Angelo J. Pompano
Today's middle school students are bombarded with stereotyped representations of gender, race, and ethnicity on television and in the movies. The intent of this unit is to create a video documentary that will show positive gender, race and ethnic images of people with whom the students can identify. I work in a K-8 school of approximately 780 students. The majority of the students are African American (56%). The second largest group of students is Hispanic (24%). The remaining students are Caucasian (13%), Asian American (4%), and 3% of the students are of other racial backgrounds. Fifty-one percent of the students are male and forty-nine percent of the students are female.
This unit addresses the needs of the students by giving them a meaningful project on which to work. The result is an end product that will be a source of pride to be viewed by all of the students of the school. I intend to teach this unit to my 7th and 8th grade Broadcast Journalism classes but it may be adapted for use with other grade levels and subject areas.
This unit consists of two parts. The first part deals with the subject of race and ethnicity as it is relates to stereotyping on television and in movies. It explores some of the ways in which stereotypes have been presented in order to give the teacher and the students background information on the problem.
The second part is on the use of video in school and how it can be used to record oral histories that will combat the negative images of race and ethnicity perpetuated by the broadcast media. The students will create a project in which they will record oral histories of grandparents and other senior citizens that will debunk these stereotypes. They will either interview their own grandparents or some the grandparents who hold monthly meetings at our school. This unit is aligned with the curriculum of the City of New Haven. It will allow the students to acquire the following skills:
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1. To understand the issues of stereotyping
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2. To acquire competencies necessary in the study of broadcast journalism and technological literacy
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3. To gain a general understanding of the technology involved in video production
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4. To debate the ethics of video journalism and to make decisions as to what might be included in a video production
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5. To debate the benefits of video journalism and learn how video taping oral histories can benefit future generations
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6. To understand that video technology has benefits but at the same time can have an effect on the way others may perceive a race, ethnicity and gender