Colerain Mack

December 12, 2016

Title: Analyzing Social Issues Through Social Media

Unit: Social Media Topic: The Role of Social Media in Societal Issues
Student Levels: 9th-10th grade

Topic Description: Relying on students interest and understanding of social media, this
topic aims to bridge learning from personal knowledge to academic knowledge of
societal issues that affect the students and their communities. In this lesson plan, students
will have the opportunity to expand their understanding of social media tools and apply
them in an academic context to better understand how social media impacts and portrays
societal issues, and how students can effectively navigate the ongoing stream of videos,
articles, blogs, and opinions that flow steadily through social media outlets.

Student Description
All students enrolled in this course are identified as English Language Learners
(ELLs), or students whose native language is not English. While some were born in the
United States, others are recently arrived immigrants and refugees. Students are a mix of
9th and 10th graders with varying educational experiences (some have been enrolled since
Kindergarten, while others only have a 4th grade education, and some refugee students
only have informal schooling experiences available at refugee camps). Student
nationalities include Cuban, Karenni, Guatemalan, Mexican, and Sudanese. According to
the WIDA (World-class Instructional Design and Assessment) performance standards,
students at the developing level of English language proficiency will process, understand,
produce or use:
general and some specific language of the content areas
expanded sentences in oral interaction or written paragraphs
oral or written language with phonological, syntactic or semantic errors that
may impede the communication, but retain much of its meaning, when
presented with oral or written, narrative or expository descriptions with
sensory, graphic or interactive support

Because of the diversity in educational experiences, students benefit from a

variety of learning approaches. This class incorporates a large amount of group work to
provide students many opportunities to communicate, however several students clearly
prefer independent work so this approach is also incorporated into lesson and activity
design. In order to accommodate many backgrounds and learning styles, students often
have the option to demonstrate their knowledge and learning through a variety of projects
instead of merely relying on paper and pencil examinations.
Learners are generally motivated and willing to participate in class, although there
are some distinct learner differences between students whose English language
proficiency is somewhat more advanced than that of their peers. Students meet every
other day for 60-minute class periods.
Objectives and Outcomes
1. Students will be able to analyze how media impacts the way we think and act, and
to offer suggestions for how they can overcome these issues on an individual level
in short sentences using basic vocabulary.
2. Students will be able to explain how social media platforms impact societal issues
(i.e. how social media brings attention to issues, how social media resolves or
creates more problems, etc.).
3. Students will be able to analyze political cartoons regarding the 2016 election in
small group presentations.
4. Students will be able to respond to a blog post about the role of social media in
the Black Lives Matter movementspecifically discuss police shootings of
unarmed Black men and the roles technology and social media have played in
national discussions of this issue.
5. Students will be able to describe the role of social media in the portrayal of social
issues in a class discussion using examples they have found on their own and
prepared to share with their peers in an informal dialogue.

Utah Core English Language Proficiency Standards (Grades 9-12)

Standard 2: The language of Language Arts
Summative FrameworkWriting: Literal and figurative language
Students at the developing level: use examples of literal and
figurative language in context from illustration or cartoons and
word/phrase banks.
Standard 5: The language of Social Studies
Formative FrameworkSpeaking: Social issues and inequities
Students at the developing level: give examples or descriptions of
social issues or inequities depicted in illustrations or political
cartoons.

Utah Core Educational Technology Standards (Grades 9-12)

Standard 3 (Category 2: Social, ethical, and human issues):
Students analyze advantages and disadvantages of widespread use and
reliance on technology in the workplace and in society as a whole.

Standard 7 (Category 4: Technology communication tools; Category 5:

Technology research tools; Category 6: Technology problem-solving and
decision-making tools):
Students routinely and efficiently use online information resources to meet
needs for collaboration, research, publications, communications, and
productivity.

International Society for Technology in Education Standards:

Standard 1: Empowered Learner
1c: Students use technology to seek feedback that informs and improves
 their practice and to demonstrate their learning in a variety of ways.
Standard 6: Creative Communicator
6a: Students choose the appropriate platforms and tools for meeting the
desired objectives of their creation or communication.
6d: Students publish or present content that customizes the message and
medium for their intended audiences.

Technologies Applied:
Computers
YouTube
Twitter
Facebook
Blogger
Various online news sources: The Washington Post, The Salt Lake Tribune,
The New York Times, USA Today, Chicago Tribune, etc.

Part I: Motivation

Learning scenario:
At the end of the class period preceding the day students will begin this new unit,
students will read a condensed article from The New York Times entitled: Pithy, Mean
and Powerful: How Donald Trump Mastered Twitter for 2016
(http://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/06/us/politics/donald-trump-twitter-use-campaign-
2016.html). The teacher will edit the article so that students can focus on the most
important information. Articles will be delivered to students in hard copy format so they
can take notes directly on the article. Students will highlight unknown words and choose
three to define and use in sentences as a cool down for the lesson (which they may also
finish as homework). Students may use dictionary apps on their smartphones to define
unfamiliar vocabulary. Before leaving class, students will call their teachers Google
Voice phone number and leave a message responding to the article as well as mentioning
the three new vocabulary words they will define and use in sentences. There will be
several questions projected on the board to prompt student responses, but the style is
meant to be free response format.
Free-Response Prompts:
What are the three new words you found in the article?
What did you learn from this article that you didnt know before?
What information in this article surprised you?
What is your general reaction to this article (surprised, angry, shocked,
interested, amused, pleased, etc.)?
Allowing students to respond to respond orally not only helps them develop
speaking skills, but also allows them to develop critical analysis skills. Students learn to
speak before they learn to write so for many students having the option to speak instead
of write captures their understanding and knowledge in the target language more
precisely than a written response. The use of dictionaries and highlighters draws students
attention to important information as well as guiding metacognitive awareness of their
own limitations and strengths within the language.
Technologies:
Highlighters
Dictionary app
The New York Times online article (printed copy for students)
Google Voice
Projector

Rationale:
I selected this article because of its timeliness and relevance to the unit in which
students will analyze how social media impacts social issues. Regardless of personal
opinions, all students are impacted by the results of the election. This article may spark
feelings of anger or irritation in some students, while it may cause other students to feel
proud, pleased, or perhaps neutral. In any case, students will have an immediate reaction
to the topic itself. In addition to the relevance of the issue, I hope that this article will give
students new insight into how pervasive social media is in influencing societal issuesa
topic they will learn more about as the unit progresses. Although students may not spend
much of their time online looking at news articles, I believe it is important to expose
them to that resource. Through condensing the article and assigning students to read with
a purpose, this task which may otherwise seem daunting or boring, becomes more
accessible to students. Highlighting words and defining them increases their
understanding and confidence that they can discuss the main idea of the article. I want
them to leave a voicemail on Google Voice so students can communicate their initial
thoughts and opinions freely. Listening to their recorded responses also allows me to
learn about their English proficiency needs in terms of oral output.

Part II: Teaching Basic Concepts

Day 1: #likeagirl
This lesson focuses on analyzing a video made by Always for the companys
#likeagirl campaign: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XjJQBjWYDTs

Pre-listening activity:
The teacher projects an advertisement onto the board and asks students to describe
what they see, and particularly how the ad makes the product seem attractive. She asks,
How does this ad try to convince you to buy Pepsi? Does this advertisement make you
more likely to buy the product? Why? The teacher asks students what they watched on
TV last night or recently. What kinds of things did you watch? Did you have to watch a
lot of advertisements? What are advertisements? Do you like watching advertisements?
The teacher explains that there are many different kinds of advertisements.
Sometimes they are boring or annoying, sometimes they are interesting and tell an
important story.
 The teacher asks for three volunteers to come to the front of the room: two boys
and one girl. She asks one of the boys and the girl to do something like a girl, for
example: run like a girl, hit like a girl, walk like a girl, laugh like a girl. She asks the
second boy to do these actions like a boy. She explains that sometimes the way
advertisements depict people or life is not very accurate. The class previews the
following vocabulary from the video projected on the board: insult, confidence, plummet,
puberty, humiliate, weak, and amazing. Students write the words on a piece of paper and
the class comes up with definitions together. The teacher uses gestures and examples to
clarify the meanings. Students write a brief definition next to each word. Before playing
the video, the teacher tells the students they will watch the video three times and that they
will discuss the big idea of the video in small groups afterwards.

Listening activity:
The teacher plays the audio for the video, showing only one frame of the video for
the duration of the first listening, and asks students to circle answers to multiple-choice
questions. The teacher plays the clip without the matching visual component (aside from
the still frame from the video projected on the screen) in order to help narrow students
focus on what the people in the commercial are saying and how they are saying it. She
previews the questions and answers with the class to ensure they understand what they
are looking for.
The teacher plays the video again allowing students to watch the visual
component while listening to the sound component and asks students to reevaluate their
answers. The class briefly discusses their answers to the questions. The teacher randomly
calls on a few students to say which answer they chose and if anyone got a different
answer. She tells the students they will hear the video once more with the audio and the
visual and see if that changes what they think about the main idea (question 4). The class
engages in a brief discussion about the video. The teacher explains that Always is a
company that sells feminine hygiene products, and asks the students why they think this
company would make a video that does not explicitly advertise their products.

Selective listening tasks:

Part 1:
The teacher passes out a worksheet with a list of actions, comparing the beginning
section of the video to the middle section. Students listen to the video with both the audio
and visual components. They check off the vocabulary words they previewed at the
beginning of the class as they hear them in the video, and circle the actions they notice in
the first and second parts of the video. The teacher pauses on selected images to draw
students attention to actions listed on their worksheet, and announces when they are
transitioning from the beginning of the video to the middle of the video (40 seconds in).
She pauses the video at 1:30. The students compare their answers with a partner and fill
out a chart together identifying the differences in facial expressions and body language in
the first part of the video as opposed to the second part.

Part 2:
The teacher leads a brief discussion of multiple-choice questions and the
comparison charts. She asks, How old were the people in the first part of the video?
They were older, right? Mostly teenagers. And what did they do when the director asked
them to do things like a girl? They were kind of silly, right? What about in the middle
of the video? How old were those girls? They were younger, right? And how did they do
the actions like a girl? Right, they did their best. So maybe the video is telling us that
people have different ideas about what it means to do things like a girl. The teacher
explains that they will talk about the music (question 3) later on.
The teacher plays the end of the video once more. The students answer T/F
questions.
The teacher selects a few students to share their answers and asks if anyone else
came up with different answers.
Part 3: Using sentence frames projected onto the board, students write three sentences
summarizing the main idea of the video in their journals.

Interpersonal speaking activity:

Step 1:
Students will analyze how the physical actions in the video promote a message.
Using the charts they made and the summary sentences they wrote, students discuss in
pairs what they think these actions mean based on the way they are done and why it
matters. Students interview a partner and briefly record responses on a worksheet.

Materials, technology hardware and software:

YouTube video
Multiple Choice, Compare and Contrast, and True or False Worksheets
Pepsi Advertisement
Projector
Interview chart
Rationale:
The objective of this lesson is to give ESL students experience listening to and
discussing a complex analysis of stereotypes in the media. The silent (vision on/sound
off) and sound-only (sound on/vision off) viewings simplify cognitive input by allowing
students to focus on one element at a time, and enabling students to predict the content of
the video. Pausing the video will draw the students attention to important moments in
the narrative. Playing the video three times provides students with multiple opportunities
to expand their comprehension of the content. With different tasks for each viewing, such
as identifying the main idea based on visual inputs and responding to true/false and
multiple-choice statements, students will be guided to focus on certain aspects or details,
accumulating more information and input with each task. The collaborative and
interpersonal activities lower students affective filters, build their confidence in
comprehension, and prepare them for the speaking activities at the end of the lesson.
Accomplishing lesson objectives will help students develop critical thinking skills
through subject matter that is interesting and relatable to high school students. This task
is relevant to students at this age as they negotiate who they are, become aware of the
image they project to other people, and consider what types of media or other sources
they allow to influence their self confidence. Learning to express their views on this topic
is an important skill to develop in order for them to communicate comfortably with their
native English-speaking peers.
The teacher uses repetition, simplified language in worksheets, and
comprehension checks to ensure that the input is meaningful, comprehensible, and
elaborated. The use of authentic material draws on students background knowledge of
cultural values. The listening activities in particular help students attend to surface-level
and in-depth meaning in the video.

Summary and transition:

In the first learning activity, students viewed a video ad campaign that examined
gender roles as portrayed by society through the media. Through a series of individual
tasks and group discussions, students were able to discuss nuances of the video and the
message it was attempting to portray, as well as connect the themes to their own
experiences and cultural values. In the next phase of the lesson, students continue a
discussion of gender roles in the case of a teacher who was criticized for an outfit she
wore the first day of school.
Day 2: #teacherbae
The next class session will revolve around the story of an elementary school
teacher who received criticism for pictures she tweeted of herself on the first day of
school.
Journal prompt: Have you ever written or posted something online (Facebook,
Twitter, Instagram, Snapchat, or in a text) that you got in trouble for? Describe what
happened.
Partner share: In pairs of two, students share their journal responses.
Class share: Teacher will ask for several volunteers to share their journal
responses before sharing an experience: One time my sisters friend posted a picture of
her on Facebook, revealing a giant tattoo on her arm that my parents didnt know she had.
My dad saw the picture and was really upset with my sister for hiding it. Does anyone
else have anything theyd like to share?
Discussion: Teacher will project questions on the board which students will
discuss in small groups:
Does it matter what we put on the Internet? Why/why not?
Are there words or pictures that dont belong on social media (Facebook,
Twitter, Instagram, etc.)? Are there rules? Who should decide?
Do people behave differently online than they do in person? Explain your
answers and give examples.
Reading article: Students read article about #teacherbae from The Huffington Post
(http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/why-is-teacherbae-being-shamed-for-her-curvy-
body_us_57d95cafe4b0fbd4b7bc8be6) in pairs. Before they begin reading, the teacher
provides a brief background explanation to the article and asks students to highlight key
information in the article in yellow, information that surprised them in blue, and anything
they were confused about in orange.
Small group discussion: After reading the article, students discuss what they think
the article is about using their highlighted annotations as evidence for their claims.
Students also discuss the following: Would this teacher have gotten in trouble if she
hadnt posted a picture? Why/why not?
Debate: Following the small group discussions, students will work with another
small group (dividing the class in half) to prepare for a debate to answer the following
question: Is the criticism of Patrice Brown justified? (Yes, she should not post pictures
like that on social media, or: No, she was dressed appropriately and should not be
criticized because of her body shape). Students will be assigned as to which side they are
to defend and follow a rubric to prepare their arguments.
Part III: Applying Knowledge
Day 3: Political Cartoons and Intro to Blogging
Starter: Students respond to a political cartoon in their journals answering the
following questions: What do you think the artist is trying to say? How do you know?
Group discussion: In table groups, students discuss the questions posted on the
board regarding political cartoons.
Class share: Each group shares some of the ideas they came up with in their
discussions.
Class discussion: What are some of the features/elements of political cartoons?
Where might we find political cartoons? Are political cartoons important?
Class analysis of political cartoon: Students review a guide for analyzing political
cartoons by reading aloud and discussing definitions as a class. The teacher projects a
political cartoon on the board and participates in a think-aloud with the class to analyze
the cartoon.
Intro to Blogging: In the computer lab, the teacher introduces students to the class
blog. At this point in the semester, students have already created Gmail accounts which
will enable them to use Blogger. The teacher directs students to the class Blog site:
http://eslmack.blogspot.com/
First blog post: Students respond to cartoon in blog post, relying on the example
they completed as a class and receiving help from the teacher as necessary.
Days 4 &5: Students analyze social issue in graphics or articles pulled from social
media.
Written analysis: Students analyze and discuss the influence of social media on
social issues through a formal in-class written response. Students choose to respond to
one artifact from a selection of three.
Group discussion: Students prepare their own social media artifact that relates to a
societal issue along with at least five discussion questions. After explaining their artifact,
students lead a short group discussion based on something they found on social media
(tweet, FB post, Instagram photo, news article, etc.).
Materials, technology hardware and software
Worksheets
PowerPoint
Projector
Blogger
Computers
Political Cartoons
Newspaper articles

Rationale
The new technologies introduced in these activities are political cartoons found on
social media platforms and in both online and hard copies of newspapers, as well as the
Blogger tool. Through introducing various platforms of media and technology, students
become well versed in their understanding and application of technological skills. While
many students may not be particularly interested in blogging, it is important for them to
develop online interaction skills in a structured setting where they can learn how to
express themselves and respond to others in a respectful way. Blogging is also a great
means for students to learn from their peers because students who may be hesitant to
speak in class often find that they are better able to communicate their thoughts through
writing.
At the end of this lesson plan, students have had opportunities to examine several
sources of integrated media (for example, Tweets cited in a newspaper article) and
discussed the impact of media on these issues. For their final task, students apply their
learning by finding their own examples of depictions of social issues on social media
which they prepare to present to the class through an explanation of what they found
along with a series of discussion questions to engage their peers in a dialogue of the
significance of the role social media plays in understanding the given societal issue.
These are crucial skills for students to learn and are particularly important for ELLs so
they have the opportunity to develop the language skills necessary to participate in
similar discussions inside and outside the classroom.
Part IV: Assessment
Motivation assessment.
For this unit, I will use teacher observation and logs to measure and assess student
motivation. At this point in the semester, I expect that I will know my students fairly well
and will therefore be able to somewhat reliably predict difficulties certain students may
have with participation or completion of tasks. With this information in mind, I will
understand what to watch for as students move through the activities. Keeping a daily log
of student participation and reactions to class activities in a Google Doc, I will
continually adapt activities in order to support and develop student motivation. Keeping
the information in Google Docs is useful because I can access it from any computer
without having to transfer the file. I can also search for key words or share information
with other teachers to troubleshoot or plan ahead for students.
Basic concept assessment:
The basic concept assessment for this lesson culminates in a formal written task.
Students select an artifact (newspaper article excerpt, political cartoon, Tweet, or
Facebook post) and analyze the overall meaning, as well as how they think social media
affects the societal issue depicted. Students have approximately 20 minutes to respond to
the prompt. This assessment allows students to demonstrate their ability to analyze the
role of social media in societal issues in an unfamiliar context with the skills they have
been developing throughout this lesson. Providing students with several options allows
students to make a selection based on their proficiency level and their confidence in their
ability to complete the task.
Knowledge application assessment:
For the knowledge application assessment, students prepare their own social
media artifact that relates to a societal issue along with at least five discussion questions.
After explaining their artifact, students lead a short group discussion based on something
they found on social media (tweet, FB post, Instagram photo, news article, etc.). In
conjunction with the basic concept assignment, students are applying new knowledge and
skills in a task that requires them to investigate and examine their own use of social
media and to design a group discussion revolving around the artifact they found. The
flexibility of this assignment allows students to search for artifacts that are personally
relevant. Students may choose an artifact in their native language, which they may then
explain and present in English to their classmates.

Lesson Summary
In this lesson, students examined societal issues through representations in
various media formats as presented by social media platforms. Students watched a
YouTube video, read newspaper articles, analyzed political cartoons, utilized blogs, read
Tweets, participated in small and large group discussions, analyzed depictions of societal
issues in social media without explicit guidance, and prepared short presentations of
societal issues present in their own social media platforms.
Students accessed and applied technology to understand these societal issues
through using social media platforms they were already familiar with to discover and
analyze new concepts in an academic setting, and also learned how to apply unfamiliar
technologies to discussions of issues that impact their communities.