Who’s Actually in the Driver’s Seat? Diverse Views of Media and Literary Perspectives

Randall L. Carswell, Language Arts, South Charlotte Middle School

Final Unit (PDF)

Implementing Common Core Standards (PDF)

200 Word Synopsis

This curriculum unit is designed to introduce students to the reality of “perspective” in virtually all text, linear or visual, that they will encounter in a lifetime. With the exception of facts or statistics, students need to consider the perspective with which any information is presented. By utilizing several different and diverse texts I believe that this unit will empower students to more closely analyze what they read and view. I am placing a greater emphasis upon the visual medium due to the fact that our chance for Global Unity depended on the ability of individual and nation to cross many barriers-the most important, communication. A worn out cliché, but still so very succinct, is the observation that “a picture paints a thousand words”. The data utilized in my research, readings and instruction from Dr. Daniel Grano’s presentation of the 2012 C.T.I. seminar, Reading Media Imagery: Critical Thinking and Literacy had a profound effect upon my decision to pursue the focus upon perspective. I firmly believe that we live in an era where the media is “spoon feeding” views and opinions as opposed to presenting objective facts and allowing the recipient to make their own decision/choice/determination!