Why Teach Graphic Novels?

I cut out this article from the 3/2/2008 issue of the Pioneer Press to post in my classroom. (Sorry if it's hard to read; I'm still getting used to using my scanner.)

I found it interesting how the newspaper wrote about a class using the graphic novel format. It caught my eye when I was skimming the paper that day, as is the effect of graphic novels on many young readers.

If you can't read the article, it tells about a middle school teacher who developed a 9-week graphic novel elective course, that students who choose to take it, take in conjunction with the "regular" grade level English class. The teacher reports on how the format of the graphic novel appeals to many types of "non-readers," from low-level readers, ELL students, and students who just aren't interested in reading.

I don't envision myself teaching graphic novels for a full 9 weeks, but after reading a few articles online and personally seeing how my own "non-readers" get wrapped up in graphic novels, I do want to work something into my curriculum. Students already choose graphic novels for their independent reading book; to ensure that everyone is familiar with the format, I would have students read at least one graphic novel during the course of the first semester. 

Then, during the second semester, I would teach a few lessons on the basic elements of a graphic novel, and what it does and does not have in common with "standard" novels. As part of these lessons, I would ask them if they thought of graphic novels as "pop culture" or something deeper, such as how "classic literature" is viewed. Are both genres worthy of study? Why? Why not? Do they think adults would have the same experience reading graphic novels as they did, or would they brush them off as merely extended cartoons?

Then, I would use Gretchen Schwarz's idea of adapting a classic literary work into a graphic novel as a major group writing assignment for one piece of literature we read as a class that year (To Kill a Mockingbird, The House on Mango Street, stories from Greek Mythology, Romeo and Juliet). Each person in a group would be assigned a responsibility, whether each person would do the drawings and writing for a certain amount of chapters, or a few people did the drawings and the others did the writing. It would be up to the groups to determine what is a fair workload for everyone involved. 

The groups' graphic novels would be due toward the end of the school year, when we'd have a day to read what everyone came up with. It would be fun to have several copies of each group's final product and have them bound, but that would depend on current resources, of course. As part of the publication day, I would have them discuss how the process of making the graphic novel deepened (or didn't!) their understanding of the original piece of literature. What did they learn about plot structure, character development, symbolism, theme, writing style, tone/voice, etc?

All in all, I think graphic novels are a valid resource in an English classroom, and probably in other discipline areas as well. Students are not "getting off the hook" in not reading text-only books; they are developing their literacy skills via a different, more visually appealing format.

Channel 5 Eyewitness News at 5:00

A friend of mine recently told me his theory about watching the news: "They save the weather and sports until the end, because that's all anyone cares about anyway. You're forced to watch the rest of the show because you're waiting to hear what the high temperature will be tomorrow, so you can plan what to wear." Well, after watching the 5:00 news on Saturday evening, I think he may at least be right about the weather part. I heard three weather previews before they actually got to the full weather report; one at the top of the hour, one that was embedded into a news story about the Red River flood, and one right before the first commercial break. It was almost to the point that I didn't need to watch the weather report; I had heard it all already! And, in case I missed it, they ended the show with weather, too.

Here's a breakdown of the 1/2-hour show (27 minutes to be exact):

• 5:00 Quick preview of top stories: Murder-suicide, Red River, Winter Storm Approaching
• 5:00-5:07 Red River Flood Watch News Story. Coverage included: reporter's narration of situation in several locations; video footage of families being rescued, a house that is now an island, zoom in on water hose, a pan shot across sandbags; interview of Fargo mayor who spoke in a very serious voice; reporter standing at site speaking in a tense, excited voice; caption at news station that reads "presidential praise." At 5:06, they talked about how "the situation is changing by the hour" and how it's related to the weather. (That was their smooth transition to preview the upcoming storm for the second time during the newscast.)
• 5:07-5:09 Murder-Suicide News Story. Coverage included: reporter outside the scene; shot of street signs showing the intersection; voice over narration with a timeline shown on the screen; long shots of caution tape, cut to police officer, cut to people walking by scene, cut to interviewee, and finally a cut to reporter.
• 5:09-5:13 Advertisements
• 5:13-5:15 World/National News Stories. About 30 seconds were spent on each of the following stories: "Put People First" Demonstrations in major European cities, Space Shuttle Landing, Spring Blizzard in Kansas, and National Guard brought in to help with Red River Flood. 
• 5:15-5:18 Weather. They talked about the Winter Storm Watch first, then current temps, Sunday's highs, Monday's forecast, tonight's weather, Sunday again, and finally the 7-day outlook.
• 5:18-5:21 On the Road Feature Story. They discussed how people are designing gravestones to include images from their lives, not just words. I noticed how there was light piano music playing in the background, which was more relaxing than the sounds from the leading news stories.
• 5:21-5:23 Sports. Brief coverage of the High School Boys' Basketball Tournament, the Minnesota Wild's upcoming schedule, and the NCAA Hockey Tournament.
• 5:23-5:26 Advertisements
• 5:26-5:27 Library Fundraiser Feature Story. They discussed how the St. Paul public library needed donations. They interviewed one man in charge, using a comfortable medium shot, and told viewers if they wanted information on how to donate, to look on the KSTP website. 
• 5:27 Weather and Sign-offs. Recap of 7-day outlook, and an invitation to "Join us at 6. Hope to see you then."
• 5:28 Advertisements

Reflection: The first thing that comes to mind is just how many ways the newscasters try to convey information to the audience. I was overwhelmed trying to record everything; it switched too often. Reporters on the scene, voice-overs, graphs and charts and lists, interviews, different background music, different shots and angles for video footage; the information overload certainly kept my attention! Which is their goal, so well done, Channel 5.

I was also struck with the tone each newscaster had. The newscasters are supposed to maintain their audience's attention; one strategy is to speak with an excited expression. No matter who was talking or what was being talked about (floods, murder-suicide, weather, boys' basketball), there was a sense of excitement and/or urgency in their voice. This was made clear with the contrast of the Fargo mayor's demeanor; he is truly being affected by the flood, there isn't anything exciting about it, and his tone in the interview was serious and weary. 

Last, it seemed the newscasters referred to the channel's website at least 3 times. I wonder, is there a quota they need to meet? Beach asserts that more and more people are turning to the web for their news, so it makes sense that the newscasters refer to their site often. I thought it was very clever of them to end the last story with a reference to the website; it is probably more effective then than in the middle of the newscast.

Facebook: "It's baller"

For this week's media ethnography assignment, I chose to focus on why and how my 9th, 11th, and 12th grade students use Facebook. I myself recently gave into peer pressure and joined this social network and was curious about how the younger generation viewed their participation in this forum. 

PROCESS: Of course, I am not "Facebook friends" with any of my students, nor do I want to be, so I didn't actually view their profiles online. Instead, I gathered "data" by distributing an anonymous survey on the last day before spring break.

My first question was "Do you participate in any social networks?" 10 out of 60 said "no"; the rest said yes, and many participated in 3 or more groups! (No wonder they don't get their homework done; that's a lot to keep up with every night!)

The next question was, "Which ones?" Since most said Facebook, I decided to analyze only the surveys that discussed Facebook. 

Question #3 was, "Why do you participate?" I compiled their responses on a Word document, creating one list for the 9th graders and a separate list for the 11th and 12th graders, thinking that there might be interesting differences in the two age groups' responses. For both age groups, the most popular reason to be on Facebook is to keep in touch with family and friends. A few people stated that they used it to meet new people (one recently joined a group for the incoming freshmen at the college he/she plans to attend next fall), and that it was simply a good way to pass time. My favorite response was, "It's baller." I guess so.

Question #4 was, "How do you decide what to post on your profile?" Both age groups responded that they like to post "funny and cool stuff," "nothing too personal," and items that "show who I am as a person." Everyone took their audience into consideration, too. One 9th grader wrote that he/she didn't post anything that would "make other people mad," and an upperclassman wrote, "my parents, bosses, and peers are looking at my profile, otherwise I just try to be myself." Now, I did warn them before they took the survey that they shouldn't tell me anything that I would have to report, so this could explain why I didn't get more shocking responses such as those that are seen in the news...but then again, maybe these students are learning from others' mistakes? I hope, I hope.

My last question was, "How does what you post reflect your attitude or stance toward certain issues?" Most surveys came back with this part blank, "IDK," "?", or "I don't really think about it." The 9th graders especially had little to say. One student said "music, that's all I care about," and another wrote about how 4H was being cut from the county and she/he posted items to raise awareness to stop it from happening. The upperclassmen had more "issues" that they cared about, including religion, Japanese culture, politics, saving the environment and rainforest, 4H, and supporting the troops/respecting soldiers. They also said they liked to post funny YouTube videos and inspirational quotes.

CONCLUSIONS: High school students mainly see Facebook as a way to stay connected with friends and family when they can't see them in person. This is made evident when they claim that they only post items that reflect their personalities and interests, but without getting too personal since it is a public forum. The underclassmen really only talked about friends and putting "cool" things on their profiles; many had never thought about their stances on issues, or if they even had any. The upperclassmen did have more to say about issues, showing their maturity level in caring more about world issues. This makes sense, as they are almost finished with high school and will be "entering" the world in the next 1-2 years.

It was refreshing to see that students didn't seem to be too sucked into the realm of Facebook; they use it to keep up with people they know, but they aren't going crazy posting a ton of items or forgetting that they don't always know who is looking at their profile. They don't seem to see themselves as the main attraction; they're there to see what others are doing and to support unique causes (although they still aren't willing to post anything that would portray themselves as "uncool," so they ARE still worried about how others view them; it's just not blatantly obvious. :-)). 

Gizmoz

Here's my first attempt at creating a CA. It was interesting that most of the "female over 14 years old" costume options were swimsuits or summer tops...not a whole lot of options for a young female teacher to look professional yet unsexy

research paper

By Cmeister / 01-Mar-2009

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Families in Fox's Ads

I briefly sat down and watched the commercials between reruns of Seinfeld and American Idol episodes on Fox this Thursday. (Conferences were cancelled due to the snowstorm and I found myself with some unexpected downtime!) In those 4 minutes, I saw ads for:

1. American Family Insurance: A young couple signs up for American Family Insurance and immediately benefit from the housing and medical coverage; their house catches fire and a few months later, they happily await the birth of their first child.

2. Quest: A man in his late 20s/early 30s is on a stationary bike in a clearly very comfortable, large home, with plenty of trees in the backyard. He is explaining exactly what he needs from his cable service to the Quest employee, who patiently sets up his cable while the customer continues to happily pedal away.

3. Best Buy: A Best Buy employee in his early 20s retells a recent situation he was in at work: three generations of women came in needing computers; each with a different need. The daughter needed a laptop for college, the mother needed a pink one for her "Pinks" business, and the grandmother needed an easy-to-use computer because she had never owned one before.

4. Essure: A woman in her 30s considers how her life would change if she got pregnant again. A voiceover explains that Essure is a "permanent" birth control method for women, and the viewer sees the woman kissing her husband and playing soccer with her kids, smiling and carefree because of the convenient solution to her previous concern.

Not one of the commercials seemed to communicate a certain media representation/message, but taken as a group, I noticed some thought-provoking trends among the four ads. With exception to the Quest ad, the theme of the ads was family, and all families involved were happy, white people. The only non-white people were the Quest cable serviceman, who was black, and the Best Buy employee, who was Asian.

People watching this channel for long periods of time may not even realize how these trends are represented, for the ads aren't selling families; they're selling insurance, computers, cable TV, and birth control. However, the subliminal media representations imply that only white people are responsible enough to buy health insurance and therefore safely give birth to their child, and only white people have enough sense to realize when they've had enough children and thus undergo "permanent" birth control procedures. The ads also hint that service jobs are for non-whites, such as the black cable man and the Asian computer salesman. Both were depicted as knowledgeable and responsible employees, but I wonder why it couldn't have been the black man on the exercise bicycle and the white man setting up the cable? Or did the ad producers even consider the message they were creating?

I don't even watch that much TV (the woes of being a high school English teacher and having stacks of papers to read and grade, I guess), and I rarely watch Fox shows. Honestly, I was flipping through channels looking for inspiration for this blog. Reflecting on that fact, it's astonishing to see such similar media representations in a such a short amount of time, in succession on the same TV channel. I wonder what NBC, ABC, and CBS ads subtly communicate to their viewers during prime time.

As one might guess, different families view themselves differently, and it doesn't matter what race/ethnicity, or other grouping they fall under (Duh). In an interview with American Psychological Association (2/11/2009), Bertha Holliday answers the following question:

APA. Family life is very important for achievement by black children. Is it more important for them than for children of other races/ethnicities? Is President Obama an example of how a nurturing environment can buffer a child against prejudice?

Dr. Holliday: Whose family life is most important for whose children? Who knows? In reality, our knowledge of family life is somewhat limited. We know about family process, parent-child interactions, critical life events, child-rearing practices, etc. – but we really don't know a whole lot about the richness, complexities, contradictions and power that are the totality of family life—especially as experienced by various religious, racial/ethnic and other identity–based communities. Nevertheless, one can say with a great degree of confidence, it is always a good thing for a child to have a nurturing environment. And it is always good for a child to have a parent(s) who is not only a provider, but also a protector and advocate. President Obama was certainly the beneficiary of these and numerous other social and developmental benefits. It also should be noted that the bulk of his formative childhood years was spent in locations that lacked deeply rooted social traditions of racism against blacks -- as was the case in the continental U.S.

 But President Obama is also to a great degree the proverbial American “self-made man,” who with little in economic resources, embarked upon a relatively solitary and  focused journey in search of his identity and his own conception of his place in the world. I think this is the aspect of the man that intrigues so many.

Critical Approaches/Lenses

Rhetorical/Audience Approach: This lens examines how the audience is affected and persuaded by what they see and hear in the media. In teaching this approach, students need to learn how to identify media messages, analyze their own active participation in perpetuating the messages, and understand how people are socialized by the messages. 

Beach's book includes a teaching idea using the novel Feed, which is one title that my colleague and I also thought to use for next year's Writing about the Media class. Another more classic novel that would work well for this approach is Fahrenheit 451. Students could analyze how the main characters are so mired in media messages that they no longer have their own personalities. This novel was part of the NEA Big Read program, which provides more specific teaching ideas.

Another idea to reinforce how prevalent media messages are would be to have a "No Brand Names" day, or if possible, week; where nobody would wear clothing that had a brand name on it. At the end of the designated time, students would discuss if and how their perception of different individuals were affected by the lack of brand name clothing.

Semiotic Approach: This lens analyzes how the meanings of messages depend on one's social and cultural codes and signs. People will interpret messages differently in terms of their own culture's values and associations with different codes and signs.

 Teaching Media Literacy uses the archetypal hero's journey as an example, which I could incorporate in my English 9 Greek Mythology unit. When discussing Greek heroes, students always challenge the myths' ideas of what a hero should be. I point out to them that this makes sense, since their culture is different in many ways to the Ancient Greek culture. What defined a hero for them depended on their culture's values. Next time I teach the mythology unit, I will expand this discussion to an assignment that has students write a hero's story that reflects the values of their own culture. Going even further, I could have them revise their stories after researching other world cultures and myths, not just Greek mythology.

Critical Discourse Analysis Approach: This approach considers how certain cultures or communities would view media messages in terms of specific definitions. (i.e., Lawyers, doctors, businesspeople, and teachers will view the same message but construe a different meaning from it based on how their professions influence their ways of thinking.)

There are several teaching ideas that immediately come to mind to help students understand this approach. The easiest one, I think, is to have each student find magazine ads and analyze what the ads' messages are promoting in terms of different discourses (gender, class, race, etc.). Of course, this could also be done with other forms of media, but it is easy for everyone to bring in a couple of magazine ads, hold it up to the class, and explain it. Since it is a still image, the class has less to pay attention to, thus providing ample opportunity to really break down the ad's message in terms of different discourses. Once that is done I'd have them view their "favorite movie of all time" through one critical discourse , and come back to the class to share their discoveries.

Feminist Approach: This lens focuses on how males and females are portrayed in media messages, thus communicating with the audience how they as males and females should act, dress, and look. As these ideals have changes throughout history and how they differ between cultures, so have the media's portrayals of gender.

To further study the feminist approach, I think it would be useful to bring in covers of a variety of men's and women's magazines, and unpack the messages from the cover's picture and stories. For example, the look of Cosmopolitan, which many high school girls carry around in their backpacks, is much different than Good Housekeeping. Or isn't it? Of course, students could research how the magazines' messages have changed over the years. I recently received a forwarded email from a 1955 issue of Good Housekeeping from a newlywed friend that could be used in this context.

Postmodern Approach: Postmodernism explores how "modern improvements" do not actually make life happier, easier, or more fulfilled; they actually make us feel sadder, more stressed, and emptier.

In the classroom, I would definitely start with a discussion of materialism, and how students are obsessed with having the "latest and greatest" gadgets. I myself will admit to having (and loving) an iPod; and secretly wanting, but unable to afford, an iPhone. Why do we want these things? How are we supposed to feel once we have them? Are those feelings actually felt when that happens?

Eventually I'd move in the direction of watching a full-length film. I like the suggested list in Beach's book (p. 41), and I also think the current Oscar nominated films The Curious Case of Benjamin Button and Slumdog Millionaire would be well-received in the classroom. Both films use non-traditional narratives to examine what is/should be valued in life.

Commercial Shot-by-Shot Analysis

The title of this post links to the commercial that I am analyzing: the i-Pod commercial that uses "Disturbia" by Rhianna.

0-35 seconds: There is a combination of medium and close-up shots of a teenage boy dancing and singing along to Rhianna's catchy song, "Disturbia." The camera pans, zooms in and out, and tracks the boy's dancing, which gives the audience the sense that they should dance to the music as well. The quick cuts also give the audience the feeling of excitement and energy that is created through quick dancing.

35-40 seconds: The music stops, and the camera cuts to his friend who has just walked in. There is a low-angle, medium reaction shot on the friend. The audience is close enough to see the look of incredulity on the friend's face, but far enough to also see the body language; the friend looks uncomfortable with the first boy's choice of music. "Dude. Do you seriously have Rhianna downloaded on your iPod?"

40-45 seconds: The camera cuts back to the boy, using a closer frame. The close-up shot lets the audience see his discomfort of being "caught" listening to a "girlie" song, and he tries to lie, saying, "uuummmm, no?"

45-55 seconds: The camera cuts back to the friend for another reaction shot.  The awkward camera angle conveys the awkwardness the two main characters fell. As the friend shakes his head and leaves, the camera remains stationary, so the audience feels abandoned (the camera is focused on the chalkboard). 

55-60 seconds: After a slight pause, the boy shifts his eyes from side to side, looks at the camera, and starts playing his music again. The camera is close up, so the audience can see the happiness the boy feels from the song.

60-70 seconds: The camera cuts to a screen that says "iPod + iTunes,"then another cut to the Apple logo. The bright colors and the catchy music that are used heightens the audience's attraction to the iPod product.