Following the horrific Baby P story, the papers have been full of vitriolic attacks on social workers in Haringey (and in general). Here's a taste of some of the ways in which this social group and individuals such as Sharon Shoesmith have been represented comments on The Sun's message boards.
Sun letters and texts
Daily Mirror - view from a social worker
Daily Mail - "bungling social workers put children at risk"
Daily Mail - social workers criticised for "flimsy abuse claim"
You can't win with the Daily Mail, can you?
As an ENGA1 mode exercise, you might find the comparisons between Sun letters and text messages useful too.
Tuesday, December 2, 2008
Single mothers
I've encouraged my students to google a phrase to get texts on a more specific topic. Demonstrating it with "single mother", some of the first-page hits I got were: this Guardian piece on J K Rowling and her rags-to-riches story (from July 1997); this Independent comment by Kate Saunders on her own experience (from Apr 2007) and this wonderful example from the Daily Mail about a single Nigerian mother who lives in a big house that - guess what - we the taxpayers are funding (from Nov 2008). There's clearly enough here for an investigation, but any of the texts could also be used as part of an 'institution' investigation into the idea of Family, or further texts about J K Rowling or Omowunmi Odia could be found for a piece on individuals.
Sunday, November 30, 2008
Gordon Ramsay is a "lying, cheating, hypocritical scumbag"
No, don't beat about the bush: tell us what you really think.
Here's the News of the World's Carole Malone telling us what she thinks of the f-word chef (presumably that f-word is now fidelity). Nice use of premodifiers there...
Here's the News of the World's Carole Malone telling us what she thinks of the f-word chef (presumably that f-word is now fidelity). Nice use of premodifiers there...
Thursday, November 27, 2008
Obituaries
[caption id="attachment_38" align="alignleft" width="123" caption="elliott smith"]
[/caption]
[caption id="attachment_39" align="alignright" width="86" caption="richey edwards"]
[/caption]
Representation of individuals in obituaries? Here's one from this week's Guardian which has a bit of a twist: no one is really sure if he's dead or not. And then a couple of others of musicians who've met untimely deaths...
Richey Edwards of Manic Street Preachers
Elliott Smith
Kurt Cobain of Nirvana
Arthur Lee of Love
Tupac Shakur
Article on Ian Curtis of Joy Division
[/caption][caption id="attachment_39" align="alignright" width="86" caption="richey edwards"]
[/caption]Representation of individuals in obituaries? Here's one from this week's Guardian which has a bit of a twist: no one is really sure if he's dead or not. And then a couple of others of musicians who've met untimely deaths...
Richey Edwards of Manic Street Preachers
Elliott Smith
Kurt Cobain of Nirvana
Arthur Lee of Love
Tupac Shakur
Article on Ian Curtis of Joy Division
Friday, November 21, 2008
Ideas for ENGA2 coursework projects - wikis
We've spent about a month with 4 classes on the ENGA2 work so far. Our classes are all taught by 2 teachers with one doing ENGA1 and the other doing ENGA2, so it means we get 3 periods a week on coursework.
In my 2 classes we've done some early work on social groups and individuals, with students using our college VLE (Moodle) to track a celebrity/ individual in the news and post their links to a wiki. It's a pretty simple idea but if you've not come across a wiki before, it might need some explanation.
Basically, a wiki is a lo-fi website that allows students to create their own pages with text, images and links to other sites. We've got it set up so each student has their own wiki and we can, as teachers, access all their wikis to check on progress. The kinds of things they're posting are links to stories about their chosen individuals and celebs, so one student has been looking at how Jean Charles De Menezes has been represented in the press during the inquiry into his shooting, several have looked at Barack Obama in the run up to and afternmath of his election, some have looked at Madonna, Guy Ritchie, Kerry Katona, Sarah Palin, Lewis Hamilton, Gordon Brown...the list goes on. But they're posting the links to their wikis and keeping tabs on evolving news stories, so that's a start.
The difficult bit is getting them to then select the most useful stuff from these stories to analyse for representation. We've spent about 3 lessons so far selecting and analysing anything from 2-3 word noun phrases ("troubled Amy Winehouse", "former drug abuser Kerry Katona") to whole paragraphs of text where more complex discourses are presented.
They're now moving onto a 2nd tracking exercise on events, issues or institutions, before we do a third and final one at the end of term on social groups.
Alongside this, we've started getting them to do some analytical work to show them what kinds of frameworks are relevant, and for this I've used extracts on how young people are represented. I'll post up the links or files later this week.
Anyway, what's everyone else doing or planning to do? I can't claim that our approach is particularly original or successful (who knows what'll actually get written for the coursework) but it'd be good to hear of any other approaches from teachers of ENGA2.
In my 2 classes we've done some early work on social groups and individuals, with students using our college VLE (Moodle) to track a celebrity/ individual in the news and post their links to a wiki. It's a pretty simple idea but if you've not come across a wiki before, it might need some explanation.
Basically, a wiki is a lo-fi website that allows students to create their own pages with text, images and links to other sites. We've got it set up so each student has their own wiki and we can, as teachers, access all their wikis to check on progress. The kinds of things they're posting are links to stories about their chosen individuals and celebs, so one student has been looking at how Jean Charles De Menezes has been represented in the press during the inquiry into his shooting, several have looked at Barack Obama in the run up to and afternmath of his election, some have looked at Madonna, Guy Ritchie, Kerry Katona, Sarah Palin, Lewis Hamilton, Gordon Brown...the list goes on. But they're posting the links to their wikis and keeping tabs on evolving news stories, so that's a start.
The difficult bit is getting them to then select the most useful stuff from these stories to analyse for representation. We've spent about 3 lessons so far selecting and analysing anything from 2-3 word noun phrases ("troubled Amy Winehouse", "former drug abuser Kerry Katona") to whole paragraphs of text where more complex discourses are presented.
They're now moving onto a 2nd tracking exercise on events, issues or institutions, before we do a third and final one at the end of term on social groups.
Alongside this, we've started getting them to do some analytical work to show them what kinds of frameworks are relevant, and for this I've used extracts on how young people are represented. I'll post up the links or files later this week.
Anyway, what's everyone else doing or planning to do? I can't claim that our approach is particularly original or successful (who knows what'll actually get written for the coursework) but it'd be good to hear of any other approaches from teachers of ENGA2.
More on representation of young people
This follows on from the Barnardo's ads earlier in the week.
Martin Narey of Barnardo's in The Times
Most adults chink children are "feral and a danger to society"
Kids these days: are they all bad?
Marcel Berlins in The Guardian
They're people not animals
Martin Narey of Barnardo's in The Times
Most adults chink children are "feral and a danger to society"
Kids these days: are they all bad?
Marcel Berlins in The Guardian
They're people not animals
Monday, November 17, 2008
Representation of young people
Some good stuff on the BBC website today linked to the new Barnardo's campaign "Children in Trouble".
BBC story
Barnardo's campaign
Could be a good investigation focus with a ready-made creative task in writing a charity ad to present a more positive representation?
BBC story
Barnardo's campaign
Could be a good investigation focus with a ready-made creative task in writing a charity ad to present a more positive representation?
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