Hi guys,
I am looking to expand the variety of activities I do with my ATAR classes for 2021.
Does anyone have any fun and innovative activities based on content that they do with their classes that you would be willing to share with me?
Thanks 😊
Kind regards,
Danielle Pieraccini
Hi Danielle,
I do a ‘Media Ownership Role-Play’ task in Year 11 ATAR (takes one 50-minute period, usually) where students are given a role in the media landscape (e.g. ABC reporter, CEO of Channel 9, Media Magnate, Independent YouTuber) and I ask them to ‘consult their superiors’ to determine how to frame and write a headline for a current issue (e.g. Immigration, Global Warming). They sit in groups, and the high-ups pass down their editorial influence (using cue-cards which explain their biases or commercial incentives) down the line, resulting in a headline and ‘angle’ for the story.
The students then have to report back on what their headline is and explain the factors and considerations that shaped it, as well as what their combined audience reach is (audience numbers for each organisation are on their cue-cards), and this leads into a discussion about the benefits and limitations of independent vs. commercial media ownership – i.e. Commercial Media employees have to ‘tow the company line’ but they have wide influence and audience reach, whereas indie publications have limited audience reach, but the freedom to editorialise as they please.
This is all just based on cue-cards, but it gets the students moving around the room and thinking critically in groups. Obviously it works a lot better with a large class, though – I only had 10 this year, so I had to reduce the scope of the exercise somewhat…
Hope that’s useful!
Tom Norman