Well, I guess you could say Miss Honey is back. It's the last day before break, and it's raining instead of snowing. Over the weekend I had a glass of wine, some Ethiopian food, and even a few bites of ice cream. I can no longer blame the weather or my lack of sugar and alcohol for my problems, so I guess it's time to put on my cheerful face. My job as a teacher is complex because my curriculum and content are always shifting. Yes, we read Of Mice and Men in English 2 every year, but I'm also constantly thinking about how to engage my students with the world around them, how to create lessons and experiences that will benefit them beyond the walls of my classroom. I wrote last week about the proliferation of fake news in our world today, and today I'm bringing awareness of that problem to my students. I've been using Kelly Gallagher's Article of the Week in my English 2 class this year. The students are generally grumpy about this because in this one weekly assignment they are required to read analytically, think critically, and write responsively. It's hard work, but it's necessary work that will hopefully engage them with relevant and timely topics as well as improve their reading, writing, and thinking skills. So far this year we've read about Colin Kaepernick, the billionaire space race, and the new war on cancer, to name a few. Today's assigned article is about Facebook's response to fake news. We'll discuss this in depth next week, and hopefully my students will be encouraged to look at the world around them a bit more critically. (Hopefully they will not be inspired to move to Macadonia and start their own fake news empire.) Additionally, we'll conquer the topic in my communications class. Each week these students participate in a "Freaky Friday" discussion (Okay, so it's not Friday, but we'll be flexible because it's the day before a break.) I give them a task or a topic, and I set them in small groups to practice their communication skills. Sometimes they are discussing a current event. Sometimes they are working together to improve outlines for a public presentation. Sometimes they are collaborating on a summary of a TED Talk. At the end of each discussion they must reflect on their role as a communicator. (Did I listen well? Did I ask relevant questions? Did I participate without dominating?) Today we're digging into fake news. We're going to watch a news clip from CNN, read some articles, and then discuss together the impact of this fake news on the world around us. My goal nearly always is awareness. I'm amazed every week at the things I mistakenly assume my students already know. Many don't know how to properly greet a teacher in an email, 99% didn't know the definition of "omniscient," and while many do know they need to capitalize proper nouns, that doesn't mean they always follow the rule. So I certainly can't expect them to know that fake news stories are lurking around every corner. I want to do my part to raise the next generation of informed voters, so today this is the work I do.
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Today I learned that Oxford Dictionaries selected “post-truth” as their international word of the year. Post-truth: “relating to or denoting circumstances in which objective facts are less influential in shaping public opinion than appeals to emotion and personal belief.” In other words, the truth is no longer relevant. I could’ve told you that. I blogged a few weeks ago about my attempt to push students to choose unbiased sources. The very next week a student from that class handed in a paper. At the bottom, right after his list of biased sources, he wrote, “There really isn’t such a thing as an unbiased source anymore. I can find truth on these websites, too.” Apparently, truth is subjective. I always knew that beauty was in the eye of the beholder, but now truth is, too? Just today I read that many Trump supporters planned to boycott Pepsi over fictional remarks made by the company’s CEO. Where did they get this misinformation? From a biased source, created just to trick people. Many of these sites are run by teenagers in Macedonia. You might think that part is made up, but really, it’s not. These savvy teens make fake websites with catchy political-sounding names, and then they make up crazy-yet-believable stories that get clicks from users on Facebook. That’s our world. Teenagers in Macedonia make up fake news stories that influence voters. And also my students. So what is my role as an educator in this world? I need to help my students re-engage with objective facts through relevant reading and lessons on bias. I also obviously need to teach them empathy. We also need to get started in preparations for the Smarter Balanced assessment next year. And by the way, the only student in my English 2 classroom yesterday who knew what the word “omniscient” means was Albert, the foreign exchange student from Spain. If you’re my Facebook friend you might know that my husband and I recently just finished the #Whole30Challenge. That means we went 30 days without any added sugars, dairy, grains, and legumes. Oh, and no alcohol. (Yes, we survived the election without alcohol.) However, our 30 days are up, so I might just have to raise a glass soon to “post-truth” and this crazy world we now live in. Or at least I'll raise a glass to John Keats and his "Grecian Urn." That's a Truth I can stand behind. It will come as no huge surprise that our country's political climate has edged its way into my classroom. I've written before about the strict ideological views held by my students, and more recently I've been seeing it play out in their use of biased news sources in argumentative writing. After I read the sixth essay on the same topic using the same one-sided sources, I knew it was time to address the issue. Like many issues in my classroom, this was my fault. I had assumed my students (juniors and seniors in an upper-level writing class) knew the importance of using unbiased sources. I told them on the front end, "Don't use biased sources," but then after the fact I began to see that they truly didn't know the difference. (This is clearly being added to my curriculum for semesters to come.) However, I knew lecturing wouldn't help. I needed a way to help them visualize this issue. I did some quick research and came across an activity from this website. I divided students into two groups and gave each group a short fictional news article to read about a fellow named Sir Sam. In their groups they were directed to read the article and then create a list of at least six adjectives to describe Sam. I had each group come to the board and share the list. As you can see, each group's list was quite different, and in some cases their chosen words were exact opposites. (This was an accidental miracle.)
Next I asked one student from each group to give a quick recap of what happened in the article without focusing on the characteristics of Sam. Each group reported the same story: Sir Sam was fired. However, one article painted him in a flattering way, while the other...not so much. We then moved into a discussion of bias in the media. We talked about how using one-sided sources destroys our credibility as writers. I admitted my own weaknesses in this area. I like reading articles that support my worldview; I feel challenged when I don't. But in the end, my viewpoint is strengthened when I consider the whole picture. Finally I introduced students to some websites that will help them determine the bias in the sources they are considering. This lesson wasn't earth-shaking, and it did disrupt my previous plans. However, it was necessary. Now if only our country could take this lesson to heart. |
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September 2020
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