Since a majority of our students are engaging with social media outside the classroom, it makes good sense to integrate it into the classroom. Not only can we help students learn digital citizenship with social media and offer a fresh approach to lesson plans, but we can also encourage students to use social media for advocacy. The following resources are examples from ReadWriteThink.org on the use of social media to get the word out or spread a message.
It is important for young people to understand their individual rights and what they, as citizens, can do to protect these rights. In addition, young people need to understand the way in which bias and stereotyping are used by the media to influence popular opinion. In this lesson, students examine propaganda and media bias and explore a variety of banned and challenged books, researching the reasons these books have been censored. Following this research, students choose a side of the censorship issue and support their position through the development of an advertising campaign.
Chances are that most students are all watching and enjoying videos found on the popular website YouTube.com. Take advantage of their interest—and practice important critical thinking and literacy skills—by having them make and edit their own videos that deal with important social, economic, and political topics in this lesson plan from ReadWriteThink.org.
In today’s world, displaying information in the form of infographics is a common practice. In this lesson students have the opportunity to create their own infographics to illustrate their own technical writing. After writing step-by-step instructions using topics about which they feel they are experts, students will learn how to create infographics that complement their writing.
Students need to practice all types of writing, and oftentimes argumentative writing is ignored in favor of persuasive writing. In fact, students may not even understand there is a difference between these two types of writing. In this lesson, students examine the differences between argumentative writing and persuasive writing. After choosing topics that interest them, students conduct research which becomes the foundation for their argumentative essays. After completing their essays, students create infographics to represent their research.
In “The Blog of Anne Frank?: Taking on Social Roles through Online Writing” after reading or viewing The Diary of Anne Frank, students will consider how political news spread in the time of World War 2. Then, they investigate how online digital media contributes to the distribution of news in recent events. This background will contribute to their design and development of a blog on the school or local political topic of their choice.
How else can students use social media?