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Background, Activities and Critical Analysis |
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By Syd Golston
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| SubjectList: Civics/Government, Current Events |
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| EstimatedTime: One class |
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| Grades 9-12 |
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| The lesson requires that students learn elements of formal logic, so that they can identify logical fallacies used by candidates to sway voters. Students also learn to use FactCheck.org to check up on claims made in commercials, and make inventories of political spots on a local television channel. |
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YouTube has changed the nature and shelf life of political commercials by enabling the public to watch them millions of times from personal computers, which expands enormously the influence that those commercials have on the voting public.
The Wall Street Journal reported in August that “Campaigns, political parties and outside groups are expected to spend some $6.5 billion on television and cable ads for federal and state elections this year, up from $4.8 billion in 2008, according to estimates from Borrell Associates Inc., which tracks local TV and online advertising.”
It becomes increasingly critical that voters learn to distinguish among valid policy presentations and spots that intend to please or intimidate the voters rather than inform them. In the computer age, it is also possible for an individual to check the facts included in commercials instantly.
- Students will examine and practice using Ten Logical Fallacies on Student Worksheet One, “Logical Fallacies.”
- The teacher then displays, via SmartBoard or projector, eight commercials from the elections of 2012.
- As each commercial plays, students select and record the fallacy in that commercial, using Student Worksheet Two, “Find the Fallacies”
- After the class has analyzed real commercials, students can make their own – using links to their Facebook pages, if they wish – at http://www.pbs.org/newshour/extra/teachers/lessonplans/politics/vote2012/adlibs_10-11.html
- Students choose one of the commercials, or another they find on YouTube, to verify facts and claims at http://www.factcheck.org/ A Project of the Annenberg Public Policy Center.
- The class selects one race in their own state, to follow claims and counter-claims in commercials. They can check newspaper or television analyses for leads.
- Students choose a two hour period of time on a weekday evening to quantify political commercials on the local ABC, CBS, or NBC station. How many commercials in all are aired? How many for each party? What is the placement of commercials during the programming?
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| Last Updated: October 18, 2012 |
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National Council for the Social Studies,
National Curriculum Standards for Social Studies
Theme 10, Civic Ideals and Practices
Learners will be able to:
- Ask and find answers to questions about how to become informed and take civic action
- Research primary and secondary sources to make decisions and propose solutions to selected civic issues in the past and present
- Identify assumptions, misconceptions, and biases in sources, evidence, and arguments used in presenting issues and positions
- Evaluate the effectiveness and importance of public opinion in influencing and shaping public policy development and decision-making
Common Core Reading Standards for Literacy in History/Social Studies 6–12
Grades 11 and 12:
- Evaluate authors’ differing points of view on the same historical event or issue by assessing theauthors’ claims, reasoning, and evidence.
- Integrate and evaluate multiple sources of information presented in diverse formats and media(e.g., visually, quantitatively, as well as in words) inorder to address a question or solve a problem.
- Evaluate an author’s premises, claims, and evidence by corroborating or challenging them with other information
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