it to find news. The site we used was www.nationalenquirer.com . We now finished this activity but I think it will be helpful to do one more day on this theme so that we can really drill in evaluating news sources. Tomorrow they will each have their own source to work with.

In step 6 we had 4 people today so we were able to cover some ground. We did the media use survey as well as evaluating a news source. With this more advanced class we were able to jump right into them all doing their own source and they did some good analysis which we will share tomorrow.

In step 5 we did the scheduled stereotype lesson today, which I was very excited about. I started with the warm-up this week of writing in their journal some media and news that they took in over the weekend. I then started out the lesson on stereotypes by asking them to imagine the following people and write characteristics of each down or draw them: criminal, basketball player, politician, Native American. For the most part we got some good answers, but not exactly what I was going for off the bat. We then waled through what a stereotype is, an assumption, and prejudice so that they know how they are different. It would have been helpful to define stereotype as opposed to racism however. The next part of the activity I put a different group label like "young people", "Latinos" or "women" in different parts of the room and gave everyone 3 post-its. They were supposed to write down 3 steroetypes, for 3 of the groups and then stick them under the label on the wall. It would have been helpful here to define these groups, like "homosexual" because some put the definition instead of an assumption.

The lesson was visual, kinesthetic,engaging, and I think well-scaffolded. Overall, I was very pleased with this lesson and will try it with the other classes.

Day 3- media use

2008-04-05T17:37:00.000-07:00

Okay...this is that inevitable point where the 3 classes have separated and are now working through different parts of the unit. The attendance issue has meant going back and reviewing earlier elements of the unit with some students, and will force me to make some strategic decisions, especially with step 6, about which parts of the unit to move forward with, and which to skip over to stay on pace.

As far as today's lesson on media use, I got through about 2/3 of the lesson plan with the step 4 class. All of the students got through the media use survey and we defined some important terms as a class as we went through the questions. The next part of class was a powerpoint presentation on media use by Americans, including specifically people their age. I think that students found most of the information interesting, especially things like how many days per year people spend in front of the tv set, that there are more tv's than people in America, what news sources people trust, and how the news doesn't really cover the issues people care about most.

We begun the activity with step 5 to evaluate their own news source with a guiding worksheet. We will continue this coming week. Step 4 did not get that far. Step 6 has been very inconsistent due to absences. With a different two students almost every day, we have gone back through the beginning part of the unit now with two new students. I will try to get them back on track this week, but might have to skip over a few activities.

Day 2: What is news???

2008-04-05T17:16:00.001-07:00

Today's lesson was very fun! Each class started out by giving the students back the results to their political preference quizes and explaining how to read where they rated on the political spectrum. Students were asked to first think about this question- "what is news?" After a couple minutes to write down their own definition some students shared their answers and we tried to reach a class consensus. We began by using two clips and asking the students to respond to each one and whether they thought it qualified as news. The first clip was breaking news of Paris Hilton being released from prison, and after some laughter, almost every student concluded it wasn't really news and probably shouldn't be on the news. The second clip was breaking news about the shooting on the campus of Virginia Tech. Almost all students agreed that was news. We then went into what made each one newsworthy or not newsworthy.

I was somewhat surprised and very pleased that students in each class were able to name all of the qualities of newsworthiness. They didn't identify them by name they identified the idea behind each- timeliness, prominence, conflict, impact, and human interest. Having these identified, the students proceeded to an activity to assess their skills in determining newsworthiness. This part was differentiated by class. For the step 4 class we used one article, read it together as a class, and went through the worksheet to determine if the news was timely, if it related to an area near them, was it out of the ordinary, and did it fulfill other qualities of newsworthiness. This article, about a conflict at a local high school, was easy for the students to understand, and we were able to get through the whole activity. With the other classes they each had different articles (1 each in step 6, and in groups with step 5). The students in step 5 answered the questions in their groups but had individual worksheets to keep them on task.

Following this activity we defined the difference between soft news and hard news, and viewed a couple of very funny videos, which I thought really engaged the class (one about what soft news IS, and the other 3 minutes on cable news about Barack Obama's bowling game). The second video really gave them an understanding of what soft news is and how to spot it. I then listed different stories and had the class guess whether it was hard news or soft news. This was probably the point in the lesson where I felt everyone was most engaged. Lastly, we defined infotainment, the blending of hard and soft news, and concluded class. In all 3 classes we accomplished everything on the lesson plan, and I was pleased. One lesson on classroom management was that one students, obviously out of it, slept through most of the class. There was a group activity moment where it would have been wise to take him aside and tell him that he needed to be awake and staying with us, or go to the counselor.

Day 1 (B)- Political Preference

2008-04-03T20:05:00.000-07:00

Today in each class we picked up where we left off the day before, mostly finishing off political and media definitions. The primary activity of each class today was the difference between the Democrats and Republicans, liberals and conservatives. We also did the political preference quiz. To distinguish between the party's I printed out positions on many different issues, had students in group try to place that view under which party or part of the political spectrum might believe that position. I also handed out a broad political and media spectrum that I made so that students can get as to where different political figures fit on the political spectrum. For the most part we didn't get to the media figures so we will catch up on that. The students tried to name each person on the spectrum and then fill in their worksheet.

For the most part the students were excited to see what their political preferences were. This activity definitely got a couple students excited as classroom debate broke out in the Step 5 class. This activity definitely made it seem like it would be a good idea to have some class debates on some of these issues later in the year. Students are very opinionated, and although mostly liberal, have conservative views on things like gay marriage and abortion.

Along with the political preference quiz it was definitely necessary to do some explaining what each question so that students understood the sides of the issue and what each answer meant. The class generally behaved very well today and was engaged in the lesson, even some students who have not been in the past. I was pleased with what we accomplished.

Day 1 (A)- unit overview

2008-04-01T10:37:00.000-07:00

So today I started the unit on media literacy. First I was introduced to the class because many of the students are new (having moving in from other classes this trimester). The first class moves a little slower as many students are special ed. or have fewer English language skills. We spent a good deal of time defining media and media literacy with them, trying to provide them with many examples. I went over the schedule, and then began working through the definitions. This class was shortened today because we had a meeting with all students to start the day. We got through about half of the political definitions today. We did the same material with Step 6, but were able to get through the entire introduction, political and media definitions today so we can move onto the political preference quiz tomorrow. Step 5, which is now a huge class, will be a real challenge both in terms of adapting the lessons and classroom management. The class is not arranged very well, prohibiting me from getting to the back of the class, which is where the most management is needed.

My cooperating teacher offered some very good suggestions after the classes. She suggested visuals to go along with the pictures would be very helpful for the first period, Step 4 kids. They have done that in the past. I am already limiting the vocabulary I will use with that class. She also suggested that I re-integrate the fact vs. opinion lesson in the context of media literacy because it is a god think to keep in mind as they learn to analyze and evaluate media for trustworthiness, bias, etc... Tomorrow I need to begin instituting some of the procedural things like what we write on the board (date, class, agenda) at the beginning of each class, and the ground rules for my 2 week unit so they are more clear. This was the most tedious part of the process, once the definitions are out of the way the rest will be much smoother. Tomorrow- political preference quiz!

Unit Starts Tomorrow!

2008-03-31T14:42:00.000-07:00

The full media literacy unit in it's very new and adapted form begins tomorrow when the kids come back from spring break. Up first... An overview of the unit, explaining what media, and media literacy are, and taking a political preference quiz so students have some idea where they stand as we start this bigger unit on media and American politics.

Lesson 2: Fact V. Opinion

2008-03-18T17:00:00.000-07:00

My objectives with this lesson was for students to be able to differentiate facts and opinions, neutral language and bias language, and to be able to recognize how a source may sometimes pass off an opinion as neutral or factual information. In addition I hoped that students could identify facts and opinions in the business plans they have been working on, and identify persuasive arguments to investors, and areas where they needed to add evidence.

Overall, the lesson went according to plan. I was surprised that I was able to get through everything that I had written into the plan and still had time left for the most part. In the first class I was able to get through the whole lesson and still have 10 minutes for them to work on how to make their business plans more effective using facts and opinions. In the second class we were also able to get to that point and since there were only two student, we were able to individually work on how to make their business plans more persuasive.

There are some things that I could have done, upon reflection. When the students were reading through the article out loud, it is important to correct their punctuation. Since many students might know the words but not the spelling, it is important to clarify how the word is pronounced. Also I could have emphasized more in the first class that although facts are verifiable, it is GOOD to have opinions, and you should express them often, but is important to be able to back them up. I emphasized that in the second class.

Overall, the worksheets and materials worked well, the editorial could have been shorter with less advanced vocabulary but we got through it, and the student participation was better than expected!

Lesson 1: Advertising

2008-03-17T17:00:00.000-07:00

My objective with this lesson was to have students understand how prevalent advertisements are, how they attempt to influence us, and what clues they might leave about our culture. Unfortunately, this lesson got off to a shaky start as I was a bit late coming into the classroom, but I think after a few minutes I had it together and was able to execute the lesson for the most part as I had intended. It was my impression before the lesson that it would be difficult for students to differentiate between many advertisements and content, and that was confirmed at the beginning of the lesson when I handed out the magazines. I had planned to use the first few minutes to define the terms but was unable to do that so I decided to define them as needed as we went along, which worked relatively well. After some one-on-one attention I was surprised at how quickly students began to be able to pick out the advertisements. They were able to identify logos and other indicators of advertising. I was also very pleased with how quickly they identified the lesson that they were supposed to take away from the exercise. They understood the subliminal effect advertising can have on them through my examples, were able to identify lessons that historians might take away from advertisements about our culture at this time and relate that to their autobiography projects, and also identify the importance of being able to distinguish between facts and opinions. Participation was very high for this class. I did not get to do the formal written assessment I had wanted to with their paragraphs, but I got more than I expected out of the discussion and was happy with the lesson overall.

10 Day Unit on Media Literacy Introduction

2008-03-16T16:55:00.000-07:00

Starting a couple days after the students come back from Spring Break (that will be April 2nd), I will be starting a 10 day unit on media literacy. This will be my full two weeks of teaching, and allow me to put to work the media literacy unit that I prepared in my social studies methods class last semester. Using this unit in my current school will be a challenge, since it is a much different groups of students than I had in mind while preparing the unit. Instead of block classes, I will see the students once a day for just 50 minutes. We are lucky to have more than 40-45 mins of time to really work. The class sizes are much smaller. The largest class has less than 10 people (depending on attendance). Technology that I planned to use is available, but since my classes are all in different rooms transporting, restarting the equipment, and getting the resources set up will require extra set up time. There are a few things that require dramatic changes to the content-

1. Vocab, Vocab, Vocab. - A lot of the vocabulary that I had intended to use will not be practical in classes where the majority of students first language is not English, and for some, their English vocabulary is still very little. So the first thing I realized is that I was going to have to do a significant amount of contextualizing the unit before we begin. I will have to review (hopefully in a somewhat interesting way) a lot of vocabulary that relates to politics and media. Defining the initial terms and concepts will take up a good part of the first two days of the unit. Even still, there will be a lot to establish as we proceed to make sure that the students can take full advantage of the activities. Since this is the beginning of a larger trimester of studies on politics, media, and government, spending a couple days on context will be worth it.

2. Technological Literacy- During the last trimester we did a unit with the students on autiobiographies as historical evidence. We were having them set up MySpace pages as their own autiobiographies. We did not anticipate however how long the project would take because most students did not have an email account, did not know how to set up an email account, did not know how to make a MySpace account, what upload and download meant, and other technological skills. Surely, there will be similar hurdles in this unit as we attempt to do extensive internet searching, using YouTube and more.

3. Time and Depth- Because of some of the unique challenges that I will be facing, each of the lessons that I have prepared will take longer than I had planned for. I have cut back on some of the lessons and for some of them I have only cut out some of the activities. The vast majority of the lessons in this media literacy unit concentrate on learning important skills that students can use in a future increasingly dependent on technological literacy. The students will be learning about politics and government throughout this unit, but only in the process of learning how to find information, sort through it, analyze it, contextualize it, and more. I have also taken into account the student population in adapting this lesson so that I use examples that relate to their lives.

I am aware that I will not be able to get through all of the material I have set out, even in this abbreviated version of the unit, so I have prioritized the schedule at the same time as ensuring that it was properly scaffolded based on what the students come in knowing.

In addition, I have already begun the unit in a way by doing two lessons that fit into the unit in advance of the full two weeks. I have done two lessons so far...one on advertising and one on fact vs. opinion. I will provide some brief reaction to those lessons in my next post!

New school!

2008-02-06T16:55:00.000-08:00

So I have FINALLY started my student teaching at a public charter school in the Columbia Heights/ Mt. Pleasant neighborhood in DC called Next Step (Proximo Paso). The school is comprised of 83 students, mostly very recent immigrants and high school drop-outs. One of the school's major goals is to prepare these students for the GED. The students in steps 1 to 3 are being taught content in Spanish at varying reading levels (elementary-step 1, middle school level- step 2, and at or near high school level- step 3). Those students also take ESOL (English to Speakers of Other Languages). Steps 4, 5, and 6 classes are taught in English at varying reading levels (some literally at 1st-3rd grade reading levels).

Of course I will primarily be teaching social studies but for the first week I am sampling all of the steps to get an idea of the schools program and get to know each of the teachers. Today I even taught a science class about global warming IN SPANISH! It was challenging but really awesome! I am also getting involved in helping an ESOL class of lower level Spanish speakers.

Tomorrow and then ALL DAY Friday I will be teaching the digestive system (in English, thank God!). I will be posting about all of my experiences as I go here on this blog. When I have an idea of lessons I will need to plan, I would love your ideas!

Scott

Takaki 14- jigsaw

2007-12-03T10:44:00.000-08:00

The way that I would teach chapter 14 of Takaki would involved a jigsawing exercise so that so many topics can be covered in one class and students can gain insight into multiple perspectives. I will focus on the involvement of different groups in World War II. Students will be broken up into several groups : Japanese, Chinese, Indians (natives), Mexicans (chicanos), and African-Americans. Students will get into their groups and review chapter 14 seeking to answer the following questions about their given identity:

1. What was the contribution of your group to the American effort in World War II?

2. How was your group simultaneously being treated on the homefront? How were they recieved after the war? Did their rights generally improve? How about their socio-economic status?

3. If you were actually a member of your assigned group during World War II, would you want to serve in the American military? Why or why not?

Students will discuss in groups. Then the class will come back together and each group will give us the background on their group and how they have responded to these questions. IF we have time we may want to explore the question: Why is it that those with the least rights and status generally serve at a higher rate in the armed forces? Why are so many new citizens so eager to fight for their country?

NCLB: destroying our democracy?

2007-11-27T07:14:00.000-08:00

A very good Washington Post article about the effects of NCLB on teaching civics and government.

"Mandated by the federal No Child Left Behind Act, the tests assess chiefly math and reading comprehension. Basic civics and history have suffered. As a result, teenagers and young adults often have no clue why the United States is different from, say, Egypt or Russia; they have little idea what liberty is."

Check it out!

Takaki 13 differentiated

2007-11-26T13:44:00.001-08:00

I would start the class by having students think about and respond to the following on page 368 of Takaki- “W.E.B. DuBois decided that they should consider “voluntary segregation” …”They should “create a closed economic circle” - shop at Negro-owned stores stocked with Negro-grown good transported by Negro shippers, and processed by Negroes.”

I would then delve into the issue of “is segregation a logical solution?” I would have students in the lower level class first make their own list of advantages and disadvantages of segregated living for a minority group, in this case African-Americans. I would then have them get together in groups and share their responses with each other. The group would then be able to use the book to pick out advantages and disadvantages and add to their list. We would then come back together as a class and discuss the issue.

For the “on-level” class I would have them dig deeper into this issue and I would have them use higher order thinking skills. They would be forced to adopt one position over the other in two teams and then prepare for a mini-debate on the issue to be held in the second half of class. They can use the book to help them form their arguments but also build collaboration and group skills as they prepare their team strategy in the debate.

For the advanced class I would explore the same issue. I would have them do the advantages/ disadvantages list for homework the night before. We would then do the debate but then we would expand by exercising transfer and seeing if they can transfer their conceptual reasoning to other situations like for example- is it moral to use segregation as the solution as in the Israel/ Palestine conflict? Might it be the only practical approach? Does it have to be one or the other?

Daily Instruction- Media Literacy Unit

2007-11-19T14:09:00.000-08:00

Media Literacy

12 Day Unit

Daily Instruction- 12 90 minute block classes

Day 1:

Objective: The students will define media and discover the different types of media they are exposed to on a daily basis, along with the advantages and disadvantages of each medium. Students will learn about media use in the United States, begin to think about their own usage, and learn to evaluate a news source and find reliable sources for both news and commentary that will contribute to a broad understanding of the world around them and provide them with the knowledge to act on issues that matter to them.

Methods: Students will begin by taking a brief survey that will explore how they use different types of media in daily life. Students will then be asked to list some of the differences between these media: tv, print, radio, and the internet. In groups we will discuss the advantages and disadvantages of each medium and then discuss together as a class.

We will then read as a class page 16 from Al Gore’s book “The Assault on Reason.” The teacher will call on a few students, each to read one paragraph. The students will then react to this reading and the class will discuss the differences between one-way mediums and more interactive mediums like the internet. What are the advantages and disadvantages to each?

The Wikipedia debate- Is Wikipedia a valid source? Students will list reasons why they think wikipedia is a useful tool or not, and whether it is a valid source for research. Is wikipedia more or less reliable than a paper encyclopedia?

Materials:

Media Use Survey
“Evaluate a News Source” handout 1.1
Group handout 1.2 – Advantages and Disadvantages of Mass Media
Copy of page 16 from “The Assault on Reason” by Al Gore (handout 1.3)

Assessment: Media use survey will serve as a form of diagnostic assessment to see what their media use and perceptions are going into the unit. Discussion will be used as a formative assessment.

Differentiation: Group work

Homework: Begin to monitor your news consumption and media habits.

Day 2: Fact vs. Opinion & Take on the Text

Objectives:

Students should be able to differentiate facts and opinions, neutral language and bias language.
Students should be able to recognize how a source may sometimes pass off an opinion as neutral or factual information.
Students should understand how prevalent advertisements are and how they attempt to influence us.
Students should be able to recognize subtle bias in the textbook, understand multiple perspectives on history, and practice effective revision and paraphrasing skills.

Methods:

The teacher will distribute copies of an editorial about junk food in schools.
On their own they will be asked to read the article to differentiate facts from opinions. Students will highlight facts and underline opinions.
We will then discuss as a class what facts we can point out and what opinions the author expresses. Ask students how they know the difference.
Distribute magazines, ask students to browse advertisements.
Ask students to record a blank piece of notebook paper how many pages are consumed by advertising. They should pick an article and read it. They will write the facts in one column, opinions in another, and sentences that they can not determine in a 3^rd column.
Ask and Discuss: Was is difficult to differentiate sometimes between facts and opinions? Why do you think this is?
The teacher will ask students to put everything else away and take out their textbook and their notebook or blank paper. The teacher will talk about the importance of understanding that history is written by the victor and that there are multiple histories and perspectives. The teacher will choose a chapter from the textbook. Students will be directed to pick a claim, assertion, or statement passed off as a fact from the textbook and dispute it. Students should explain why they think the statement is misleading and if the statement includes bias language. Students will then be asked to re-write that paragraph from the text with more neutral language or in a way that is fair and includes multiple perspectives. Students will then share the original paragraph, their new version, and why they changed it.

Materials:

Salt Lake Tribune Article
Newspapers
Textbook
Notebook

Assessment:

Differentiation:

Homework:

Read “Re-Thinking Objectivity” from the Columbia Journalism Review here- http://cjrarchives.org/issues/2003/4/objective-cunningham.asp .
Read page 191-194 in “News: The Politics of Illusion” by Lance Bennett.

Day 3: Truth or Objectivity?

Objectives:

· Students should have developed an opinion on whether objectivity or balance, is a more important goal for the media and whether they think the media is responsible for achieving either, both, or neither of those. Students should also weigh the advantages of striving for objectivity and balance versus an approach based only on truth and accuracy.

· Students should be able to articulate the arguments for and against each side of this issue.

· Students should have an understanding about how the American media approach to balance and objectivity differs from the approach of many other democracies in the world.

Methods:

I will start the class with that short video clip and brief reaction (5-10 mins)

I will then put up on the board this definition- “Objectivity- the practice of presenting both sides of an issue.” Students will then be asked what the problem is with this definition. We will discuss the issue of presenting multiple perspectives vs. dualism (2 sides to every issue), whether each side to any given issue has equal weight and deserves to be presented as equally important. To illustrate this I will have a student pick an issue (out of list or out of a hat) and have students brainstorm all of the different opinions on that issue as I write them on the board (10 mins)

Next I will present a different definition for objectivity- “not influenced by personal feelings, interpretations, or prejudice; based on facts; unbiased: an objective opinion.” Based on that students will be asked to discuss whether it is possible for individual reporters to truly be objective. (5 mins)

Students will then be given two articles on the same issue. One article will be from an American newspaper and one will be from a European newspaper. The articles will be covering the same issue. Students will have 5 minutes to read the two short articles.

Students will then be put into 6 groups with about 5 people in each group. The group will have about 5 minutes to discuss what differences they found between how the two newspapers covered the issue, how many viewpoints they presented and whether they believe the emphasis was put on truth and accuracy or objectivity and balance. (5 mins in groups)

After the groups have finished discussing we will come back together as a class for a 15 minute closing discussion with the following guiding questions:

1. In striving to achieve objectivity and balance in reporting, do we end up accomplishing neither?

2. Would we be better off if American media were run more like Europe? Should each channel, network, etc… state their bias upfront so that at least the viewers know where they are coming from or is the goal of objectivity worth it even if we can’t be perfect?

Materials:

· Projector and laptop to play video clips

· Copies of the articles being used- http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/13827858/ and http://www.guardian.co.uk/israel/Story/0,,1818696,00.html

· “News: The Politics of Illusion by Lance Bennett.

· Students will need a notebook, pen, and hi-liter.

Assessment:

This lesson will be assessed in a few ways. The class discussions, both at the beginning and end of class will serve as formative assessments to see how their knowledge is developing as we explore each subtopic of this lesson. The way this skill will ultimately be assessed is through our media literacy performance assessment at the end of the unit. Students will be asked to keep a journal of the media that they watch and use and one of the things they will be asked to observe is how that television program, newspaper article, radio show, etc… either promotes a certain agenda openly, or strives for objectivity and balance. Their analysis will be a good indicator of whether or not they have developed the right analytical skills and whether they can put them into practice.

Differentiation: Working in groups (interpersonal), using technology (video clips)

Homework:

Read “A Brief History of the Public Interest Standard” here- http://www.ibiblio.net/pub/electronic-publications/stay-free/ml/readings/public_interest.pdf
Read “The Role of the Media in a democracy” here- http://usinfo.org/media/press/essay3.htm
Reflection on the readings- homework handout

Day 4: Public Interest vs. The Bottom Line

Objectives: Students will explore the debate about the role of the free press in a democratic society, develop their own opinions about the responsibility of the media to the American people, and critically examine the commercialization of news.

Methods:

Define: Hard news, soft news, infotainment, sensationalism, ratings.
Have students list examples of hard news, examples of soft news
What do you think the mainstream media in America focuses on?
Short lecture on the commercialization of the news based on this- http://www.ibiblio.net/pub/electronic-publications/stay-free/ml/intro_history_dis.pdf
Students will be given a news website and be asked to evaluate the balance of “infotainment” to “hard news.” Students will have approximately 10 minutes to examine the website and come to their conclusions.
A speaker will come (An editor of a local newspaper) in to discuss the choices editors face in balancing pop culture and soft news with hard news and news in the public interest. After a brief speech students will be able to ask the speaker questions about the balance between serving their democratic function and ensuring their success as a business.

Materials:

Speaker!
You Tube clip- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dCEZaHCWmsI – is THAT news?
Laptops with internet access

Assessment: Participation in the discussion will serve as a formative assessment, students will be judged both by participation, questions asked, and listening.

Differentiation: Use of neighborhood resources

Homework: Read page 159-163 by Lance Bennett from “News: The Politics of Illusion” on “The Top Ten Reasons the Press Took a Pass on the Iraq War.”

Day 5: Iraq as a Case Study: Did the media fail us?

Objectives:

Analyze whether the media failed to critically question claims and assertions made by the administration in the lead up to the Iraq War.

Methods:

Class will begin with a clip from the movie “Uncovered: The Truth About the Iraq War,” The clip will discuss the idea of the media’s failure to critically examine the justifications made for war in Iraq.

Students should have read “The Top Ten Reasons the Press Took a Pass on the Iraq War” for homework. Students will then be put into groups of 3 or 4. They are first to review each of the ten reasons to determine whether they think that they are accurate. They are then to try to come to a group consensus about which reasons they think were the most influential in the media’s lack of scrutiny leading up to the Iraq War. We will then come back together as a class and try to come up with a consensus top 5.

Students will then read two mea culpa’s on the Iraq War, one by the editorial board of the New York Times and one by Bill O’Reilly (conservative commentator).

Brainstorm:

Should there be consequences for media that fails at its most basic responsibilities?
How can we make sure that doesn’t happen again?
How can average citizens hold the media accountable?

Materials:

‘Uncovered’ documentary DVD
Students can use the timeline of Iraq and the Media provided by FAIR as a resource: http://www.fair.org/index.php?page=3062
Mea Culpa’s- http://www.nytimes.com/2004/05/26/international/middleeast/26FTE_NOTE.html?ex=1195621200&en=669901f1eb67aa10&ei=5070

AND

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/02/11/politics/main599684.shtml

Assessment: Group work and consensus building in developing reasons the media failed regarding Iraq.

Differentiation:

Homework:

Read “Why Media Ownership Matters” article here- http://www.commondreams.org/views05/0403-25.htm
Read “Facts on Media in America- Did You Know?” - http://www.commoncause.org/site/pp.asp?c=dkLNK1MQIwG&b=2127045

Day 6: Corporate Media and Consolidation, a threat to democracy?

Objectives:

Students should develop an understanding of the consolidation of media ownership in the United States, what it’s effects are, and why it is important.

Methods:

We will start by defining several terms as a class: Media consolidation, FCC, conglomerate.

We will then view a You Tube video of a Bill Moyer’s newscast on the FCC and media consolidation.

Students will be divided into 6 groups representing GE, Time Warner, Disney, News Corp, CBS, and Viacom- the 6 large media conglomerates in the United States. Students will use http://www.stopbigmedia.com/chart.php and draw a graphic organizer that shows the major ownership components of their group. Students will then pick one of the companies owned in each medium (tv, radio, publishing, film, online holdings, etc…) and brainstorm how that ownership could bias the reporting of their news outlets and why it would be in their interest to that company. Students will then present their findings to the class.

Materials:

http://www.stopbigmedia.com/chart.php

Assessment: Graphic organizer and presentation

Differentiation: Visual/ Spatial assessment method

Homework: none

Day 7: Censored: The stories the media didn’t want you to know about. Why not?

Objectives:

Students will be able to identify reasons why stories are often censored in the mainstream media and who it benefits.

Methods: Today students will begin by choosing one topic from the list of the top 25 censored stories of 2007 from Project Censorship. Students can choose to work on their own or with a partner. First students will read the article on their issue and then work on paraphrasing the idea for the class. Students should consider the following: what is the main idea of this report? What is the supporting evidence provided? Are the sources reliable? Why do you think this story was not widely reported on? Who would want it censored and why? After students have had a chance to consider these points and summarize the article, they will give a short presentation to the class on their story. If time remains in class we will have a more broad discussion about what reasons mainstream media sources might have for censorship.

Materials:

Top 25 censored stories of 2007 and archives- http://www.projectcensored.org/censored_2007/index.htm
Student notebooks

Assessment: Presentation of their story and analysis of why the story was censored and who it benefits.

Differentiation: Differentiates between intrapersonal and interpersonal learners by allowing them to work on their own or with a partner.

Homework:

Day 8: Political Language

Objectives:

To acquire the skills to decode and break-down political messages and understand emotive language and how it is used to advance an agenda
To learn how to fact check information sources and political candidates in order to make more informed political decisions.

Methods:

Asking the right questions
To the teacher: Encourage students not to accept claims at face value. Rather, have students test claims by asking a few questions. Who is speaking, and where are they getting their information? How can I validate what they’re saying? What facts would prove this claim wrong? Does the evidence presented really back up what’s being said? If an ad says a product is “better,” for instance, what does that mean? Better than what?

Arguments consist of sentences that use language informatively. But, of course, not all sentences are informative. Some are emotive, which means they use language in a poetic fashion. Emotive language is intended to express feelings and attitudes. In the case of these two advertisements, the emotive function is meant to trigger a certain reaction in viewers. The word "amnesty" could inspire a sense of injustice. Other emotive terms, such as "Washington politicians," could prompt viewers to feel impotent or powerless, while the euphemism "tragic day" and the blanket label "terrorists" could be used to inspire fear.

Emotive language can keep viewers from realizing that key facts are missing and leave them open to accepting misleading statements. For example: The Citizens United ad, after it rekindles the fear of 9/11, claims the bill would put "potential terrorists...on a path to U.S. citizenship," which is both vague ("potential terrorists") and inaccurate since it implies the bill would allow actual terrorists to become U.S. citizens.

Have students view the Grassfire.org and Citizens United advertisements and review the storyboards (Grassfire.org, Citizens United). Give each student a copy of the Emotive Language Handout. Allow students to pick out the expressive words/phrases in the ads as well as any claims they believe may be misleading. Their list should include the following:

Emotive Terms/Phrases

amnesty
our values
tragic day
terrorists
Washington politicians
aliens
great nation
gangs
drug dealers
convicted criminals
wrong
rule of law
worse/better
meaningless
nation of immigrants
foundation of law and order

Misleading Phrases

"9/11 hijackers were in the United States illegally"
"put millions of people who are in our country illegally, including potential terrorists and gang members, on a path to U.S. citizenship"
"bill does not even allow convicted criminals to be deported"
"Now Congress and the president want to give amnesty to millions of illegal aliens instead of securing the border"

Organize the students into groups of 3 to 5. Instruct them to discuss their findings and answer the following questions:

Do any of these words serve two functions? In other words, are there any words that are both emotive and informative?
Where else have you seen these words used?
What emotions do these words convey?
Do these words obscure or reinforce the factual statements? If so, how? If not, why?
How reliable is the source of the information in the ad? What is the source?
What information do we need to keep someone else's choice of words from doing our thinking for us?

Keep students in their small groups and have them go through the Citizens United ad and remove the emotive and misleading terms and phrases. Their final product should look something like this:

EXAMPLE:
Citizens United Ad Script

Newt Gingrich: _______________ were in the United States illegally.

Today, more than five years since that _________, our borders remain open ______________.

____________, the new McCain-Kennedy immigration plan _______ millions of people who are in our country illegally, including __________ and ________, on a path to U.S. citizenship.

This bill_______even _____________ to be deported. That’s ________.
The United States is a __________. The ________ should be nonnegotiable.

But our ___________ was built upon a _______________.

_____________ makes our laws __________ and ________ millions more to cross the border illegally – making the problem _________. Not ________.

The new McCain-Kennedy immigration plan ____________ our borders, and it ________. Don’t let the _________ compromise our security.

_________________.

After students have removed the emotive and misleading terms/phrases, have them replace the words with neutral terms/phrases. When they are done, hold a class discussion. Ask the students if they found the assignment to be difficult or easy, and how they think the ad has changed.

Cross-checking / Weighing the evidence
To the teacher: Be sure to tell students not to rely on one source or one study, but to look to see what others say. Not all sources are equal.

Now that students have parsed through the ads and identified the emotive and misleading terms/phrases, it's important that students learn to seek relatively unbiased information from competent sources. Point out to students that they must keep an open mind and actively look for facts in order to counteract the sometimes erroneous conclusions that can be made based on deceptive terms and phrases. In order to combat the effects of emotive language, viewers have to be ready and willing to discover the facts on their own, while using reliable, impartial sources.

In this case, students will be given a FactCheck.org article and a summary of the immigration bill's provisions from Project Vote Smart, a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization that gathers and organizes information on candidates for political office. Using these sources, students should be able to check the phrases in the ad and determine if they are indeed accurate.

Keep students in their small groups and distribute the FactCheck.org and Project Vote Smart research materials. Instruct students to read through the sourcing and answer these questions:

What is the definition of “amnesty"?
Were the 9/11 terrorists in the United States illegally?
Who are “potential terrorists” and how many people would that account for?
Would the bill put actual terrorists and gang members “on a path to U.S. citizenship"?
Would the bill allow convicted criminals to be deported?
Would illegal immigrants be punished for breaking the law? If so, how?
Can accurate statements about the bill be conveyed in an ad without using emotive terms/phrases? What would the ad look/sound like?

Materials:

FactCheckEd.org lesson plan and commercial video- http://www.factchecked.org/LessonPlanDetails.aspx?myId=11&mySectionId=1
Storyboard handouts for the two commercials
Fact Checking resource- http://www.vote-smart.org/issue_keyvote_detail.php?cs_id=14122

Assessment: Replacing emotive words with neutral words exercise will help determine if the students understand the difference between the two and how it affects the message.

Differentiation: Using technology (watching the commercial)

Homework:

Read the framing handout.
Read the Luntz memo page 1-3 and 21-25- http://images.dailykos.com/images/user/3/Luntz_frames_immigration.pdf
Lastly, read http://www.rockridgeinstitute.org/research/lakoff/luntz

Think about these questions?

- Is framing effective?

- Do you find anything wrong with the Luntz memo? Anything particularly insightful?

- Is framing ethical? Do the ends justify the means?

Day 9: Media Manipulation

Objectives:

Students will understand how politicians and political operatives manipulate language in order to advance an agenda
Students will be aware of the tools used to frame the news in the favor of a particular group and how communications professionals try to influence how the media frames issues.

Methods:

Review vocab: VNR (Video News Release)- Handout, Spin, Framing
What is spin an how is it used? The teacher will give a description of spin and give some prominent examples of how it has been used. Students will then be asked to practice spin.
The teacher will give a description of framing and how it has been used over time.
Students will watch the segment “Give Us What We Want” about Frank Luntz and political framing from the PBS Series “The Persuaders.
Students will then be assigned a particular bill such as “No Child Left Behind”, “The Patriot Act,” and “The Clear Skies Initiative.”
Students read over collected information on their bill from Wikipedia and then fill out the accompanying worksheet.
At the end of class we will have a group discussion about each bill and how students answered the questions on the worksheet.

Materials:

VNR handout
Framing and Spin handout
PBS online presentation “The Persuaders” here-
No Child Left Behind-

A. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No_Child_Left_Behind

B. http://www.vote-smart.org/issue_keyvote_detail.php?cs_id=V3149&can_id=53293

C. http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2007/08/21/3314/

USA PATRIOT Act-

The Clear Skies Initiative

Assessment: The worksheet will give a very good indication if the students understand why words matter and how they can be manipulated to influence public perceptions. This is a formative assessment.

Differentiation: Using technology (PBS presentation), group work.

Homework:

Read “Liberal Media Evidence” from the Weekly Standard here- http://www.weeklystandard.com/Content/Public/Articles/000/000/004/143lkblo.asp
Read “What Liberal Media?” by Eric Alterman, here- http://www.thenation.com/doc/20030224/alterman2
Write down arguments for each of these points of view- the media is liberal, the media is conservative, the media has only a corporate bias, the media has no bias.

Day 10: Is the Media bias?

Objectives:

Students should be able to detect direct and indirect sources of bias in the news.
Students should have an understanding of the strategies some use to cover their subtle biases.
Students should have reviewed the evidence regarding a political bias in the media and should have developed an opinion as to whether they think the media has a liberal bias, conservative bias, corporate bias, or no bias at all.

Methods:

The teacher will hand out the “detecting bias in the media” worksheet” and review each point with students, provide examples, and check for student comprehension. Different pages from the day’s newspaper will be handed out to students in groups of 3 or 4. They are to take an article and dissect it using handout 10.1 for bias. A short class discussion will follow.

Students will then be put into a large circle with a smaller circle inside of it. All students on the inside circle are expected to participate in the discussion. We will start by claiming that the media is liberal. All who have points to contribute can start on the inside circle. When someone on the outside circle has a point that they want to contribute, they must be “tapped in” by someone from the inside circle who is ready to go out. We will then turn our attention to the second point of view- the media is conservative. Students will then be asked to advocate the position that the media is neither liberal nor conservative, but simply corporate in it’s bias. Finally, students should defend the position that the media has no bias from the point of view of a reporter. The discussion style will remain the same.

Materials:

Handout 10.1 on Detecting Bias in the Media
Newspapers

Assessment: Students will be assessed through the discussion in both debate points and listening skills.

Differentiation: This style of discussion can be good for both vocal and more shy students and allow everyone to contribute in the way they feel more comfortable.

Homework:

Read “The Role of Stereotypes in the News.” - http://www.media-awareness.ca/english/special_initiatives/toolkit/stereotypes/role_stereotypes_news.cfm

Day 11: Stereotypes and Cognitive Dissonance

Objectives:

Understand the way that the media can reinforce stereotypes and how that can be harmful.
Learn the concept of cognitive dissonance and how it affects our learning

Methods:

Students will be divided up into 8 groups and be asked to list common stereotypes for one of these groups: young people, Latinos, African-Americans, women, lawyers, homosexuals, Jews, the poor.

Students will come back and talk about these as a class.

Then students will be given handout 11.1 and asked to think about what might be wrong with those images. This will lead into a discussion of stereotypes being reinforced by the media and how they can be subconscious and reinforced.

The teacher will then present a brief powerpoint presentation about cognitive dissonance and do an incorporated activity on how they deal with cognitive dissonance. Students will then be asked to brainstorm how cognitive dissonance affects them. Students will be asked to write a plan for introducing themselves to perspectives that they usually do not.

Materials:

Katrina image handout
Butcher block paper for each group to record stereotypes of their assigned groups

Assessment: Group work on stereotypes and their own “anti-cognitive dissonance plan” will serve as assessments.

Differentiation: Group work, visual intelligence used with image exercise.

Homework: work on final performance assessment

Day 12: Practicing Media Literacy

Objectives:

Break down political rhetoric and spin
Fact check claims of political candidates
Distinguish between facts and opinions
Use all previous knowledge to build a political advertisement for your assigned candidate.

Methods:

We will start class by assigning each member of the class one of the 8 Democratic presidential candidates involved in the Democratic debate in November, 2007. The teacher will hand out the scorecard worksheet. Students will then watch 25-30 minutes of the Democratic debate and as they watch fill out the worksheet. Students will then get together with the other students in the class who had the same candidate. They will compare their notes and then have the next 20-25 minutes to research claims made by their candidate and claims made against their candidate during the debate. They should divide up the research effectively to make sure they take advantage of this class time in order to discover as much as possible. Each candidate group will then be given 5 minutes to present to the class the evidence they have found to support or refute the claims made regarding their candidate. If there is time remaining the students will get back together in their group and write a 30 second radio ad for their candidate based on what they have learned about them from the debate.

Add-on exercise- Be a press secretary! Students will pretend they are the press secretary of the candidate they were assigned, and from what they have learned, take questions from the rest of the class as practice using political language and spin.

Materials:

Video of Democratic debate
Debate watch worksheet

Assessment: The debate watch worksheet will serve as a good formative assessment to see if students are able to incorporate what they know about the use of political language and the use of rhetoric to pass off opinions as facts in order to break down their assigned candidate’s message.

Differentiation: Using technology to watch the debate in the classroom, having students work both alone and in groups (intrapersonal/ interpersonal), bodily-kinesthetic involved in add-on “be a press secretary” activity.

Homework: Complete the performance assessment for the unit.

Takaki 12 method

2007-11-19T12:50:00.000-08:00

CNN report Rick Sanchez did a fantastic report on what it is like as a day laborer in the United States today. He disguised himself (which was easy to do since he is latino and speaks fluent spanish) as a day laborer and the camera's come along and record what life is like trying to get by as a hispanic laborer in the United States. I would start the lesson by discussing what conditions were like in the 1920's for Mexican immigrants and what it is like today. Students would review the key immigration facts at the bottom of this article and then list similarities between the 20's and today with Mexican immigrants.

I would then show students the Rick Sanchez report and then have them write a diary entry, putting themselves in the place of a Mexican day laborer in the United States. They should try to convey not only what happens on a typical day, but what life is like outside of their work, how it impacts them and their family, how they feel about being in America, etc... Here is a description of the Sanchez report.

Takaki 11: The Spatial Jews

2007-11-11T14:38:00.000-08:00

I was thinking for a while about how to incorporate visual/ spatial intelligence with a chapter about Jewish immigrants in America and New York city in the early 20th century and then it came to me.... Jewish history IS spatial. The Jews have always been known as a wandering people. Whether it was from the exodus out of Egypt of out of Europe in World War 2, for most of history the Jews have been a people without a home. Constantly they have wandered and dispersed, their hearts in one place and their bodies in another. They have, wherever they have gone added tremendously to whatever community they have joined. So how do I convert that natural link into a lesson based on visual and spatial intelligence?

The website myJewishLearning.com is an amazing resource that discusses the mobility of the Jews over time, and gives an example similar to those in Takaki about Jews in Shtetls. The students will be divided up into groups and they will have one of these stories. They will read the biography and then based on the story, draw a visual representation of life inside the shtetl of that particular Jewish immigrant.

Finally, to connect them to the broader context of physical divisions in cities and towns between different immigrant groups I would have them relate that to their hometown of Washington D.C. I would hand out one DC neighborhood map per group and have them guess what the largest ethnic groups were in each neighborhood and then check to see if their perceptions were true. Finally I would show them a similar breakdown of NYC ethnically in the 1920's so that the connection is made clear.

Learning Processes # 3

2007-11-05T13:52:00.000-08:00

Two of these three posts are actually about the learning processes of my students. I thought these stories were more relevant because as a teacher I have a great window into INDICATORS of learning, which is what I was looking for this time. I think these were pretty insightful.

October 18, 2007

There are two learning processes that I reflected on a bit this week. They are not so much from “catching myself in the process of learning” this week, but rather noticing I had never noted a learning process that happens to me EVERY day. The first process is association. I have a strange mental habit to associate almost every single thing that I learn with the place that I learned it. This habit makes recall a lot easier in some ways because if I remember where I learned a basic fact, I will start to recall all of the smaller details, because somewhere in my brain they are all in the same folder. That process of association is always visible with students. Students will associate different content with creative songs, acronyms, or whatever creative way their teacher used to teach the material. For example, one of my classmates has used the example that she will never forget a rule of fractions because her teacher taught her by saying…”just like Dolly Parton, big on top, small on the bottom.”

The other indicator of learning is transfer. There is an event that made me think of this recently when a friend told me a story. It turns out that I actually told them that story not too long ago, and they were telling me like it was new! That has happened to almost everyone at some point or another. The point is, when we learning something new, we add it to our repertoire of knowledge and we use it in new contexts…or what we think are new contexts. This concept of transfer is one of the most important indicators. So often in my practicum class I hear students say “Ya, I know that because Mr. or Mrs. --- taught me -----.” That means that they are using knowledge learned in another class to help them outside that class. Being able to transfer knowledge and apply it to their lives is critical.

October 24, 2007

You can tell when the project has made a real impact on the students’ learning when it appears the reading has struck a chord. It does so for several reasons. Often I could recognize a connection through a quote in the reading where the student obviously felt in synch with the author. If the reading taps into something going on in their own lives, the reading transforms into critical thinking. You can tell almost immediately when reading out loud whether the students are simply reading or whether they are speaking. Yesterday in class students brought in their projects, a children’s story that they wrote about an American figure they admire and read a book about. Going around group to group as they read their stories to each other, learning indicators were very clear. I had a conversation with one student about her story on Elizabeth Edwards. When asked she had a very interesting and immediate reaction to her thoughts on Mrs. Edwards. She had a gut reaction to some of the things she read, and her response made it very clear that she was not reciting something she had already written, by actively thinking, evaluating and synthesizing the information. On the other hand, some students presentations were clearly a recital of what they had written, or admittedly by some students what “my parents told me to write.” Immediate reactions to evaluative questions often serves as a good indicator of student learning.

November 1, 2007

One of the indicators of student learning is when you see students forming a clear connection between something they have learned at home/ from their parents/outside of school, with something they learn in the classroom. There have been a couple of incidents where I have witnessed this in the classroom. A few weeks back when we were beginning a unit on Africa, many of the African-American students brought in their personal experiences at several points. When the teacher was explaining a typical African style clothing pattern called Kente cloth, many of the students began to pipe up about whether this clothing was typical in their family. As we led into different stereotypes of Africa it was clear that the students were not only engaged but learning when they took a personal stake in refuting stereotypes. Linking the content to a students family experiences is a good way to measure student learning. This happened again in yesterday’s class. Yesterday was Halloween and I was doing my practicum. The class started off each period with Ms. Mostoller teaching a brief history of Halloween. Several students throughout the day refuted the tradition and celebration of Halloween because they have heard from their parents that Halloween is devil worship. This is actually a somewhat common belief among Christians, after all Halloween is a Pagan holiday. When the students speak up however, you can tell that they have a grasp of the history being taught because they often begin with “so I know that …. (something about the content, curriculum being taught), BUT (and then voice their objection or comments).”

Takaki CH 10 method

2007-11-05T08:56:00.001-08:00

Chapter 10 discusses many factors that either contributed to or hindered the success of Japanese immigrants to America. I think that it is important for students to be able to read through a text and explore how each element discuss relates back to a central idea. In order to help them work towards that goal I would pick the central topic of “Name some factors that helped and others that hindered the success of Japanese immigrants in America.” The students would be given a helpful graphic organizer in order to complete this task. It would be a two column chart with a large square box between the two columns. In one column students would write factors that helped Japanese immigrants succeed, and in the other column factors that hurt their chances. In the box in the middle would be facts that contributed, but the students are not sure of their overall impact.

Students would complete this chart for homework the night before class. In class we would start by compiling one large class list to put all of this information together. Then students would be able to list the points they have listed in the box, and discuss and debate their impact and try to come to a conclusion as a group.

After this activity students would be put in groups of 3 or 4 They are to pretend they are a Japanese family living in Japan and they received a letter from a friend in America detailing both the advantages and disadvantages of emigrating from Japan to America. One of the three students would be assigned as the father, one as the mother, and one or two as the children. They are to have a family meeting to decide whether they should emigrate and if so, who should go. At the end they will share their ideas with the class.

Examples –

Positives- escape economic hardship of Japan, 1908 Gentleman’s Agreement that allowing Japanese women only to come to America, American education exposed Japanese women to the outside world, increased ethnic solidarity, etc…

Negatives- Both Chinese and Phillipino workers brought into to break up Japanese dominance which eventually meant lower wages, women systematically paid less than men for the exact same work, constantly watched and overseen by “lunas”, leaving family behind likely to never return, weather and work conditions were brutal, etc…

Unsure- Believing they would only be in America for short time, they felt no responsibility to contribute to American society, the assimilation of the Nisei, etc…

Takaki 9: Teaching about Indian removal and the Dawes Act

2007-10-28T09:47:00.001-07:00

After students have a brief summary on the “Indian Question” they will have some background on the Indian removal acts of the late 19^th century and especially the impact of the Dawes Allotment Act. To use a new method of teaching this week I will try to use popular music as a bridge to the understanding of what happened to the Native Americans in this period, and the real life impact it had on their lives and the future of their tribes.

I will use the song “Don’t Drink the Water” by the Dave Matthews Band. The Dave Matthews Band is pretty popular amongst young people, so it could show students that someone who is very popular today is still concerned about what happened to the Native Americans over a century ago. Students will be given a copy of the lyrics to the song and then will be asked to work (either in groups or on their own) to interpret the lyrics and write in the margins what they think he means with the lyrics and how it relates to what they learned about Indian removal from their text. This will be a good bridge into a larger lesson/ unit on the impact of Westward expansion, the elimination of the frontier, and it’s impact on Native Americans and their heritage.

The lyrics to the song can be found here.

Performance Assessment on Media Literacy

2007-10-22T10:23:00.000-07:00

Performance Assessment on Media Literacy

Level: 12^th grade

Connections to Curriculum: This summative assessment will be given at the end of their two week curricular unit on media literacy. This assessment is designed to measure the students’ ability to critically interpret the media, examine media spin and bias, and understand the important role of the news media in our democracy.

Inquiry Question: Based on your understanding about the role of the media in American society and the necessity of critical media literacy skills, how have you been able to find valid and reliable sources and how have you interpreted their trustworthiness?

Standards:

Content standards-

12.7. Broad Concept: Students evaluate and take and defend positions on the influence of the media on American political life.

Students:

1. Discuss the meaning and importance of a free and responsible press.

2. Describe the roles of broadcast, print, and electronic media, including the Internet, as means of communication in American politics.

3. Explain how public officials use the media to communicate with the citizenry and to shape public opinion.

Example Students watch and analyze television political commercials and describe how they have changed over time (livingroomcandidate.movingimage.us/index.php) (12.7.3).

12^th grade skills standards- 1. Students distinguish valid arguments from fallacious arguments in historical interpretations 2. Students identify bias and prejudice in historical interpretations.

Overview: This take-home final assessment will consist of several sections. First, students will be asked to compile a list of their favorite and most reliable news sources. Among these sources the students must have at least 3 television or radio programs that they trust, 3 print publications (newspapers or magazines), 3 internet news websites, and 3 blogs. Below is the beginning of creating a rubric based on what qualities make a news source reliable. It is important to note that not all of the students’ sources need to be objective. As we have discussed in class, there a valid arguments both for and against objective and balanced media. Students must choose 3 sources to provide a complete annotation for. For these three sources students must explain why they find the source to be reliable, how it contributes to their understanding of issues that matter to them and their community, and finally how that source helps them fulfill their role as a citizen.

Criteria:

Diversity of sources – Is there a mix of objective and bias sources? Do all or most of the sources have a similar ideology or agenda? Do all or most of the sources have a similar type of news (“straight news”/ commentary/ investigative, etc…)?

Have they explained whether the source is objective or bias? Have they explained whether the source is balanced or fair?
Have they explained which points of view are presented by this source? Do they usually present two sides to every story? Multiple perspectives? One perspective?
Have they explained if the source has any corporate ownership that could influence how it presents the news?
Have they explained the investigative/ research qualities of the sources presented?
Do they demonstrate the ability to appropriately match issues of importance to them and their community with the most appropriate sources?
Do they explain how the source backs up assertions with evidence?

Time Allotment: Students will have one class period to answer the short answer questions below. The annotated list of media sources part of the assessment will be explained to students at the beginning of the unit so that they can progressively work at it. It will be due on the day of the in-class assessment.

Prior Learning (from 2 week unit):

Ability to critically analyze a news source for validity, objectivity, fairness, reporting standards, and bias
An understanding of the traditional role of the press in a democratic society
How to decode media spin and break through the filters to
Ability to understand both what is being told by a news story and perhaps more importantly, what story is not being told.
Understanding of media consolidation and its implications
Advantages and disadvantages of different types of media (ex- tv, blogs, etc…)

Short Answer

Please explain the consequence and implications of the following: “According to one estimate, the number of communication professionals in America (150,000) now exceeds the number of journalists (130,000), and the gap is growing (Bennett 130).”
Should the media strive for objectivity? Should they strive for balance? What is the difference between the two? If you think the media should strive for objectivity, should they try to achieve it in each story or over time?

Respond to this evaluation of the effects of media consolidation: “…although information outlets are undeniably proliferating, their ownership is increasingly concentrated, and the first effect of concentration is to push small media promoting noncommercial values out of the way (Bennett 233).” Explain some of the major effects of media consolidation and take a position on it’s effect on the media’s ability to perform it’s democratic function.

Teacher Administration:

The teacher will introduce this assessment during the first day of the curricular unit as part of the objectives. Give students a clear idea of how their final assessment will fit in and accurately measure what they have learned throughout the unit.
Provide students with the rubric for how this end of the unit assessment will be evaluated.
Give students reminders throughout the week that they should be collecting and beginning to evaluate their news sources.
Ask students to narrow it down to the 3 they want to evaluate in depth by the start of the second week, ask them to come to class with that list so you can simply check it off to make sure they have begun the process.
At least a few days before the testing day students should be given the rubric fo
On test day, the teacher should has several responsibilities:

Collect students’ annotated sources project
Explain that they have approximately 40 minutes to answer the short answer questions presented to them.
Make sure all students have a pen and have cleared their desk of everything else
Collect student work at the same time with one or two minutes remaining in class time.

Takaki ch 8- teaching through art

2007-10-21T21:43:00.001-07:00

One of the methods of teaching that I do not typically use and am less comfortable with is artistic. Some students however are not only good at art, but find it a great outlet for expressing both their passions and their knowledge. Art can be both fun and expressive at the same time. From a work of student art the teacher can also, I believe, get a very good sense for s student’s comprehension of the issues based on how extensive and analytical the art work is. So in order to teach Takaki chapter 8 “Searching for Gold Mountain,” I will have the students draw a mural in teams of 3 in order to express what they have learned about Chinese immigrants in America in the second half of the 19^th century. Below are some of the things that could prove valuable parts of a mural on Chinese life in America as discussed by Takaki:

their role as laborers
agricultural contributions and troubles (floods)
gold rush
mining/ miner taxes
building of the central pacific railroad
the dangerous nature of the work
formation of Chinese urban communities
anti-Chinese riots
angered white workers / unemployed
the Chinese Exclusion Act
Chinese fighting back against discrimination
The very small representation of Chinese women in America
Working as prostitutes
Building of Chinatowns
Underground associations
Chinese wives writing letters to their long removed husbands in America

Students will have the full period to work with the students in their group to decide which topics are most important and should be covered in their mural, how to visually represent, in a cohesive matter, the life and struggles of early Asian immigrants to the United States. Students will be practicing cooperative skills as well as learning artistically, and will not only benefit from their own projects but I think they will learn a whole lot from the work of their classmates as well!

Learning Process blog- update

2007-10-15T13:27:00.000-07:00

September 16, 2007

For my class on “Effective Instruction” we were assigned a reading on understanding white privilege. As I read through the article and the author listing her ideas of white privilege I found myself continually asking the same question…”is this really about race or is it about class or race AND class?” So I decided to test out my theory as I read. Next to each item she mentioned I wrote an “R” for race, a “C” for class or a “RC” for race and class. But after doing that for the rest of the first page I stopped myself and my theory had been refuted by the reading. It turned out that after that I point I was writing only an “R” for each item. It turns out she really was talking about privilege based on race and not class issues disguised as race issues. What I noticed here is that from prior experience I tend to be suspicious when anyone argues that there are a plethora of things that set us apart based on race because what I have so often found is that they are really talking about class and falsely equating black or Hispanic with poor. Because of this I have become (and I think in a positive way) concerned with dispelling simplistic logic when it comes to issues of race and class.

September 23, 2007

Today I did the reading from Takaki for class on Monday and I noticed a pattern as I went through and wrote my notes in the margin. The one thing that I seem to do (and I have noticed the same thing about how I think in life as well) is I very easily zoom out to capture the larger concept that the author is trying to get at. As I go through Takaki however this trend has accelerated greatly, in large part I think because I always have in the back of my mind “what can I teach from this chapter?” I think one of the most critically important parts of every lesson is providing students with the conceptual framework so they have the ability to transfer and use this knowledge to be better citizens in today’s world. Anyway, it was clear as I was taking notes that I was trying to fit each argument into a broader historical trend. Here are some of the many comments I wrote in the margins:

“he’s hiding behind state’s rights” (in reference to Andrew Jackson not protecting land treaties with the natives.
“ I could ask students, what do we owe to the Indians? Is there really any way to pay them back?” (in reference to a quote about Andrew Jackson being concerned about the welfare of the Indians).
“once again…a strategy to turn them against each other in order to secure white/ elite dominance.” (in reference to a quote about President Jackson trying to create divisions between the natives).
“compare to Israel/ Palestine…plenty of land available but not THAT land.” (in reference to “removal meant separation from a special and sacred place.”)
“the beginning of railroad tracks dividing the races.” (in reference to running rail lines through Indian territory led to a recomposition of race)
I think that my pattern of trying to fit arguments into broader conceptual schemes or historical trends is very helpful for me in learning because I clearly learn best when I have a reference. The only downside to this is that I obviously need to be aware of what may be false connections, or situations that seem analogous but the complexities make it clear that one must approach them each on their own merits and not simply by comparison. I think this will mostly be a helpful skill as a teacher however because I can use it to draw parallels that students might better understand and it gives me multiple avenues of trying to approach any given content. One additional approach to take this to the next level would be to try and teach history by conceptual units and common narratives as opposed to chronologically. This has been tried before by some teachers and I have read about both significant upsides and downsides.

September 29, 2007

Separate from my social studies learning that is being done for classes, I have decided to spend as much “free time” as I can trying to study up not just on my American history, but on alternative version of history. The goal is not only to bring myself back to the point where I have a basic understanding to communicate to my current and future students, but so that I can present them with as many perspectives as possible. As part of that effort I am reading Howard Zinn’s well-known “A People’s History of the United States.”

As I read through the first couple of chapters this week I noticed a trend about how I was approaching the process of dissecting his interpretations. As Prof. Lawrence’s professor once said, “history is all selectivity and narrative.” Based on that premise I take a very critical approach to any historical account. I ask myself “what are they leaving out?” and “what kind of history are they trying to show?” and so on. Because it is clear both from the introduction and from popular media accounts and reviews of this book that Howard Zinn definitely has an objective in mind when writing this history, despite agreeing with him most of the time, I have put myself in an even more critical than normal frame of mind. Questioning is always good, regardless of source; but what I have found is that I tend to more meticulously criticize those that largely agree with me. The point of reading about history is not to practice shaking my head up and down…so I try to question the motives, agenda, and reasoning process of those who agree with me ideologically even more strongly. But what is the process? How do I do this? First it is important to match up alternative histories to textbook histories and determine what is most valid about each interpretation. Can they be meshed together? Where do they contradict each other? What context do the evidence and anecdotes exist in? Anecdotes are great and I love to use them, but you must often take them with a grain of salt, because one story is not always representative of the time or setting it takes place in. As far as evidence, especially quotations used to back up the author’s argument, it is important to build context so I usually go digging (even if it’s just wikipedia) for some basic information about that time period and what was going on socially, culturally, etc… It’s easy to use quotes to build up any argument you want to make. If you want to make white people look like the bad guys (and most of the time they were), but you can selectively choose to paint a picture without defining the spectrum of what was considered progressive for the day.

Anyway…it was just a realization I came to as I was reading Zinn. Despite agreeing with his overall premise and historical assertions, I found myself questioning him more aggressively and through an effort to build context, learned much more about that history than if I just read Zinn.

October 9, 2007

I am doing this entry tonight because while attending my “Effective Instruction” class this evening I realized that I was doing what this journal is all about…catching myself in the process of learning. There is a student in our class named Jill who is deaf and a professor at Gallaudet University. She has actually taught me a lot over the course of this semester and opened up my eyes to some of the possibilities of working with special needs learners, but this time it wasn’t her teaching insights but rather just having her in the class to begin with. I have been doing this for weeks but I guess I just never thought about it until now. There are two interpreters in the class who come and sit in the middle of our horseshoe to interpret the class discussion for Jill. They rotate back and forth. I have been struggling, usually having them right next to me, not to watch them to much and rather focus on whoever is talking, or Jill herself if she is talking. I read the novel “Train Go Sorry” last semester for my special education class and it taught me a lot about working with the deaf, but one lesson was that you should look at them when they are speaking and not at their interpreters. It is definitely an issue of respect and dignity. So I have been trying hard to do that but also battling another urge…to learn sign language! So tonight I really just couldn’t help myself. I wanted to be respectful and watch Jill while she was speaking but while other members of the class were speaking I kept checking back in with the interpreters to see how they signed something. Any time an interesting word or phrase came up, I glanced back to check it out. What this taught me is that one of the ways that we learn is from the needs of peers. It reminds me of the kid who raises his hand and says “I have a stupid question, but…” and inevitably it isn’t a stupid question, they were just the only one with the nerve to raise their hand and ask it. In truth, half of the class probably was wondering the same thing, but didn’t learn it until someone else bothered to ask the question. One of the positives about having students with learning disorders or special needs in a “mainstream” classroom is that ALL students benefit from it. The tools and resources that are used in special education really could be used more often in other classrooms to the great advantage of all of the students. So many unique and helpful technologies have been developed for that purpose, but not much thought given (as far as I know) as to how they could be used in inclusion classes. On top of that there ought to be serious thought given to peer tutoring between learning disabled students and other students. Also classes specifically geared towards this kind of interaction should be constructed. Not only is it good for all students, but could really be empowering for the special needs students to show that they also have something to teach their peers.

October 12, 2007

Today I noticed that my learning process and teaching process have begun to merge in many ways. I was at Kramer books tonight and just browsing around when I came across a new book by political and constitutional expert Larry Sabato called “A More Perfect Constitution.” The book outlines 23 proposals for amendments to the U.S. Constitution. As I began to read through the intro’s to some of the chapters I realized I was seeing both ideas that I had heard before and ideas that I had not and that seemed very creative and intriguing to learn about. The first thought that came to my head though, was not “I can’t wait to read this book!.” Instead it was “I can’t wait to TEACH this book!” Immediately I began thinking of ideas for how I could use this interesting book in the classroom. I could have them debate his proposals, come up with new amendments themselves, and on and on. Anyway this is a quick blog entry but I thought it was worth noting that at the same time I was in the process of learning these new ideas, I couldn’t separate the teaching process.

Takaki Ch 7- Labor expoitation and unions!

2007-10-15T13:26:00.000-07:00

Takaki Chapter 7 Method

To teach about chapter 7 in Takaki I would focus on labor exploitation and unions. I would focus on this for two reasons. First, it is important part of the story of manifest destiny and exactly how America came to be what it is today, politically, economically, and culturally. Perhaps even more importantly learning about labor and unions is a good way to advance-scaffold their learning which is coming down the road. This chapter covers most of the second half of the 1800’s, and when you think of the labor movement, it really starts in the early 1900’s with the Pullman-Porter strikes, etc… So not only is this part of learning the lesson about the Mexican-American relations and manifest destiny, but it will prepare them for learning that is coming soon and give them a base of knowledge to work with.

The way that I want to teach them this lesson is using a “gateway activity” of one of my favorite movies of all time…the NEWSIES! This Disney classic really never gets old for me…even though I saw it for the first time in 5^th grade I believe. It’s a great way to teach kids about what unions are and their importance and also about scabs and how they have been used. So to preface it I will begin with a more didactic approach of covering the lead up to the Mexican-American war and the idea of manifest destiny. I will then have the class help me compile a list on the board of how the Anglos exploited Mexican labor and all of the means (besides slavery) that can be used as tools for labor exploitation (ex- stripping them of property, bringing in scabs to replace them while on strike, taking away their political power, etc…). Then I will ask the students for their thoughts on how workers, and the Mexicans in this case, could fight back against this injustice. This discussion will hopefully bring us to unions. I will then shut out the lights and show a couple scenes from the movie. After the movie clip I will transition back to the lesson of Takaki ch. 7 by talking about the mutualistas as an early example of the labor rights movement and also the importance of class and racial solidarity.

Takaki Ch 6 method- Irish and African immigrants

2007-10-08T13:40:00.000-07:00

What I would like to convey with my lesson about the 6^th chapter of Takaki is the difference in African and Irish immigrants, and how they became part of American society. The question I am driving at with the lesson is- Why were Irish immigrants eventually able to wield such greater influence than Africans even though they were treated similarly upon their arrival. What advantages did the Irish have? Was it all about race or were other factors more important?

I want students to get a real idea of how these two groups progressed differently as immigrants in this country, so I will divide the students in the class based on the proportion of African to Irish immigrants starting in the mid 19^th Century. Each student will represent 1 million immigrants and they will be either African or Irish. The students will be asked to stand in the front of the class with African immigrants on one side and Irish on the other. To demonstrate the differences in their progressions, I will highlight a few indicators so that students can visually see the discrepancies. Among the things I will compare:

1. Number of them who would have been slaves

2. How many would have been unionized

3. Skilled vs. unskilled labor

4. How many were able to vote

5. How many were women

6. How many attended college

7. How many settled in the cities/ how many settled in the country

I think that these visuals will give the students some idea of the vast differences in the two groups. From there I will bring the class together for a discussion on the following topics:

1. How did the elite/ ruling class/ whites keep the other races down by pitting them against each other?

2. Were there attempts to join together in common pursuit of economic fairness and justice?

3. Why couldn’t they organize effectively?

4. Was being white really enough for the Irish to overcome the stereotypes and oppression?

I would end the class by reviewing some of the 7 criteria above and showing students where the two groups stand today. Why do they think that is? Will it change?

Takaki CH 5 teaching method

2007-10-01T13:42:00.000-07:00

Working with Takaki Ch 5, I would have students do a text comparison by examining the views (through their writings) of both Frederick Douglas and Pati Delaney about what the right strategies were to pull blacks out of slavery. Did it have to be through the barrel of a gun, or was there a peaceful way to do it? Was economic power/ land ownership really the best way to power and rights, or do you think other rights could have led to equality?

In “Historical Thinking” they talk about building a context around the arguments of the time so that we aren’t engaged in “presentism.” I would use the quote from page 110 about pre-nuclear era thinking to show students what presentism WAS. From that, the first thing I would have the students do it build a social context around the writings. They can use the whole Takaki chapter and I would provide an additional couple of resources that give them an idea of lifestyle and the mindset of the time period. Based on that they would, in groups, work to build a social context for the reading by examining the following:

1. What were the far ends of the debate over these questions at the time? What were the extremes, what positions were more mainstream, and who held each position?

2. What cultural institutions put African Americans at a disadvanatage?

3. What, and who, prevented blacks from having equal access to education and other empowering resources?

4. What types of social relationships were acceptable, which were not?

5. How was the culture of mid 19^th century society different from today?

Then I would have them read excerpts of texts (letters, essays, etc…) of both Douglas and Delaney and do a comparison of their views WITHIN the context of the time period. Then the class would discuss as a whole:

Could freedom only be achieved at the barrel of a gun? Could power only be acquired through land ownership?

Curricular Unit Outline: Media Literacy

2007-09-24T13:01:00.000-07:00

Unit: The influence of the media on American political life.

Grade Level and Class: 12^th Grade- Principles of U.S. Government class

Unit Length: 10 days (2 school weeks)

2. It is absolutely critical that in the age of You Tube and Facebook, mainstream media and alternative media, that students be able to critically analyze and break down what they see and hear from media sources. This skill is known as media literacy. If students are to engage the democratic process and their voice is to be heard, they have to know how to navigate the complex world of American media. Without an understanding of the role of media in our society, its influences, and how the media can be used to manipulate and spin the truth, students can not make informed decisions as citizens in a our democracy. Far too often we have see the use of fear projected through the media that has paralyzed the judgment of our country. We can not allow young people to be manipulated, but must teach them the skills to be thoughtful and questioning citizens.

3. The topic of this unit will be the influence of the media on American Political Life. In the 12^th grade D.C.P.S. Content standards for Principle of U.S. Government, the broad concept standard 12.7 reads “Students evaluate and take and defend positions on the influence of media on American political life.” I believe that we can use all of the assigned standards here within this curricular unit.

a. The big ideas students should develop an enduring understanding of in this unit include: The meaning and importance of a free and responsible press in a democracy, How the media filters information for public consumption and limits your access to critical information necessary for making judgments as citizens in a democracy, Public officials and candidates manipulate the media but with the right skills you can decode these messages, and that American society and culture is influenced by the media and influences the media itself.

b. Students must know how to break down media stories, sift through the information and decipher what is important, what is being told, and maybe most importantly, what is not being told. Students must also know how they can, as citizen activists, influence how the media acts, through boycotts, exerting influence on advertisers with mainstream media, etc… Lastly, students need to know where they can look to get the most accurate and objective news information, and how to evaluate a media source. These core ideas will be learned by the students developing an understanding for the role of the media as a government watchdog in a democracy and their role as investigators. If students understand the role the media should play in a democracy, they can better interpret what is going wrong. Skills that will help include linguistic ability and strong vocabulary, ability to understand an interpret symbols (often used in advertising), ability to decode implications, inferences, and intentions.

c. We want students to discover how important it is that the media is responsible in how they choose what to cover and how to cover it. Should the media strive for balance OR objectivity? What is the difference between the two? How does the media use emotional appeals in order to achieve their objective? How do candidates do the same? How about drug companies (through advertising)? We want students to be familiar with arguments both for and against objective media. Students should also be aware of the principles and importance behind having a free press. Students should be able to identify arguments for and against whether media have an impact on people’s actions (like video games).

4. Essential Questions

A. What is the role of a free press in a democracy?

B. Do media outlets have a higher responsibility to the American people or their shareholders?

C. Does violence in the media lead to real life violence? Do people mimic what they see in popular culture?

D. How can the media be used to manipulate information and spin the truth?

E. What are some of the key differences between traditional media (TV, print, radio) and electronic media (the internet)?

F. Is the media bias? If so, towards whom?

5. Assessment

Students will be asked to make a political ad in groups. They are to pick one of the Presidential candidates (of any Party) and make a 30 second political advertisement that could be used on television and on You Tube. Students will be asked to upload their video to You Tube upon completion.

Students will also be asked to bring in, on the final day of the unit, an annotated list of their favorite and most reliable news sources. Students should annotate each source with why they believe that source contributes to their understanding of issues that matter to them, and how it helps them fulfill their role as a citizen.

The last means of assessment will be students taking a journal over the course of the second week of the class to track how many hours per day they use the following media: television, radio, print media (newspapers, magazines, journals), and the internet. The internet category will be broken down so they can track how often they use the following sites: YouTube, Facebook, any major news website (CNN, MSNBC, FOX, etc…).

a. It is important that we build on what students already know by starting the unit with gaining a basic understanding of what the different media are, the differences between them, their advantages and disadvantages. Then we can move on to the impact they have on our lives, which students can also draw from prior experience. Then we will step back and examine what is the role of media in democracy, before we lead into how does our modern media either succeed or fail in the role, and how can they be used and manipulated to influence public opinion?

b. The knowledge and skills will be most engaging if the students interact with the different media themselves, monitor how they already use them, and draw on their prior experience.

c. Students will be able to practice what they learn as part of the assessment to this unit but then, hopefully, in their day to day lives as well. This isn’t an issue that will ever go away, especially for young people. They make these choices, consciously or unconsciously every day, we can hope the result of the lesson will be that they are more conscious of these decisions and evaluations.

d. Surely in their Language Arts and English courses students will have and continue to learn how to evaluate language and symbolism, which is a key part of this unit.

e. Students will be engaged in a group project to use their new knowledge to make their own political commercial. Also, students will have opportunities, throughout this two week unit to discuss, in pairs, media that they have used in recent days and what they remember or took away from it. Perceptions on the whole will be important for students to learn that in fact their habits may be common or uncommon, but it will show them how media influences all of our lives.

7. For this curricular unit it would be difficult to pre-test students knowledge of the issue, but certainly we could pre-test their skills of analysis, synthesis, decoding symbolism, and other important skills. As we go through the instructor needs to be very aware, and keep track of how individual students begin to develop media literacy. Do they begin to ask more questions, think deeper, analyze more thoughtfully?

8. Neighborhood Resources

Any radio stations or TV networks that are located in the area could be of help to incorporate some sort of field trip or class speaker to come in. It would work well to have an editor come speak about the process, from start to finish, of deciding what to cover. Also students could ask these individuals how they balance their responsibility to be government watchdogs and investigators with the network pressure to go with more news that is more superficial, violent, sexual, etc…

Also if there are newspaper stands in the are this could help because students could pick up the newspaper each day, and hopefully develop that habit, and continue to do so in the future to practice media literacy. The Best Buy in the neighborhood would be helpful if students need to purchase any sort of electronics to help them put together their video or if I as the teacher need to get anything that would help the class as a whole. The video store could be helpful in terms of finding appropriate movie clips to play or maybe even if they have tapes of old news broadcasts.

9. Materials Needed:

· TV with both VHS and DVD player

· Computer and projector to play online clips in class

· Common Sense Media’s “Media Literacy” guide

· The Living Room Candidate website- with campaign commercials for every election back to 1952. http://livingroomcandidate.movingimage.us/

· Media Matters for America (the major progressive media watchdog group)

· Media Research Center (Right-wing media watchdog group)

· “What Liberal Media?” Book by Eric Alterman

· School Library/ Internet Access for students

· “News: The Politics of Illusion” Book by W. Lance Bennett

· Students will need access to internet, notebook paper, markers, pens.

Takaki Ch 4- Forcible Removal

2007-09-23T22:04:00.000-07:00

The 4th Chapter of "A Different Mirror" provided some really great material for engaging students while teaching about the how early American leaders handled the "Native American problem." One of the most apt analogies I continued to think of as I read through was the Israeli/Palestinian conflict, but that's only the beginning.

My lesson would focus on the forcible removal of the Native Americans from the land that was rightfully theirs, and what strategies were employed to move them off of their lands and force them into reservations, out of the way of the "beloved white" country as Ben Franklin hoped for. To start my lesson on this chapter I would put a series of statements on the board that begin with "they were...." and then have many descriptions such as "given monetary compensation in order to evacuate their own land", "forced into small communities that were segregated from the ruling race", "moved to make way for economic development of the elites", "forced to evacuate their land despite the economic contributions they were and could have continued to make to their country." Students would then be asked who they thought these statements applied to? Because of the reading and the unit we are on, students should logically guess Native Americans. But then I will write the following things on the board: Native Americans, Palestinians in Israeli territory, Jews during WWII, immigrants in American cities today. I will then explain how many of these statements actually apply to all of these groups. I think these parallels would allow students to better understand what was done to the Native Americans as a historical pattern and not an isolated event in American history.

In the lesson I will follow this up with a more specific case study of two comparisons- immigrants today and the Israeli/Palestinian conflict. I will discuss the different strategies that have been used with these 4 groups (Native Americans, immigrants in America today, Israelis and Palestinians) to separate them, to make way for economic development, to "homogenize" society, etc...

Also I think it is important to discuss a few other things within this lesson/ unit. The concept that land can not be substituted, that Native Americans had a connection to their land just like Jews, Muslims, and Christians all have a connection to Jerusalem. It is not sufficient to offer them other land that is not rich in their own tradition and history. We will also talk about a common theme in Takaki so far, how the elites have once again tried to turn the minority against each other so that they didn't unite against the elite.

I think this could make a very interesting and engaging lesson but could also be expanded to a larger unit.

Takaki Ch 3

2007-09-17T12:14:00.000-07:00

It turns out that before the slavery that we all commonly study in our history classes, slavery in the United States has not always been tied to race. In fact for a long time, as Takaki explains in Chapter 3, it was tied to religion. I think that students would be very surprised to hear about the Irish slave trade, and more specifically, the differences and similarities between European and African slaves in the early days in the colonies. To teach this, I think it would be effective to have students re-read with this in mind. What was different about the lifestyle of European and African slaves? Students will go back through the first 10 pages of Chapter 3 and in one color, highlight all of the statements that pertain only to European servants and slaves, then all of the important statements that pertain to only African servants and slaves in another color, and finally in a third color, highlight all of the important statements that pertained to the lifestyle and treatment of both European and African servants and slaves. I would then have the students break up into groups in and discuss the different things they highlighted for the three groupings, and then come to a consensus as a group. We would then, as a class, make a large venn-diagram (Europeans on one side, Africans on the other, and the commonalities in the middle). I think this would provide the students with an interesting look at how slavery started in this country and how it became a racist institution through a progression of events in the early years, which is documented well by Takaki. This is using to some extent the learning process of Aaron Barnett when it comes to separating the reading by topics and then understanding each before you move on.

Learning Processes #1

2007-09-10T13:46:00.001-07:00

This past Wednesday I observed that one of the ways that you sometime pick up information is through collaboration, even if it means collaboration with your 8^th grade students. On my first day of practicum in U.S. History class the students were handed back their world maps from the teacher where they had to color in each country depending on which continent it was in. For the most parts the students got everything right, but when it came to islands…that was a trouble point. You can’t blame the students. It’s hard to tell whether Bali is part of Asia or Australia and whether Cuba should be put under North America or South America or whether Iceland is part of North America or Europe. Anyway, I did happen to know almost all of the answers because I LOVE maps, and have studied them a lot, and done a fair amount of traveling. However, a few really threw me off, especially islands in the Indian or Pacific Oceans. I didn’t even know whether Cuba should be labeled North or South America…and I STUDIED in CUBA. Actually, I was fairly sure it should be South America, since Central America or the Caribbean were not options, and it is a Hispanic island. But not according to their textbook, which labels it is as North America. I learned a lot during this lesson, but especially that one of the ways we learn is to work together, to contest conclusions and to come to final answers as a group, even when there is dispute, we are learning in the process. The students and I may not have a final answer on whether Cuba is in North or South America, but they now know that the island is Hispanic, they speak Spanish, it is in the Caribbean, and some other facts I shared. It was a fun learning experience for me, especially with a diverse class who could all provide some valuable input.

Takaki Chapters 1-2

2007-09-10T13:45:00.000-07:00

In the introduction to “A Different Mirror,” Takaki does a good job of explaining the expanding multiculturalism in the United States, our changing demographics, and the reaction by many Americans. The “this will ruin our moral fabric” argument that is now being made by people like E.D. Hirsch and Pat Buchanan is the same argument made by many, in times of great immigration in our history, that as we become more diverse, it will weaken our unity. Instead, the opposite has proven true. “E Pluribus Unum,” or “Out of many, one,” has accurately reflected how our nation has grown stronger through diversity and multiculturalism. Takaki also takes some time to compare various immigrant groups and how they have been dealt with as they have become part of the American fabric. He is wise to point out how we have often in the past pitted different ethnic and racial groups against each other, in order to, in effect, keep all of them down beneath the “ruling elite.” It is clear that history is written by the victors, but that we must take a look at other views of history, especially those of the victim, and minorities.

Chapter two of Takaki is a depressing but accurate view of how many of our founders viewed Native Americans, and how they dealt with trying to clear the way for the Europeans to set up their own communities, often in the same place that the Indians were living. It was common for the “settlers” to view the Indians as “savages,” and “barbarous.” They were viewed as animals, unable to control their savage instincts. Takaki, by exploring the views and writings of many people that Americans are taught to admire, exposes their hideous and hypocritical view concerning America and the rights of Native Americans.

Here is the way I would choose to teach this. I would start the class by putting some names on the board. Among them might be Thomas Jefferson, Sir Thomas Moore, John Winthrop, and Captain John Smith. I would then ask students to write down anything they already new about these 4 people. When they finished I would write down everything on the board. “President of the Untied States” and “founding father” for Jefferson, “City upon a hill” for Winthrop, etc, etc…. After this I would ask for students general views on these early Americans. Then I would write on the board next to these names 4 quotes. I would use Takaki’s material, like Jefferson’s quotes such as “nothing will reduce those wretches so soon as pushing the war into the heart of their country,” and John Winthrop’s quote about God “making room” for the colonists by wiping out the Indians with smallpox.

After giving them a chance to digest these quotes (without their authors), I would ask them who they thought would say things like this, and then match up the names on the other side of the board with these quotes. That would then lead me into a lesson on how the founders approached the “Native American problem.”

Welcome and Introduction!

2007-08-28T21:54:00.000-07:00

Hello to all of my friends in Social Studies Methods and everyone else (all 2 of you who may read this)...my grand plan is to use this for not just this class in particular but in general for all of my thoughts on education and my journey toward becoming a teacher so maybe I can expand the readership a little as time goes on. A few things about myself that will let you all know where I am coming from before I jump into posting my thoughts on education.

A little background...I am from Marlton, NJ originally, was brought up in some very good public schools with some amazing classes and educational options. I completed by Bachelor's in International Affairs with a minor in Spanish at American Univ. last May and am pursuing my Masters in Secondary Education/ Social Studies currently. It may seem like I made a drastic change in fields, but I see it as a natural extension of my interests. Let me explain...My mission is to bring about change. Change in this country, change in this world, change in my community. There are a couple ways to do that. You can work through politics and activism to bring about social change that will help thousands of people at a time, or you can work to bring about change one person at a time (through direct action, by being a parent, by being a doctor, by being a teacher, etc...) I have been active in politics since I was 7...volunteering with my mom, licking envelopes for Bill Clinton's re-election campaign. At 14 I wrote a book about the impact of the 2000 election on young people, and in 2003 I had a life-changing experience. I began to volunteer for Howard Dean's presidential campaign...and I felt an amazing thing....empowerment. He convinced me (and millions of others) that the power to change this country really was in our hands, that we had the power. I believed it... and it was, and still is true. The campaign failed, but not the idea behind it. Each and every one of us does have the power to change our world, our country, and our community. Public Service is a noble calling, and teaching is one of the most noble public service professions there is.

What I care about is empowerment. It's what I've dedicated my life to. I saw kids in my high school that had SO much potential, so much to give...but no one told them the amazing things they could do with that talent. So many people that have confined themselves to a life they don't find fulfilling, to work they don't feel passionate about. For me...it only took a little push to empower me to do the things I've always had the capacity for. Just a little push. Just the opening of the window. I want to provide that little push, that little inspiration, that enables the young people that I will encounter in the classroom, to live a life of fulfillment. I want to help young people realize the potential that they all DO HAVE to have a dramatic effect on the world around them, to make their own lives, and the lives of everyone around them better.

The world can't run without both types of activism. We will never solve the tragedy of 37 million people who live in poverty in the United States without a POLITICAL solution, policy changes that help millions at a time...yet the homeless man on the street can't wait around for political leadership, he needs food now, he needs shelter now. Helping on a social scale and a direct scale are equally important ventures. I will never lose the desire to do both. To engage young people in the political process, and the Democratic Party, I currently run my own political non-profit called the Democratic Youth Strategy Council (www.democraticyouth.org). And to help on a direct level, I am choosing teaching as a career. I hope to eventually teach government, civics, world affairs, and other subjects at the high school level.

Every single young person that we as educators can engage is a step towards the kind of progress that will lead our communities, and our country, toward a better future. Every student we can empower, we are touching the lives of so many unseen. In every statement I write here, in every theory I propose, in every observation I note, in every assertion I make here...that is always the mission in the back of my head.