Don’t Drink and Drive: Assessing the Effectiveness of Anti-Drinking Campaigns - Lesson
In this lesson, students explore a variety of anti-drinking and alcohol awareness campaigns in order to determine their effectiveness. Students will deconstruct the different approaches that have been used by various organizations to reach teens and young adults and will debate those techniques that are most likely to resonate with youth. In a summative activity, groups of students create and implement an alcohol awareness campaign for students.
Kids, Alcohol and Advertising - Lesson 2: Young Drinkers
In this lesson, students learn why the alcohol industry needs replacement (new) drinkers and how it exploits the needs and desires of young people in order to foster brand loyalty.
Screen-Free Week
Screen-Free Week is an annual event that traditionally takes place in May. Each year people from around the world make a conscious decision to turn off screens of all kinds for the week.
Excessive Internet Use - Overview
We don’t always hear the clock ticking when we’re online, and young people are no exception. Between doing research for homework, talking with friends, updating social media and playing games, it’s easy to see how kids and teens might lose track of time.
Responding to Excessive Use
Time spent using devices is one of parents’ top concerns when it comes to their kids’ digital lives – and is the number one source of conflict between parents and children relating to technology use. It’s tempting for parents to act authoritatively and lay down the law on the number of hours their kids can spend on the computer, but in order to effectively address excessive use, there needs to be an active, voluntary commitment on the part of the young person to control their behaviour. Otherwise, kids will just find ways to work around their parents and be left to their own devices once they’re old enough to leave the house.
2SLGBTQ+ Representation in Other Media
2SLGBTQ+ people have been involved in producing their own media for as long as alternative media has existed, but with the advent of the electronic age and cheaper and more accessible electronic devices for production, there has been an explosion of 2SLGBTQ+-produced media of all kinds. The following section explores the ways that 2SLGBTQ+ people have sought to claim space for themselves within media and culture.
Where no Eagles soar
This winter the Olympics return to Canada for the first time since the Calgary games of 1988. For many people, the most vivid memories of that Olympiad are the colourful stories of some of the less accomplished athletes, such as British ski jumper Michael “Eddie the Eagle” Edwards and the members of the Jamaican bobsled team. It's unlikely, though, that there will be any charming underdogs in this year's Olympiad, as the games become more and more the province of professionals. As audiences and advertising revenues drop, however, will the professionalization of the Games spell their downfall?
Balancing your family’s media consumption over the summer
Summer can feel very long sometimes. Heck, I’ve been there. I clearly remember the days when the kids seemed crazier than a pack of wild squirrels, leaving piles of household detritus in their wake while I followed them helplessly, longing for a hot cup of coffee and five minutes in the bathroom without someone knocking on the door.
Upcoming events
The Association to Reduce Alcohol Promotion in Ontario is accepting submissions for the ARAPO Recognition Award until Friday, February 29th. (Yes, it's a leap year.) In the words of their Guiding Statement, the award is for “recognition of individuals (e.g. journalist, teacher, student etc.) or organizations (e.g. schools, businesses) that have made, and continue to make, outstanding efforts to reduce the effect of alcohol promotion in Ontario.” Nominations must be made jointly in writing by two or more members of the community, following a format you can find here.