The Seven Great Debates

INTERNET GOOD...when I say so.

As professionals should we "protect" students from content we consider to be negative? My answer in a word is "no," but to be more specific, I feel it's important to realize that we can't keep children in a bubble away from the negative parts of the world or media. It only follows that this protection could lead to censorship.

As a mother, I make sure to keep tabs on what my three-yr-old daughter watches on TV, but that is a private decision based on my set of moral values. As an educator, I hope I can help my students better understand the messages they see every day, both positive and negative.

I see many parallels between more traditional texts/canonical literature and what one would consider more modern "texts" and I hope to draw on my knowledge of traditional literary critical analysis to help my students better understand the underlying messages of today's more modern media.

Should we include popular culture? YES!

To what degree is each educator's individual option. However, it seems particularly effective in my subject area. In fact, it's been said that you know a piece of literature is in the canon if you see it parodied on The Simpsons! (The two that come to mind are Poe's The Cask on Amontillado and The Raven.)

Dozens of classics have been redone or have similar storylines. (Clueless=Jane Austen's Emma.) This simply shows students that these stories are timeless and sparks their interest in texts they might otherwise find archaic.

Along with connecting popular culture to more traditional classroom texts I also recognize the huge potential of using technology and media in the classroom as a political forum. The videos we watched this week put forth specific political ideologies. As a creative writer, I especially enjoyed Video #1 and felt that the video enhanced the impact of the poet's reading. It also helped convey the true frustration felt my those who are callously labeled "multicultural." This is definitely something I would consider doing in my own classroom. Video #4's documentary approach could also be used in the Language Arts classroom to supplement a research paper or as part of a cooperative unit plan with a history or social studies teacher. I see this documentary process as a way to learn the tools, but also as I way to share what you have learned with your class members.

It's my belief that you can't discuss literature without discussing politics, so adding an additional forum and/or forms of media to the equation doesn't change things much. While I wouldn't go so far as to say these new technologies should be more politically explicit, I do believe it is impossible to separate politics from all forms of media. To what degree each educator chooses to draw on media literacy education as an additional resource is an individual decision, but I hope that I can help my students learn to question themselves and the world around them and that media literacy will play a a roll in that process.