Good Trouble: From the Classroom to the Community

(Project length will vary depending on the genre)

Unit 2 asked you to research a topic about which you are passionate, organize sources in different genres, and record your own ideas alongside those of secondary sources. In your project conclusion, you reflected on the important things you learned, and what people should know about this topic. The next step is to bring your thoughts out of the classroom and into the community.

Unit 3 asks you to write either a traditional research essay, a letter to an editor (OpEd), a video recording, or podcast to communicate the information you learned in Unit 2. In this unit, you will write about the subject you researched in Unit 2 in the genre of your choice. Whatever you choose, it should be the genre that best reaches the audience you think needs to hear about your topic.

How will you entreat people to engage with your work? Will they read an essay on your topic?  Will you write a photo essay or perhaps a newspaper editorial? The genre choice is yours, as long as it is appropriate to communicating your message effectively and considers how to best reach your target audience.

Helpful resources for composing in various genres: 

The NYT has an entire list of “Mentor Texts” that help you write articles like a sports article and a personal health column. It’s quite useful.  It can be found here: https://www.nytimes.com/column/learning-mentor-texts

The New York Times on creating a Podcast:

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/22/learning/making-a-podcast-that-matters-a-guide-with-examples-from-23-students.html

More resources for creating texts:

Free music: https://www.purple-planet.com/

Free sound effects: http://soundbible.com/free-sound-effects-1.html

Copyright safe images (photos, clip art, etc): https://search.creativecommons.org/

Stock videos (and photos): https://www.pexels.com

Illustrations you can manipulate: https://undraw.co/illustrations

https://www.canva.com/ is a mostly free (especially if you upload your own images) design program that does everything from posters and banners to storyboards and comic strips. A real go-to tool for a lot of people.

Posters, infographics, etc.:

Online comic maker: https://www.makebeliefscomix.com/

Audio creator/editor:  https://www.audacityteam.org/ [easy to use with a full range of tools, lots of videos about how to use it]

Screencasting/video recording:

  •  https://screencast-o-matic.com/ Screencast-o-matic is free if you want to do screen capture videos from your laptop (note: 15 minute max time).
  • YouTube Studio will give you lots of tutorials about how to create videos

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