Co-Co's AdverSmarts
This interactive unit is designed to help kids between the ages of 5 and 8 recognize the marketing techniques used on commercial websites that target children.
Ads That Don’t Look Like Ads
Level: Grades 5-9
Duration: 1 ½ to 2 hours, plus time for the assessment activity
About the author: Matthew Johnson, Director of Education, MediaSmarts
This lesson plan is part of the Close Reading Media Across the Curriculum program. Funding provided by the Government of Ontario.
TV Dads: Immature and Irresponsible? - Lesson
In this lesson, students explore the nature of stereotypes by looking at the negative image of the TV dad as presented in situation comedies (sitcoms) and advertisements.
Sex in Advertising - Lesson
To introduce students to the use and prevalence of sexuality in advertising.
Online Marketing to Kids: Protecting Your Privacy
This lesson introduces students to the ways in which commercial apps and websites collect personal information from kids and to the issues surrounding children and privacy on the Internet. Students begin by considering how comfortable they would be with people knowing various things about them, and then watch and discuss a video which explains how targeted advertising works. They then explore the idea of targeted advertising through a class exercise in which Prince Charming tries to target Cinderella with an ad for glass slippers, and then analyze how their own personal information might be used to target them with ads. In the second part of the lesson, students are introduced to privacy policies and how they are rated by the website Terms of Service, Didn’t Read. They read and analyze the site’s rating for a popular app and then learn ways to limit data collection. In an extension activity, students are introduced to the idea of “dark patterns” and imagine how the Wicked Queen might use them to convince Snow White to accept “poison” cookies.