Digital Outreach for Community Engagement Lesson Plan

Digital Citizenship
Internet & Mobile
Media Production

Level: Grades 9 to 12

About the Author: Jessie Curell for MediaSmarts

Duration: 2 hours

This lesson is part of USE, UNDERSTAND & CREATE: A Digital Literacy Framework for Canadian Schools.

Overview

This lesson asks students, in groups, to take their issue and solution to the streets. In order to enact real change through action for the benefit of the larger community, each chosen topic will need to be exposed to and understood by other members of the community. In this lesson, students will design a community outreach promotional campaign in order to effect real change that matters to them. If the students have completed the Digital Storytelling for Community Engagement lesson and have created their own Digital Story, this digital project can be used as the starting point/product with which to share with others. If not, groups of students can create a hypothetical solution to an existing problem, which then could be disseminated to the larger community using their designed outreach strategy.

This lesson is designed as part of a three-part series Creating Digital Content for Community Engagement:

However, each is also designed to be delivered as a standalone lesson and any two of the lessons can be taught together without the third.

Learning Outcomes

Students will:

  • engage with a local or national issue as a group and learn how to disseminate information to the larger public
  • using the Community Engagement Activity handout as a starting point, design an outreach campaign using clear goals, a “Call to Action” and a variety of both on and offline methods
  • learn how to evaluate effectiveness and efficiency of outreach methods and how to adjust accordingly

This lesson and all associated documents (handouts, overheads, backgrounders) is available in an easy-print, pdf kit version.

Lesson Kit