Make Cycle #1 Archive: Remix to Speak Back to Media
- Resource Type:
- Make Cycles
We kicked off the first summer Make Cycle for Letters to the Next President 2.0 by encouraging us all to remix to speak back to media. Here is archive of what happened as well as related resources you are welcome to use/remix as needed this Fall:
What does it mean to remix media? And if remixed media was to “speak back” what would it say?
With the rise of increasingly targeted social media and unprecedented spending on election media, it’s critically important for young people to understand how media influence them as future voters and citizens. Remix is a hands-on way to learn about the election process while talking back to these messages and finding your own voice.
Make With Us
We invite you as educators to try your own hand and to explore with remix with us this week. Here are a few ways to get started (see How-to and Resources for Making below):
- Speak back on an issue or topic you really care about by annotating with hypothes.is.
- Speak back to existing political advertising by breaking and then remixing media using Media Breaker.
- Speak back by creating or remixing by “writing the web” using Mozilla’s Thimble.
Places to share
Here are places where you can connect with other educators and share what you make:
- L2P 2.0 Summer Make Cycles Facebook Group
- Twitter via #2nextprez
Archives of Live Events
We are excited to make and connect with you!
Alan Berry, The LAMP
Joe Dillon, Denver Area Writing Project/NWP
Robert Friedman, Mozilla Foundation/Hive Learning Network
Emily Long, The LAMP
How-To and Resources for Making
Speak back on an issue or topic you really care about by annotating with hypothes.is.
To start, you will need an issue or topic that you really care about … something you can dig your teeth into. Not sure where to start? Try browsing the New York Times Room for Debate series as one way to think through a range of topics and opinions.
Check out some ways that people passionate about their topic have spoken back to media through annotation. At climatefeedback.org, for example, scientists from around the world comment on the accuracy of a variety of climate change media articles using the web annotation. Scientists’ comments, or ‘annotations’ are layered directly onto the original texts allowing readers to easily identify where and why the coverage is consistent (or inconsistent) with state-of-the-art thinking and knowledge in climate science.
Can you imagine creating a annotation interest group like this? Who shares your interest? What texts need talking back to?
You can try this yourself using tool called hypothes.is. For example, if we take the topic of college affordability and the way higher education is framed in the election, we can find a few starting places for annotation:
- This article from Politico talks about approaches from both sides of the isle.
- This Washington Post article might also prompt annotations and remix.
Try this Quick Start Guide for Teachers to get started with your own annotation and then to support others. A larger Teacher Resource Guide is available as well as a specifically developed L2P 2.0 Teacher Resource Guide for the Letters to the Next President 2.0 project.
If you only have 10 minutes you can try your hand at annotating an article and notify a colleague that they should do the same. … If you have a couple of hours, you can create a blog, a Facebook group, or Slack channel devoted to your topic, then identify the first few texts your group will mark up.
There are fun ways to think about annotation offline too: Find an article in print that you want to speak back to and gather colorful markers and sticky notes. Try to be creative in the way you mark it up. Be inspired by New York Post-it wars. Alternatively, you could take an article and create a blackout poem to creatively speak back to it.
Take a photo so we can see what you made! Share at the L2P 2.0 Summer Make Cycles Facebook Group or via Twitter tagged #2nextprez.
Speak back to existing political advertising by breaking and then remixing media using Media Breaker.
Start by checking out a playlist of ‘broken’ election videos created by students in The LAMP’s Break the Election programs this past spring.
In what ways are these youth speaking back to messages they are receiving and why?
You can try your hand at one of these:
- Here is a Guide to Critical Commentary with Media Breaker and The LAMP’s Guide to Fair Use
- Here is a compilation of actual (not yet remixed) 2016 Republican/Democratic campaign ads that you could use to start (also see PoliticalAdArchive.org).
- Alternatively, if current candidates are deemed too volatile, consider going back to past candidates/elections and bring an historical lens into the picture.
Here is a link to Media Breaker Studio and some guidelines for how to get started.
- Quick Start Guide for Teachers (set up your studio page)
- Quick Start Guide for Students (create and save your break in a studio)
Note: you can also try Media Breaker Editor without signing up (note that this version will not automatically save).
If you only have 10 minutes, feel free to grab some images and headlines and mash them up into one image instead of make a full media break. If you have a couple of hours, you can also remix pieces of video (news clips, debate segments, campaign commercials) and mash them up into a video about a candidate.
You can also try this off-line using printed materials you might get in the mail or see in periodicals/posters. Use these materials to create a collage that speaks back with your critical commentary on their materials. Take a picture of your collage to further share.
Share at the L2P 2.0 Summer Make Cycles Facebook Group or via Twitter tagged #2nextprez.
Speak back by creating or remixing by “writing the web” using Mozilla’s Thimble.
Start by trying your hand at remixing a few fun items to make them your own. Thimble allows you to remix online content by editing HTML and CSS directly. A great way to learn about basic web mark-up language while making your message clear.
Click on “Remix” to get started and notice there is an online tutorial within each activity to walk you through step-by-step:
Want to take it another step further? You can speak back by make your own version of the news with this Hack the News Activity.
Need more support? Start a conversation and get support from peers on Mozilla’s online forum.
Or, if you want to explore offline, find a physical newspaper or magazine with an article to speak back to or “remix”. Have students create a collage by replacing images with cutouts or hand drawings, and having them replace paragraphs or sections by handwriting reflections and pasting them over the printed text.
Share at the L2P 2.0 Summer Make Cycles Facebook Group or via Twitter tagged #2nextprez.
Additional Resources
Speaking back often also requires research to support sound commentary and argument-making supported by sources. Here are some resources that might be helpful as starting points:
Working online requires web literacy; here are some great resources helpful in this area too:
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