Teaching Media: Media Techniques
In this lesson, students learn how different media use different techniques to communicate meaning.
In this lesson, students learn how different media use different techniques to communicate meaning.
This lesson series contains discussion topics and extension activities for teachers to integrate the TVOKids Original series Wacky Media Songs. This lesson focuses on enabling students to make media and use existing content for their own purposes.
In this lesson, students talk about dressing up and taking on identities that are similar to or different from them. They are then introduced to the idea of avatars as a kind of “dressing up” inside video games and consider the ways in which the technical, generic and aesthetic limitations on avatar creation and customization affect their choices and their ability to represent themselves online.
This lesson familiarizes children with how and why “junk food” is advertised to kids. The lesson starts with an introduction to advertising and a discussion of the gimmicks involved in food advertising to kids. Students discuss the various foods they see advertised in their daily lives versus the ones they don’t see, drawing important points from this data. With this information in mind, students complete an advertising log and also choose an advertisement and analyzing its subject matter in relation to what they have just learned.
In this lesson, students use mind maps to explore concepts of “respect” and “consent” in an online context. They consider a wide range of scenarios that shed light on different aspects of consent relating to digital media and draw on those to create a detailed definition. Finally, students create an “explainer” video in which they illustrate one of the aspects of consent.
In this lesson students are introduced to the concept of "avatars" and share their experiences creating and playing avatars in video games and virtual worlds. They then create avatars using a program that is intentionally limited in terms of available body types and gender markers, first creating an avatar of their own gender and then of the opposite gender, and then discuss the program and relate it to representations of gender and body image in games and virtual worlds and in other media. Students then create avatars using a much more flexible version of the program and compare that experience to the more limited version. Finally, students use the more versatile program to create avatars that represent how they see themselves and how they would like others to see them online and reflect on the choices that went into creating them.
In this lesson, students learn about media as a source of information, and how this information is presented from a particular point of view.
In this lesson, students are introduced to the ways video games may impact their mental and physical health. Students start with a reflection on their use of video games, specifically the amount of time they play and the role of games in their lives. This is followed by a class activity based on several key questions relating to the positive and/or negative effects video games may have on our health. Finally, students will be given an opportunity to debate key claims on the health effects of video games.
In this lesson, students learn how media influence how we see the world and send intentional and unintentional messages.
In this lesson, students explore the ways in which the media frame is used to tell stories.