Homework Assignment #6

Please print out the lyrics to a popular song and analyze them, paying special attention to issues we've discussed in class: gender roles, violence, views on romance, etc.

Analysis should be minimum one page, double spaced.

Homework Assignment #5

As usual, please answer the following question with at minimum a one page, double spaced response.

• Choose a movie or TV clip that depicts a situation you have experienced in your life. (ex. college life, dating, work, etc)
• Did the clip accurately represent your experience or did it miss the mark?
• Can your experience only be explained through the relation of the clip itself (ie "...it was like that movie...")
• Do movies/TV accurately represent everyday life or do we model our lives after movies/TV ?

Homework Assignment #4

Bring in an advertisement and describe how it portrays women or men. Is this portrayal positive or negative?

Homework Assignment #3

Apologies for the late post.

As usual, please write a one page single spaced result to the following prompt.

• Are video games today too violent? If so, give examples.
• Have you ever felt like you (or a friend) play too many video games?
• What are some positive aspects about video games? Are there any?

Homework Assignment #2

Please write a one page, double-spaced response to the following prompt:

Choose a form of media and discuss how you represent your identity through that medium. How does this compare to how you represent yourself in person? Do these mediums have a positive/negative effect on your relationships?

Homework Assignment #1

Please write a one page, double-spaced response to the following questions:

What kind of experiences did you have with media as a child/youth? Were they positive or negative?

End of the Semester Dinner!

After class, we thought it would be nice to have dinner together at House of Curries on Durant and Telegraph. We know it's a busy time, but if you want to eat with us, you're all welcome to join us!

Guest Speaker: Richard Sterling

Next week, our beloved faculty sponsor, Richard Sterling, will be giving a guest lecture along with one of group presentations on TV. Here's a brief biography on Richard Sterling, a current adjunct professor at UC Berkeley's Graduate School of Education:

Richard Sterling is the executive director of the National Writing Project. Formerly he was a faculty member at Lehman College, where he was also director and founder of the Institute for Literacy Studies, a research unit of CUNY. He also directed and founded the New York City Writing Project and the New York City Mathematics Project. In 1992 he received a grant from the DeWitt Wallace-Reader’s Digest Fund to develop a national project of teacher research groups in 12 cities across the U.S. As national director of this Urban Sites Network, he worked with teachers and faculty from all regions of the country to develop a body of practitioner-based research documenting educational practice. Richard Sterling is working to extend the work of the Urban Sites project to both rural and urban settings and to develop ways to close the gap between university researchers in education and practitioners in the field. His publication highlights include co-authoring ”The National Writing Project: Scaling up and Scaling Down,’ in Expanding the Reach of Reform: Perspectives from Leaders in the Scale-Up of Educational Reform (RAND, 2004). He is currently working on projects for new teachers under a grant from the Stone Foundation and on issues of adolescent literacy under a grant from the Carnegie Corporation. Since 2003, Mr. Sterling has chaired the advisory group to the College Board's National Commission on Writing in America's Families, Schools, and Colleges.

Is There Not A Correspondence?

Is There Not A Correspondence?

Next week we will be discussing the affects of movies. For your assignment, write the usual one page, double spaced paper on:

A movie or television show that portrayed a situation you have experienced, such as:

• College life
• Dating
• Work
• Cultural & Ethnic experiences (Joy Luck Club, American Me come to mind)
• Or other "specific" "real life" "experiences"

Is There Not A Cause?

And then write about how true to life that film was to your experiences. Did the film accurately capture your experience? Or did the film entirely miss the mark? Or did the film become so ingrained and foundational to the culture, that your experience cannot be thought about outside the context of the film ("It was unreal the way we looked into each others eyes/I made that last second 3-point shot/dove out from that out-of-control, burning vehicle/etc., like something out of a movie!").

Is There Not A Cost?

Then, discuss the implications, if any, of forming perceptions based on movies and television.

Video Game Week

Hello Golden Bears,

As you may have heard, next class will cover the issue of video games and its effects on minds. Next week's homework will take the form of an interview. As usual, it need only be one page double-spaced.

As we saw in the video clip in class today, there are many reasons offered by those who play video games for extensive periods of time (addicts) and those who are friends and acquaintances with those same people, in explanation of their habits. We heard opinions arguing for and against these video gamer trends.

For your assignment, interview someone you know who plays a lot of video games. The purpose of the interview is to uncover why someone will be willing to commit a large portion of their time to playing video games. Although I do not have any set questions you must ask, some suggested questions can be

• What is it about video games that is so satisfying to the player?
• What motivations do video game players have for playing games for long hours?
• Have they ever missed important events or commitments to play video games?
• Do friends from online gaming networks take priority over friends from "real life?"
  
• Can someone be addicted to video games? Compare it to other kinds of addiction. Do they have anything in common? Or is it all an exaggeration?
• Is there a need to justify the amount of energy and time spent on video games?
  
• And other questions
  

Also, pay close attention to the kind of language used by the video game player's responses. Is there any sort of value system that his/her language reflects (ie., as we saw in the video clip in class, much of the video game players' language had to do with inclusion and being part of a greater community. One interviewee referred to players like himself as "Smashers.")

Once again, have fun and be creative with the questions. Try to get at the heart of what motivates avid video game players.

Yours,

David

Fun Day!!!

Hi everyone,

Here's the list of food and supplies for the potluck today if you forgot!

Soda - Nick, Raymond
Cookies - Heather, Monica
Entree (Pizza) - Lawrence
Chips - Carli, Desteni
Salsa - Desteni, Yejin
Cups/Plates - Daniel
Napkins/Forks/Spoons/Knives - Matt
Dessert - Blanca, Hector, Stephany, Linda, Johanna and Lindsay (Fruit)
Salad - McCabe, Brittney
Other - Carlton/David, Laura, Maria (lemonade), Rosalie (tuna pasta), Jessica (something wonderful), Michelle (chicken)

Looking forward to all the fun, food, and bonding!

Children and Media

Hi everyone,

Thank you for coming and participating in the discussion on children and media. This will be an online forum where you can leave comments and we can continue thinking and talking about how the media has desensitized us (especially with our children).

Question to think about and/or discuss:
Is the loss of innocence from media's desensitizing effects from the media even a problem? Are we just overreacting?

Enrollment: Spaces Left!

Hi everyone,

It turns out that there is still room in this DeCAL for upper division students to sign up for Education 198. We will try to extend the lower division limit...

Here are the ccn's:
Education 98: 23674
Education 198: 23977

Try and sign up ASAP before I open it up to everyone else. If you missed the first day of class, it's ok, just sign up and we'll see you this coming Monday!

-Carlton