Block III Project

So finally, here is my block III media literacy project post. Staci and I have finally come together on a final topic for our project. We were a little stuck and confused with what to actually do with the assignment, but after consulting Hobbs, we decided on a final idea.

We're going to focus on advertisements and how they effect teenagers.

Our objective: To show how marketing shapes social lives of teens, and how objects function symbolically in the construction of personal identity.

Hobbs research conducted a similar exercise in her chapter on advertisements/propoganda. First, students free write about brand loyalty. What brands are you loyal to, and why? Where have you seen these brands before?

Then, we have a class discussion on the students' free writing. Hobbs said that her students moaned when they were told to stop writing. They were so excited to write about brands that they didn't want to stop! Then, they were chatterboxes upon discussing it. Imagine having this much participation in a classroom!

Then, we will define brand loyalty as a class: When people repurchase a particular brand for a number of reasons (friends use it, socially acceptable, no other option, out of convenience.

Students will break into small groups (6) and will be assigned different commercials which they will analyze.

Students will be answering the following questions in their own personal blogs:

Demographics: who are the people being targeted? Race? Gender? Social class? Educational background? Residency?

Underlying idea: what is the underlying idea that the commercial is promoting? What do they want you, the viewer, to learn from the commercial?

Symbolic Association: What does the commercial want you to associate with its product? What emotional feeling do you get from watching the commercial?

Here are the links for the commercials we assigned to each group:

Army

Cingular

Proactive

Doritos

Kohls

Adidas

Understanding that this will take more than one class period, students are expected to present their findings to class the following day.

This project seems fun and interesting to students. Hopefully this would be ultimately successful in a real classroom!