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Project | 8 Weeks

On Our Minds Podcast


Introduction

In this assignment, you will learn how to make your own podcast segment about an issue related to mental health. You will learn how to create an audio story, write a script, and edit audio. The result: a 3-5 minute audio story about a young person and their experience with mental health. Click on the Assignment Tab above to view the project.

Learning Outcomes

  • Understand how to record AUDIO INTERVIEWS (in person or virtually)
  • Understand how to gather AUDIO SCENES
  • Understand how to TRANSCRIBE recorded audio
  • Critically think about story STRUCTURE and create a SCRIPT
  • Understand how to EDIT AUDIO to form a cohesive narrative

Why Mental Health?

Global and national events plus all that is going on in our homes and neighborhoods affect our MENTAL HEALTH.

What is mental health? Mental health includes our emotional, psychological, and social well-being. It affects how we think, feel, and act. It also helps determine how we handle stress, relate to others, and make choices [source]. Many factors contribute to mental health problems, including: biological factors (such as genes or brain chemistry), life experiences, and family history.

Mental illness is on the rise among adolescents, with 1 in 5 teenagers living with a severe mental disorder [source]. And 70% of teens say that anxiety and depression are major problems among people their age in their community [source]. That means that mental concerns are really common. There are many resources available, though young people may not always know where to go for help.

Why report on mental health? The media plays a crucial role in advancing our understanding of mental health and reducing stigmas around these conditions. Youth journalists, in particular, have a unique perspective and opportunity to show what mental health really looks like for young people, what kind of services are available to them, and the real stories behind the statistics.

Classroom Conversations

Before embarking with your students on generating story ideas and diving into production, it is important to first:

  • Have class conversations about mental health. You could invite your school counselor or nurse to join you in these discussions.

TEACHERS: USE THESE CLASSROOM ACTIVITIES TO START THE CONVERSATION

  • Familiarize yourself with podcasts and talk with your students about how podcasting can be a great format for telling mental health stories.

External Podcast Resources:

Some great podcasts to listen to with your students:

Examples

Empowered Learner

Students leverage technology to take an active role in choosing, achieving and demonstrating competency in their learning goals, informed by the learning sciences. (ISTE)

Demonstrate technical support related to media production (e.g., broadcast, video, web, mobile).

  • CCTC AR-AV 3.1: Demonstrate how to repair and service transmitting and receiving systems.
  • CCTC AR-AV 3.2: Employ knowledge of wireless and wired transmission systems.
  • CCTC AR-AV 3.3: Demonstrate installation of cabling for audio/video productions.
  • CCTC AR-AV 3.4: Demonstrate the installation of a wireless audio/video system.
  • CCTC AR-AV 3.5: Demonstrate how to troubleshoot audio/video system operations.
  • CCTC AR-AV 4.1: Apply knowledge of the critical elements in designing a production to activities in the pre-production stage.
  • CCTC AR-AV 4.2: Identify the basic functions and resources for editing an audio/video production.
  • CCTC AR-AV 4.3: Apply computer-based development in video production and editing, with an emphasis on digital technology.

Language - Vocabulary Acquisition and Use

  • CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.L.9-10.4: Determine or clarify the meaning of unknown and multiple-meaning words and phrases based on grades 9–10 reading and content, choosing flexibly from a range of strategies.
  • CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.L.9-10.5: Demonstrate understanding of figurative language, word relationships, and nuances in word meanings.
  • CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.L.9-10.6: Acquire and use accurate general academic and domain-specific words and phrases, sufficient for reading, writing, speaking, and listening at the college and career readiness level; demonstrate independence in gathering vocabulary knowledge when considering a word or phrase important to comprehension or expression.

Demonstrate the use of basic tools and equipment used in audio, video and film production.

  • CCTC AR 2.1: Assess workplace conditions with regard to safety and health.

Creative Communicator

Students communicate clearly and express themselves creatively for a variety of purposes using the platforms, tools, styles, formats and digital media appropriate to their goals. (ISTE)

Demonstrate writing processes used in journalism and broadcasting media.

  • CCTC AR-JB 2.1: Demonstrate how to cultivate sources for stories.
  • CCTC AR-JB 2.2: Demonstrate how to obtain information to use in writing a story.
  • CCTC AR-JB 2.3: Develop written stories for print and broadcast.
  • CCTC AR-JB 2.4: Demonstrate how photographs support the development of stories.
  • CCTC AR-JB 2.5: Employ knowledge of the similarities and differences among editorial, feature, and news writing styles.
  • CCTC AR-JB 2.6: Define the terminology associated with journalism and broadcasting.
  • CCTC AR-JB 2.7: Develop a complete radio project.
  • CCTC AR-JB 2.8: Develop a complete television project.

Analyze the legal and ethical responsibilities required in the arts, audio/visual technology and communications workplace.

  • CCTC AR 4.1: Analyze the legal and ethical responsibilities required in the arts, audio/visual technology and communications workplace.

Reading - Integration of Knowledge and Ideas

  • CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.L.9-10.7: Analyze the representation of a subject or a key scene in two different artistic mediums, including what is emphasized or absent in each treatment (e.g., Auden’s “Musée des Beaux Arts” and Breughel’s Landscape with the Fall of Icarus).
  • CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.L.9-10. 8 (Not applicable to literature)
  • CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.L.9-10.9: Analyze how an author draws on and transforms source material in a specific work (e.g., how Shakespeare treats a theme or topic from Ovid or the Bible or how a later author draws on a play by Shakespeare).

Plan and deliver a media production (e.g., broadcast, video, web, mobile).

  • CCTC AR-JB 3.1: Analyze the elements of a newscast production.
  • CCTC AR-JB 3.2: Analyze individual announcing competence.
  • CCTC AR-JB 3.3: Identify wardrobe suitable for on-camera appearances.
  • CCTC AR-JB 3.4: Analyze production functions..
  • CCTC AR-JB 3.5: Demonstrate promoting productions.
  • CCTC AR-JB 3.6: Analyze how image capturing and graphics design support the development of electronic presentations.
  • CCTC AR-JB 3.7: Distinguish amongst various musical radio formats.

Demonstrate technical support skills for audio, video and film productions.

  • CCTC AR-JB 4.1: Examine equipment and its function.
  • CCTC AR-JB 4.2: Examine production activities.
  • CCTC AR-JB 4.3: Explain how to run a board shift.
  • CCTC AR-JB 4.4: Examine set design principles and practices.

Speaking and Listening - Presentation of Knowledge and Ideas

  • CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.L.9-10.4: Present information, findings, and supporting evidence clearly, concisely, and logically such that listeners can follow the line of reasoning and the organization, development, substance, and style are appropriate to purpose, audience, and task.
  • CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.L.9-10.5: Make strategic use of digital media (e.g., textual, graphical, audio, visual, and interactive elements) in presentations to enhance understanding of findings, reasoning, and evidence and to add interest.
  • CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.L.9-10.6: Adapt speech to a variety of contexts and tasks, demonstrating command of formal English when indicated or appropriate.

Speaking and Listening - Comprehension and Collaboration

  • CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.L.9-10.1: Initiate and participate effectively in a range of collaborative discussions (one-on-one, in groups, and teacher-led) with diverse partners on grades 9–10 topics, texts, and issues, building on others’ ideas and expressing their own clearly and persuasively.
  • CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.L.9-10.2: Integrate multiple sources of information presented in diverse media or formats (e.g., visually, quantitatively, orally) evaluating the credibility and accuracy of each source.
  • CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.L.9-10.3: Evaluate a speaker’s point of view, reasoning, and use of evidence and rhetoric, identifying any fallacious reasoning or exaggerated or distorted evidence.

Writing - Research to Build and Present Knowledge

  • CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.L.9-10.7: Conduct short as well as more sustained research projects to answer a question (including a self-generated question) or solve a problem; narrow or broaden the inquiry when appropriate; synthesize multiple sources on the subject, demonstrating understanding of the subject under investigation.
  • CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.L.9-10.8: Gather relevant information from multiple authoritative print and digital sources, using advanced searches effectively; assess the usefulness of each source in answering the research question; integrate information into the text selectively to maintain the flow of ideas, avoiding plagiarism and following a standard format for citation.
  • CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.L.9-10.9: Draw evidence from literary or informational texts to support analysis, reflection, and research.

Writing - Production and Distribution of Writing

  • CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.L.9-10.4: Produce clear and coherent writing in which the development, organization, and style are appropriate to task, purpose, and audience. (Grade-specific expectations for writing types are defined in standards 1–3 above.)
  • CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.L.9-10.5: Develop and strengthen writing as needed by planning, revising, editing, rewriting, or trying a new approach, focusing on addressing what is most significant for a specific purpose and audience. (Editing for conventions should demonstrate command of Language standards 1–3 up to and including grades 9–10.)
  • CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.L.9-10.6: Use technology, including the Internet, to produce, publish, and update individual or shared writing products, taking advantage of technology’s capacity to link to other information and to display information flexibly and dynamically.

Reading - Key Ideas and Details

  • CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.L.9-10.1: Cite strong and thorough textual evidence to support analysis of what the text says explicitly as well as inferences drawn from the text.
  • CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.L.9-10.2: Determine a theme or central idea of a text and analyze in detail its development over the course of the text, including how it emerges and is shaped and refined by specific details; provide an objective summary of the text.
  • CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.L.9-10.3: Analyze how complex characters (e.g., those with multiple or conflicting motivations) develop over the course of a text, interact with other characters, and advance the plot or develop the theme.
Topics

Journalism

Representation

Podcasting

Education

Mental Health

Levels

Intermediate

Advanced

Materials

Mic

Computers

Mobile Phone

Internet

Notebook

Estimated Time

8 Weeks