Brown Group

Critical EvaluationOur Franchise wishes to educate the public about media literacy. One way to ensure that the article or news story we read is true is to critically evaluate the source. We are here to teach you how to do that through three different media channels.

Small Town NewsAs a Small Town Newspaper we pride ourselves as the voice of our community for the New digital age, yet we dont always get it right. You can find us at the newsstand and online @SmallTownNow as we work out the kinks of reporting in a transmedia era.

➔ We utilize printed articles to share inaccurate stories with the readers so they can realize how susceptible they are to distorted information.

➔ We will use Twitter as a source to contribute to the stories as well as a platform to interact with our audiences. The characters will post daily updates and “netizens” can tag responses as well.

➔ Our webisodes will show a dedicated Small Town Newspaper reader, who purchases a copy every morning. He reads a less than believable article and proceeds to share it with all his colleagues at work.

To critically evaluate our newspaper, our micro-movies and twitter feed will follow up with corrections on how those stories could've been critically evaluated. We’ll use “Ad-like” videos and twitter blast to inform our audience.

We are co-workers at a Newspaper company. We have a columnist who is gullible enough to report about practically every story to cross her path without checking sources. Then we have the pessimist of the office who evaluates every story or feed he reads on twitter. Of course, we have the office pet who creates micro movies to display how easily our fabricated printed story was dispersed throughout the day. We also have two interns who are aspiring reporters with different attitudes. They are both more than capable of joining the staff yet are always overlooked.

Informing the public, one fallacious story at a time!

Through our own mistakes we seek to

teach the readers how to critically evaluate their

sources using triangulation and critical

thinking.

Meet our staffColumnist …………………………………………….

Rhonda

Twitter ……………………………………………. Archie

Intern #1……………………………………………. Denise

Assistant ……………………………………………. Joe

Intern #2 ……………………………………………. Alex

RhondaHi readers! My name is Rhonda and isn’t it a lovely day :) I am from a small town named DalilaVille where I grew up surrounded by daisy’s! I was raised to be a kind hearted individual who values trust and believes it is given not earned. I have a plethora of hobbies but what I most enjoy is reading romantic novels by a fire with a glass of wine! I attended a small high school where I learned I wanted to be involved in journalism by participating in our school newsletter. I earned an AA degree from the city college in the town next door and was hired on at a small town newspaper as a columnist. Over the years I have reported on hundreds of stories for our readers but for some reason I still receive backlash from them. Readers leave comments about how inaccurate my stories are but I believe if a story presents itself then there has to be some truth to it and it is my duty to pass it on.

RhondaIn communicating our franchise’s message of media literacy Rhonda is the example of what not to do. She reports on practically every story that crosses her path to teach how susceptible society is to mendacious stories. Rhonda does not think critically when doing her job nor does she fact check her sources. Rhonda’s co-worker Joe creates webisodes to showcase the spread of her erroneous stories.

Archibald Thurston Jr. IIII am Archibald Thurston Jr. III. I hail from New York, New York where my family has been a part of the Socialite scene since the Roaring 20's. My Great Grandfather William Thurston owned Shipping company and made a great deal of money shipping in Spices from Asia. We would tell my Grand Father Archibald Thurston of his travels to the Far East to search out spices and exotics wonders. He was one of the first importers of Soy sauce to America. As William grew in stature in the city he sent My Grand Father to a prestigious Boarding school in Upstate new York called Darrow School. When my father Archibald Jr. II was of age he also attend this school. I of course followed in his footsteps. Having spent my formidable years at a college preparatory school helped shape me. I knew at age 16 I wanted to be a news man. I wrote a column in the schools newspaper about and when I was editor in Chief by My junior year. I beat out John Taylor whose family is from Massachusetts. Our Families have had a long history at Darrow so it was extra special to stick it to the Taylors. It seems people from Massachusetts are just not as civilized as New York. Why Darrow chooses to help out these ingrates is beyond me but I guess it has helped lead me to where I am today. Sometimes you must help out the uncivilized people around you. Inevitably I will Head back to New York to take my rightful place among the top News en in the world but I feel I need to help out the less informed first. It sort of like when Rhonda wants to report on some Homeless shelter handing out free blankets. Being here helping out these people is like handing out blankets except I'm handing out knowledge in the form of twitter corrections. And these interns? I'm sure the newspaper staff at Darrow is better suited to report the news than them.

Archibald Thurston Jr. IIIMy Tweeter Series "Real Events in the Big City" started as a way to distract myself from the boredom of small town living. But after the first week I received so many tweets asking why my colleagues would report such false stories that I knew I had to take action. I take stories written by Rhonda then I critically review using techniques taught to me by the famed Professor Howard Rheingold in his course "Crap Detection 101". Using his techniques on "How to search" and "How to know" it's pretty easy to find holes in Rhonda's stories. I tweet out about 3 corrections per week. My Followers have grown to 330 since I began this campaign to clean up small town news.

Denise - the internHello world! This is Denise. I have been an intern for 6 months now. I was born in San Jose but I grew up all over the place. My family moved to Korea before pre-school. My father was a photographer and we travelled a lot, by “a lot” I mean we were constantly moving. After preschool we went to Northern Ireland for 2 years. We moved again. This time to Singapore when I was 10 and again to Taichung when I was 14. We stayed in Taichung for 2 years before we moved up to Taipei, where I graduated high school. I decided to go to college in the U.S. while my parents are now somewhere in Europe. I read a lot. Growing up in so many places had equipped me multiple language skills and global visions. However, I find it hard to settle in this company. At first I tried to speak up in meetings, but the longer I work the more confused I am. Most of the time I find my supervisors and fellows do not see the world I do. I was neglected and ignored. But I really want to be part of the group! That’s why a while ago, I decided to adapt a strategy I used when I tried to blend in, which I was forced to back then when we were moving around. I started to only speak up to what I find my viewpoint “sync” with the group.

Denise In the media literacy campaign, Denise demonstrates a communication theory, Spiral of Silence. People tend to remain silent when they feel that their views are in opposition to the majority view. This is because of the fear of isolation. In this case, Denise decided not to speak up and remain silence until her viewpoint sync with her colleagues.

JOEHello readers! My name is Joe, and I am the assistant at Small Town News. I have been with the newspaper for almost 3 years. My dad is an English teacher and my mom is a writer. I was born and grew up in Santa Cruz, CA, and studied journalism at UC Santa Cruz. I also worked in the printing department of our school newspaper. After graduation, I got a job with a small magazine in town as the office assistant. I got let go after 5 months because my boss said I gossip too much. On my spare time, I like to hang out at coffee shops with my laptop. I also like to walk my two dogs down to the beach and watch them play in the water.

JOEJoe is indecisive and tend to like to blend in the background when real work is being done, as he has no idea what he’s doing. He does not care much about his job or his colleagues. Because of his unprofessional demeanor, it has influenced the outcome of these webisodes that he has created.

AlexHey! My name is Alex, I am a recent college grad from the University of Idaho. I received my bachelors in Journalism and am one of the interns at Small Town News. In college I worked for the news paper and as an editor for ledge and add it to my resume. My interthe town news, moreover as an intern at Small Town News I’m hoping to expand my knowests are reading and investigating which explains my infatuation with constant note taking and learning. Aside from my interests in journalism I enjoy watching television and Discovery Channel.

AlexI’m the type of journalist that is very hands on and at times will micro-manage everyone around me, which is why I aspire to one day be the boss of my own newspaper. However at the moment I work as an intern at Small Town Now which limits my amount of input and professional output to coffee runs and copy making. My fellow intern Denise and I are usually shunned to the side yet remain confident that one day the news staff will give us our time to shine. In the mean time I find myself annoyed by Rhonda’s gullibility, Archibalds pompous attitude, and Joe’s nonchalance. I feel that they need me to micro-manage them to success rather than pick up their coffee with two sugars and one cream.

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WEEKLY TEAM MEETING Rhonda: Welcome to today’s meeting. We will be discussing our franchise’s goals and the ways we go about accomplishing them. Rhonda: We wish to inform the public about how easy it is to spread untrue stories with social media. We then teach people the tools necessary to avoid this issue with media literacy. Joe: Last week, we accidentally printed a fabricated story without realizing. Because of that, our paper got criticized. Good thing Archie was able to save us via Twitter, but I will let him elaborate more on that.Rhonda: I like to report about almost anything that my sources give me. It is my duty to share the knowledge given to me, to others. When my reports are inaccurate my colleague Joe shows our viewer’s the frenzy my stories can create.Joe: My responsibility is to make webisodes showing how the stories we print can easily be spread by our readers. Archie: I use twitter to teach Rhonda’s readers techniques like triangulation and critical thinking with media literacy. I point out where she went wrong like not crap checking sources.

WEEKLY TEAM MEETING (continued)Alex: I know I’m just an intern, but I have skills and these skills should be utilized. I can help Rhonda proofread before anything goes to print. Don’t just use me to fetch coffee.Archie: You seem quiet, do you have anything to add Denise?Denise: OH, no, no, no, I have nothing to add. Well…. I think everything we’ve discussed thus far are great ideas. I think our twitter feed is a modern way to teach our viewers about media literacy. Joe: Great observation Denise. You’re still fairly new, but youwill fit right in with our Small Town News family.Archie: Thats it for today folks! Have a good weekend and remember don’t believe it until you check it!