lesson: The Television Mirror
Purpose:
- to enable students to think critically and detect gender and race bias in televison show
- to encourage students to take action to try to remedy some of these biased protrayals
Activities:
- Read "The Television Mirror"
- Have students prove or disprove the statistics in the article (i.e. how many girls are there in their school population? how many boys? does this proportion validate or disprove the proportion found in TV shows?)
- Have students use a variety of sources for population data, both for the US and the world, as well as online sources, such as the C.I.A. Fact Book to compare the TV ethnic representations with that of the real world.
- Have students analyze a popular TV show in class or at home and bring in observations of the portrayal of various ethnic groups, as well as male and female roles, to see how they compare or contrast to the findings of the Children Now organization.
- If the portrayals are, indeed, inaccurate, have the students brainstorm the effects on young viewers and decide on a course of action they could take that might remedy the situation. (i.e. write to the network, the show's producers, advertisers, etc.)
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