Investigating, Informing, Influencing: Exploring Current Issues on a National and Global Scale

This unit was created by Alexandra (Alex) Yeganegi, a high school English Language Arts educator in Marietta, GA, as part of the 2023-2024 Pulitzer Center Teacher Fellowship program. It is designed for facilitation across eight class periods, with work outside of class.

For more units created by Pulitzer Center Teacher Fellows in this cohort, click here.

Objectives:

Students will…

• Explore the similarities and differences in reporting from mainstream media news sources and the Pulitzer Center. 

• Explore reporting on issues that are relevant in both the United States and globally. 
• Analyze reporting in order to gather information and varying perspectives on a global issue that will help them formulate an argument. 
• Determine how to make their findings relevant and accessible to an audience of teenagers in the U.S..
• Use digital media tools to create a social media post that effectively engages, informs, and persuades a teen audience about a global issue. 
• Reflect about their understanding of a global issue, understanding of news, and their own learning throughout the unit.

Unit Overview:

Students need to think critically about important local and global issues in order to be informed citizens who are equipped with the information and skills to engage with their worlds. While students in the U.S. often explore through a U.S. perspective (especially in American Literature courses), we must expand our viewpoints through a global lens in order to understand diverse perspectives. This unit is intended to fit into the larger picture of a course in which students have extensively read and discussed immigration and the American Dream. Therefore, this unit begins with a focus on stories of migration. Students examine Pulitzer Center reporting together to look at the stories of migrant journeys to, and experiences in, the United States. Next, students work in small groups to explore stories of global migration.

Students practice analyzing the content in a global news story, evaluating the writer’s structure and use of text features, and generating claims based on the evidence and reasoning in the texts. This section of the unit serves two purposes: First, it connects to the themes of the course as a whole. Second, it scaffolds and models expectations for interacting with the reporting. 
After exploring issues impacting migrants and refugees as a class, and in small groups, students select one of the following topics for further exploration: Justice, Environment and Climate Change, Mental Health, Public Health, Women, Indigenous People, and Poverty and Homelessness (note: These topics were selected from the Pulitzer Center’s focus areas  because they support the required coursework of the students who engaged with this unit in spring 2024, but the topics could be easily interchanged). Working in small groups, students will read, analyze, and evaluate a curated list of Pulitzer Center-supported reporting on the issue they selected. After working with their texts, groups will formulate claims about the issue around the world, support the claims with strong evidence from the texts, and determine a call to action. They will then use digital media tools to create an Instagram carousel that engages their school audience, informs their audience about the issue they selected, and persuades their audience to take action. Finished performance tasks will be posted to a school Instagram account for a real-world audience. To increase engagement, challenge the groups to repost and share their carousel to try to get the most interaction (likes and comments).

Performance Task(s):

Students will create an Instagram carousel using digital media tools about a global issue that they think their school audience should know more about. The purpose of the campaign is to report on their findings from various sources, make the issue relevant and understandable for the intended audience of U.S. teenagers, and effectively engage and persuade the audience about possible calls to action.

Assessment/Evaluation:

Formative Performance Task (Article Analysis Handouts) Rubric [.pdf][.docx]
Summative Performance Task and Rubric [.pdf][.docx]

Seven-lesson unit plan for teachers, including pacing, texts and multimedia resources, guiding questions for group discussions, performance task instructions, and grading rubric for the unit. This unit was written to be taught over the course of 13 90-minute classes, but can shortened or extended as needed.

Unit Resources:

Georgia Standards of Excellence: 

ELAGSE11-12RI1 Cite strong and thorough textual evidence to support analysis of what the text says explicitly as well as inferences drawn from the text, including determining where the text leaves matters uncertain. 

ELAGSE11-12RI5 Analyze and evaluate the effectiveness of the structure an author uses in his or her exposition or argument, including whether the structure makes points clear, convincing, and engaging. 

ELAGSE11-12RI7 Integrate and evaluate multiple sources of information presented indifferent media or formats (e.g., visually, quantitatively) as well as in words in order to address a question or solve a problem. 

ELAGSE11-12W1 Write arguments to support claims in an analysis of substantive topics or texts, using valid reasoning and relevant and sufficient evidence.

ELAGSE11-12W2 Write informative/explanatory texts to examine and convey complex ideas, concepts, and information clearly and accurately through the effective selection, organization, and analysis of content. 

ELAGSE11-12W6 Use technology, including the Internet, to produce, publish, and update individual or shared writing products in response to ongoing feedback, including new arguments or information. 

ELAGSE11-12W7 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.

The following examples capture engagement by students in Marietta, GA in this unit plan in spring 2024.

1. First, students evaluate their connections to news outlets and their experiences engaging with the news. They compare and contrast different news sources, and then evaluate headlines from different news outlets for stories related to climate and the environment (or another issue the teacher chooses). The following image captures one student's analysis of what they tend to see in the news about climate and the environment in the U.S. and outside of the U.S.

2. Students then evaluate several Pulitzer Center-supported stories on climate and the environment (or another topic determined by the teacher) and use a graphic organizer to track the claims made in those articles, the ways the author uses images/text features to support their claims, and to reflect on what new understanding they have about climate/environmental challenges worldwide after reviewing the article.

a. Analysis of the article, "In Namibia’s Kunene Region, Government Initiative Helps Livestock Farmers Cope With Recurring Droughts" by Mandile Mpofu about government-led initiatives in Namibia to combat challenges faced by farmers due to recurring droughts

b. Analysis of the article, "Parched Rivers, Withered Crops Show Dire Impact of Amazon Drought" by Sam Cowie and Rodrigo Pedroso about the impacts of droughts on communities in the Brazilian Amazon

3. Students then identify a global issue to focus on for their final projects and utilize graphic organizers to analyze seven news stories on their selected topic. The following are analyses from students on news articles related to the focus issues they explored.

• Analysis of an article on an investigation into undercounted deaths in Pennsylvania jails
• Analysis of an article on health care challenges faced by women in of color in rural areas in the U.S.
• Analysis of an article about refugees from Afghanistan who have settled in the D.C. area
• Analysis of an article about women in Kashmir who face challenges to accessing menstrual health services
• Analysis of an article on women divers in India who support seaweed cultivation

• Analysis of an article on an investigation into how AI algorithms on social media inaccurately categorize photos

• Analysis of an article cowritten by a father and child who co-created a podcast about how to discuss mental health and suicide with teens.
• Analysis of an article about the impact of rising temperatures worldwide on mental health

4. Next, students synthesize their learning from seven articles on a topic they chose using the graphic organizer "Putting it all Together." This resource guides students in thinking about connections between the seven articles, and ultimately what they may want to share in their social media posts for their student audience.

5. At the end of the unit, students synthesize their learning about a global issue through analysis of several news articles into an Instagram carousel where they share their learning with a student audience and identify potential actions readers could take.

• Student-created Instagram carousel focused on reporting about migration to the U.S.

• Student-created Instagram carousel focused on homelessness in Georgia

• Student-created Instagram carousel focused on women's rights worldwide

Click here to visit students' posts on Instagram on topics such as mental health, challenges faced by Indigenous communities worldwide, the fairness of justice systems worldwide, poverty globally, and more.