Resources for Teachers - Finding and verifying information

Recognizing Emotional Appeals

This is the third lesson in the Critical Thinking Across the Curriculum series, though it can also be delivered independently. In it, students learn how we can be persuaded by emotional appeals as well as by arguments. After identifying emotionally charged words, they find them in an article and analyze their persuasive effect. Students study a public service announcement to examine how images and story can be emotionally persuasive, then watch a pair of videos to compare how they use emotional persuasion. They then conduct a red teaming exercise to identify the possible risks or drawbacks of using emotional appeals and ways of mitigating those. Finally, they create their own persuasive work using emotionally charged languages, images and music.

Break the Fake: Printable posters and bookmarks

They are designed to accompany a full suite of Break the Fake resources including a workshop, tip sheets,

From Ethics and Empathy to Making and Remixing: Extending Digital Literacy to the Secondary Grades

For more than a decade, MediaSmarts has been a leader in defining digital literacy in Canada. This is reflected in the elementary digital literacy framework we launched in 2015. The Use, Understand & Create framework is based on a holistic approach which recognizes that the different skills that make up digital literacy cannot be fully separated. 

Break the Fake: Make Your Own Custom Search Engine

To make a custom search engine you will need to be logged in to a Google account. (If you don’t already have one, go to accounts.google.com to sign up.)  You don’t have to be logged in to Google to use it. As well, anyone can use a custom search engine once it’s been created, so a whole class can use search engines made with a single account.

Break the Fake Tip #3: Verify the source

Whether you’re looking at a website, photo, video or news story, what really matters is whether or not the people who originally created it are trustworthy. Even when it has been shared with you by someone you trust, like a friend or family member, you can’t know if they checked the facts. So it’s up to you!