Rationale

Final Project Rationale

Technology and media are interwoven and inescapable aspects of our modern lives. The media not only inform and entertain us, but they also surround us and influence us in both blatant and subtle ways. Technology has become not only a vehicle for the transmission of media, but also a way for us to interact with it, customize it, create it, and share it with our families, friends, and the world. Therefore, as future educators, it is necessary that we equip our students with the skills they need to negotiate the technology and media of today, as well as the inevitable advancements of tomorrow.

For the final project, our group chose to create lessons that would focus on a multifaceted analysis of how information is presented through photojournalism. Our daily lives are increasingly inundated with images, and, whether we consciously acknowledge it or not, we are constantly making associations, connections, and conclusions based on the information presented in those images (Cortes). It is clear that the media teach, and in the case of news material, the media teach us about the world and our role in it. For that reason, it is crucial for students to understand the tools and operations of the news media so that they can evaluate the reliability of presentation of current events. The issue of information reliability could not be more important in any arena than that of news media, especially in this climate of polarized political news reporting, increased multi-media broadcasting, and decreased reading of traditional newspapers.

Because much of the metalanguage used to describe still images is transferable to film and television (Golden), the lessons in this unit utilize the still image as a teaching tool to expose students to this metalanguage and prepare a knowledge base that can be built on in more and more sophisticated analyses of various media forms. Furthermore, because today’s students comprise a generation raised in a digital world, our lessons draw on students’ technological savoir-faire through activities that use technology as a tool for meaningful learning and student engagement. All of the activities and assessments are carefully linked with lesson purposes, so that student learning and evaluation coalesce into an intentional, reflective, and constructive process.

Lesson One addresses how the news media present information through formal elements, such as focus, angle, framing, and composition. Students are introduced to these terms through overt instruction involving a Power Point slide show. Student attention is called to the way that formal elements manipulate viewer perception and response, and this awareness of conscious manipulation allows students to realize the photographer’s purpose, audience, and ethical motivation. Recognizing the human agency behind media creation and possessing the language required to discuss the means of creation are the first steps towards evaluating media reliability.

During the second part of Lesson One, students are given agency in manipulating media through an activity that allows them to “frame” images differently to create different impressions. This activity uses experiential learning as situated practice in a way that would reinforce the concepts presented in the lesson while empowering students through exercise of their new skills. Students then have an opportunity to “publish” their analyses and responses to this activity on the class Wiki. By formally reflecting their thoughts in writing, students are prompted to construct a metacognitive (and eventually critical) awareness of media constructs. The use of the Wiki extends their agency to the Internet community.

Armed with their newly acquired metalanguage, students advance to analyze photojournalism images even further in Lesson Two. News images in particular call on our cultural pools of knowledge and orientations to certain events and symbols, and so a “close reading” of the connotation and denotation of news images uncovers layers upon layers of cultural information and societal values. Often, such emotionally charged images as those of soldiers or environmental disasters (as used in Lesson Two) evoke complex responses and associations in the viewer. This lesson scaffolds students in deconstructing these layers of meaning and calls awareness to the intention of the photographer in conjuring certain associations. Students are to be constantly reminded of the human being behind the lens, and of the impossibility of unbiased //mediated// information.

The lesson also employs technology in situated practice through the use of VoiceThread. Students will use this application as a venue for critical oral commentary. Not only does the VoiceThread discussion forum provide for a literacy event among students, it also ensures that students practice intentional and self-regulated speaking and listening. The lessons in this unit activate all of the language arts (listening, speaking, reading (viewing), writing, and thinking) in a variety of activities and applications. Students practice literacy skills in contexts that appeal to many learning styles and that encourage collaboration and negotiation among peers. The lessons of this unit are constructed with these goals because of our belief that the educational experience should culminate in a civic literacy and a communal responsibility to participatory democracy.

Finally, even in addressing the contemporary and techno-centric issue of media literacy, the value of literature should never be lost in the English classroom, or in society as a whole. Our brains are structured to understand our lives through stories, and this is even transferrable to visual “texts” through the adage, “Every picture tells a story.” Therefore, in the final lesson of this series, students apply what they have learned about photojournalism to a short story. They become the journalists themselves, and “report” on the events of the narrative through both writing and image. The envisionment process of choosing and constructing images invites readers to step into the “story world,” and is especially helpful for students that struggle with fiction and “horizons of possibility” (Langer). Students must consider their “news audience” in selecting the feature scenes from the story, and they must consciously distinguish between narrative and “reporting” registers of discourse. They have a chance to contemplate how other students might have chosen to depict events differently, and this reinforces their understanding of the agency and responsibility of the news reporter. In their reflection papers, students articulate what they have learned about how images communicate information, as well as how they contribute to our perception of news and events. Most importantly, students are reminded that there is always a human story behind the news, and this will deepen their understandings of the many ways (pictures, poems, narratives, etc.) that we tell the stories of human existence.

The lessons in this unit embody the theories, philosophies, strategies, and standards that we have cultivated as future educators through the English ProTeach program. They demonstrate our practical understanding of what is realistically feasible in a classroom, while showing our ambition to stretch our students’ capabilities to encompass greater and greater learning possibilities. We are grounded in a fundamental value of language and literature, and still we strive to adapt to evolving literacy needs in order to prepare students for the ever-changing world. Most importantly, we are committed to our individual students, to our peers, and to the integrity of our profession. May these commitments guide us to fulfillment in a life of teaching and learning!