The education goal of the
lesson plan I chose to use for the technology integration plan is to increase
student understanding of censorship. The lesson is intended for a twelfth grade
English Language Arts classroom, but adjustments may be made to lesson plan for
it to be used in elementary grades. The lesson plan aims to raise social
consciousness of the representation of ostracized groups in media institutions
by analyzing and criticizing forms of media. This will segue into students doing
a close reading of a banned text of their choosing and determine if the text
should censored or not. The lesson plan will end with students creating a
campaign to ban or not ban the text they read.
The Common Core
standard in the first row of the technology integration matrix focuses on
students evaluating how information is presented in different media or formats
to address a question. The question that students will address is: how do media
institutions manipulate the minds of consumers? Students will learn about
cultural criticism and then use that lens to identify how media institutions
and technology foster oppressive ideologies. The educator will use the
smartboard to screen television and magazine advertisements to the classroom.
Meanwhile, students will use Notability on the iPad to take notes and assist
them with their analysis on the presented forms of media. The iPad will also allow
students to access the forms of media that the educator presented to the
classroom again. Students will be given
enough time think critically and then share and discuss their analysis with a
designated partner. The think-pair-share activity will segue into a large-group
discussion of the underlying messages the consumer consumes through various forms
of media. The educator will take notes that highlight the classroom discussion
on Google Docs, students will be able to view the notes the educator is jotting
down on the smartboard, and the educator will share the document with the
students on the classroom’s Google Drive. Afterwards, students will search
through the Internet for a form of media that promotes oppressive ideologies
and write an analysis on the medium. The students will post the form of media
they selected and their analysis of their selection on Google Blogger. The
classroom will be required to comment on two blog posts for homework and the
blog posts will be assessed. Additionally, the four ISTE
standards are met because students are gathering information found on the
Internet, thinking critically about the information to address the problems
with media institutions, and create blogs to critique and communicate
information.
The Common
Core standard in the next row of the matrix focuses on the students’ ability to
distinguish central themes of a text and analyze the expansion and interaction
of the themes throughout the text; an provide an objective summary. The
educator will present students with a list of banned texts; they will do
research on the reasons for the text being banned and the class will cast an
informed vote on which text to use for the lesson. Once the text has been
selected, students will read the text using Subtext, a digital reading app on
the iPad that facilitates close reading. The educator will highlight vital
passages for students to pay extra attention, create open-ended questions and
multiple choice to assess students understanding of the text. The educator will
also integrate videos, images, and web links into specific parts of
the text to help students connect themes. The class will collectively create an
objective summary of the text through a class discussion. The educator will
listen to the discussion and address any misconceptions as he or she mind maps
the summary on Bubbl.us and shares it on Google Drive. After, students will
individually work on mind mapping the relationship between the themes and their
development in the text by providing textual evidence on Coogle. Students will
share their Coogle with a designated partner and collaborate to expand on each
other’s mind maps. Lastly, students will voice their opinion on the censorship
of the text and provide textual evidence to support their opinion in a blog
post on Blogger. Peers will comment on each other’s blog posts and respectfully
comment. The educator will assess the students’ ability to support their
argument. All ISTE standards are met because students conduct research and make
an informed decision on the text they will use for the lesson plan. Also,
students are learning from each other’s mind maps and contributing to the
expansion of other’s mind map. Blogger is a fundamental tool because students
are creating blog posts as a mean of personal expression.
The last Common
Core standard in the matrix is intended for students to meticulously develop
claim(s) and counterclaims, and provide evidence that highlights the
strongpoints and limitations of their claim(s). The student should also be conscious
of the audience to who she or he is writing to and their potential biases. The
final standard in the technology integration matrix makes an explicit
connection between the first and second standard. Students can work
individually or in pairs to create an advertisement campaign to support their
decision to censor the text or not. They will try to persuade the audience to
support their cause. Students should use at least one of the propaganda
techniques that was identified and discussed in the beginning of the lesson
plan. Students can get as creative as they wish and are required to use one form of technology. Students can create a Facebook page, Twitter account, create a magazine advertisement, radio
advertisement, poster, bumper sticker, t-shirt design, and/or television
advertisement. Students will present their form of advertisement to the
classroom and the class will respectfully discuss and analyze the effectiveness
of the advertisement. The final project of the lesson plan meets the ISTE
standards of “creativity and innovation” and “communication and collaboration”
because students are creatively collaborating to communicate their position on the issue of censorship to large masses through forms of technology. Hence, I
integrated technology into this lesson plan with the objective to raise social
consciousness of how media institutions and technologies promote oppressive
ideologies of marginalized groups, but also too show how students can use those
same mechanisms and technology to collaborate with each other and take action
against the powers at be that believe they have the authority to ban books!
