The McDonald's Game

You all have probably heard of this before, but it is a game where you essentially have to run a McDonald's store and make decisions about health vs profit and such.

I think it is a nice look at the corporate globalization from this week and the body image stuff from a few weeks ago.

Game: http://www.mcvideogame.com/index-eng.html

Just Do It: Direct Vs. Indirect Media Education Lessons for Men and Women

Hatoum and Belle (2006) pointed out that reading magazines targeted at men often lead males to be dissatisfied with their physique and want to add muscle. Also, men had much higher, usually unrealistic, expectations of female fitness if they regularly read these magazines.

There are at least two routes toward combating this trend. We can put men and women (or boys and girls, but only one age group in a session) in a classroom setting and introduce them to advertisement and magazine images that represent unrealistic human form. We can inform them what makes these images unrealistic (ie. digital manipulation, steroids) and the pervasiveness of the practice in advertising.

This would be the direct route. Normally, I am all for this, but we have seen such studies only attain pieces of the desired results. Therefore, I suggest we come at them sideways.

We are now in a formal setting, and the students are informed that the next project will be worth a significant portion of the grade for class X. We discuss advertising and the strategies that are used to make a persuasive television advertisement, possibly showing some examples. Assured that they are noticing issues like unrealistic body image, we inform them of the assignment. They must produce a short advertisement for a product, using the strategies that they are aware of. The ads will be shown to another class and their grade will be determined by how many of those students would be willing to buy the product advertised.

So now the students scurry off and seek ways to sell their product. What they will soon realize is that they cannot rely on the tactics that soda and car commercials do, because they cannot possibly put those things in front of the camera. The body of Cindy Crawford is not going to help them sell their can of Pepsi because a very low percentage of women have a shape remotely like hers, and it is unlikely that one of those few is sitting in their classroom. They will realize that the bodies of the real, tangible individuals that we interact with daily do not resemble Heidi Klum or Jesse "The Body" Ventura.

Now the students realize that what they encounter in magazines and commercials are less "real" people and more constructions created through dozens of individuals manipulating and producing what is essentially an "effect." The degree of separation between the manipulation of a model in a magazine advertisement and the digital/physical amalgamation of Benjamin Button in David Fincher's film is due to nothing more than a matter of preferred method of production. The digitally "painted on" model and computer generated model of Brad Pitt's head on the body of a 60 year-old actor are equally absurd in their appearance when compared to the reality that is placed in front of the camera.

At least Fincher gives us, the audience, a tell to indicate that this is indeed fantasy. Even the least sophisticated viewer will notice that Button's head (the digital model of Pitt's) is unusually large for his body. The character maintains this proportion until his age is approximately that of Pitt, when he actually does his own acting.

The magazines don't give us this wink of the eye. They would have us believe that what we are gazing upon is reality. It is a disservice that harms the self-esteem of many individuals, and a practice that shows no sign of dissipating.

Practical Classes

I ran across this article about practical classes that should be offered in public schools. Unfortunately, there are only two on there, but I think we can assume there are several more that are certainly needed.

http://bit.ly/cVTulm

And here is one about the poor decision to base education policy on exceptions to the poverty/knowledge gap.

http://wapo.st/9GDpKH

Got Veggies? NOT!!!

Severson's (2010) article has some pretty intense recommendations. And it isn't the first time in our readings that an organization recommended nine servings of fruits and vegetables in a day. That seems like an outrageous amount to me. I thought it was silly when they were talking to people that are intimidated by vegetables, but this intimidates me.

No wonder people don't even bother trying. They are told that this is how much they are supposed to be eating, and it is far from their current consumption, so they tune out. I think we may need to set a more reasonable goal to start reversing some of these troublesome trends.

One idea that I really like is the "edible schoolyard" (despite its weird name). Kids pitching in to produce veggies seems like an easy way to create some ego involvement with their healthy food. Now, Berkeley schools are most likely going to have resources far beyond most public schools, but it is a step in the right direction. Maybe the parents can get their children involved in growing veggies at home and get a similar effect? How do the kids that grow up on the farms of the Midwest fare in the vegetable eating contest?

Maybe we should all get some of those French cooks we saw in the clip last week, who hid the veggies in tasty treats? If America won't listen, we will just trick every single one of them into eating vegetables.

It would be Lex Luthor's lamest, but healthiest, scheme ever.

Food ad

In an attempt to get past the popular ads from the last few Super Bowls, I did some real digging. The result is this gem from Australia or New Zealand.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EDPnZBezwjw

Especially relevant for those of us who took rhetoric last year.

Ads in High School

I have very little recollection of advertising in any school before high school. The only exception would be the book fair, which Betsy covered already (I agree that it is a "pester power" machine).

In high school, I recall the band selling candy (leave it to the band to corrupt our community ;) ), which Lindsey admitted to doing herself. Other than that, the only thing I can think of is the Coke and Powerade (which is owned by Coke) machines. The interesting part is that they were not available during the school day. They were located in a breezeway between the main gym and the little "back gym," where the training room was also located. However, this breezeway would remained locked through the school day, leaving only one access point between the gyms. After the official school day was over, the breezeway would be unlocked. Therefore, the only people using it were athletes, some of the after school clubs, and faculty members. I don't know what the official line is, but I think the lack of access during the school day makes a major difference. I don't think that, correct or not, anyone would dispute that after school and during school activities fall under different philosophies.

I may be wrong, but after I graduated I think they went to having the machines be accessible all day. They were not making enough money with the current strategy, so they could either remove them or maximize profits on them. Of course, they went with the latter.

Media Literacy in the Heartland

Virginia, where I went to high school, has been covered (twice). So I went to one of the few other states with which I have any familiarity of the education system at all; Indiana. My aunt is a high school guidance counselor* there, and one of the things I distinctly remember from taking the tour of that school is an entire (although miniature) television production studio. Several cameras, room and materials for sets, and editing equipment IN A HIGH SCHOOL. This, of course, blew my mind. There is nothing even approaching this in the high schools in Tidewater, so I spent the day whining about how I missed out on a cool opportunity.

So, I got a taste of media literacy in Indiana through personal experience. But what else is there? In order to start looking, I went to the Indiana Department of Education and found a section labeled "Search." This seemed like a good idea, but searching "media literacy" received no hits and searching "media" received over 300, including a weird one about kindergartners using scissors.
http://dc.doe.in.gov/Standards/AcademicStandards/StandardSearch.aspx

I instead began pouring over the pdf version of the standards for high school and ran across a whole section about "Mass Media and Media Literacy Standards" (why this didn't come up in the search is beyond me; probably a conspiracy against helicopter parents or something). I found the description of the section particularly appropriate. It read,

Students study the importance of mass media as pervasive in modern life at the local, national, and global levels. Students recognize the impact of mass media messages through news, entertainment, and persuasion on contemporary society. Students analyze and evaluate the history, governance, and ethical issues of mass media to gain a perspective of how influential mass communication has become. Students prepare for their roles as informed and engaged citizens in a democracy. They use media literacy and communications skills to become writers, speakers, or media producers who address content issues and the impact of mass communication. They become knowledgeable consumers of mass media information.

So they learn how to recognize, analyze, and produce media messages. Sound familiar? So it looks like the Hoosiers** have the right idea. Students look at the history, nature, and ethics of mass media. There are a dozen standards/goals that relate directly to media literacy, stating that "Students use their comprehension skills, knowledge base, and information from various media sources to develop a broad perspective that enables them to analyze and evaluate the meanings of mass communication messages they encounter." They also learn how to research and write about the media, including a study of media convergence.

http://www.doe.in.gov/opd/languagearts/docs/media_standards.pdf

I'd like to post all of the standards on here, because I think they are really well thought out. But, that would be a big waste of this little media space when I stuck the link to the original source in here already. I highly recommend looking at this, as it is very interesting and laid out in such a way that you can read it in 10 minutes.

What I don't know at this point is whether these standards are all reflected in the tests and curriculum. I will have to ask someone with personal experience to get these questions answered. I also didn't look at the standards for the other grade levels, but due to the attention put into these, I imagine that they are also impressive and ambitious.


*I wanted to interview her and get some thoughts on this, because she probably has some great insights. I have not been able to do that yet, but as soon as I do I will update the post.

**The cool stuff that the school has is a big deal, but everything that you've heard about Indiana high school basketball is true (and thus, a bigger deal). The "basketball hero around here is treated like a god" line from Hoosiers; pretty much the reality of it.