２学期目の日本語クラスでは言語とマスコミの関係について学びました。詳細な内容としては、
- メディアの形態（SNS、テレビ、新聞、その他）
まずメディアの形態について学びました。クラスではグループ内でディスカッションを行いそれぞれのメディアの種類を考察しました。
- メディアの技法
クラスではそれぞれのメディアで使われる技法などを深く考察しました。内容だけでなく、メディアは映像の見せ方や言葉使いで大きく意味が変わる事があると知りました。
- マスコミの実態：情報操作
僕がこのユニットで最も学んだトピックはマスコミの実態についてです。それは客観的な視点から見たマスコミの実態とそのもくろみです。僕はWTとオーラルを通して情報操作をメインにリサーチを行いました。それ故、左翼右翼が大手マスコミに及ぼす影響などについても学びました。
このユニットを通して僕は日本に於けるマスコミの現状について知りました。今後はニュースやメディアを目の当たりにする際、つねに客観的な視点から見、深読みをしないように気をつけたいです。
Majority of the mega cities around the world happen to be located close to the coast lines. This is because of the multiple benefits that coasts provide when it is being well managed. There are six factors that coastal management consists of, transportation, tourism, industry, resource extraction, settlements, and wildlife habitats. All six are beneficial and detrimental to the coastal city, and also to each other, therefor they all cannot coexist together. Therefor coastal cities each have different types of coastal management, depending on their geographical location and purpose.
Having a port is one of the most effective ways of using a coast. Having ports that provide transportation along the coastline, cities are able to import and export between other cultures at a very cheap price. Although transportation over water costs a lot of time, it can be very cheap to transport a mass amount of items. Therefor it is very popular to have factories and industrial settlements around ports. Resource extraction also goes well with transportation. Resource extraction can be things such as, natural gas, fishing, and oil extraction. When these are extracted along the coastline, it can be distributed and transported very effectively using the port and its transportation. Even though having a port and industrial settlements can boost the coastal cities economy, it creates a lot of waste and pollution killing the wildlife.
Tourism is also one of the most effective ways of using a coast. Coasts can be arranged for drawing in tourists through leisure and recreational spots. In most tourism spots, the number of settlements also start to increase the surrounding area. This is because the amount of jobs increase, due to the demand of the tourists and visitors. It also is amusing to be living besides a beautiful coast thats flourished with recreational and leisure spots.
Although being located on a coast can be beneficial, it can also be detrimental. When coastal cities develop their city, it is inevitable for not having pollution. Pollution can lead to erosion of sea level. Although this may not be a major threat for most cities, it can be critical for some places. Miami for example has potential of suffering from coastal erosion. In order to avoid this, they will have to conduct some sort of engineering to their coasts.
In these ways, coastal management is important to those who live close to the coast. Although it is quite impossible to have all six factors at once, it is still up to the coastal city in what way they choose to invest on the coast.
Here is the link to my report.
After I had finished my project, I learnt that I have gained alot of new knowledge through out this whole project. I was able to meet my goals which was how can Japan teenagers avoid gaining stress? Implying my research to the knowledge I already had, I was able to come up with several definant ways to cope stress. I also was able to state my main point effectively in both my movie and powerpoint. I think my movie could’ve been more detailed with original clips but I spent too much time on the powerpoint, which caused me to rush to finish the video. I used clips which we took for the PSA Assessment also.
Strength in Product: Detailed powerpoint
Weakness in Product: Video lacking technological details
I have had many struggles inorder to create my final product. Research was one of the most struggling. Simply because I had to research on suicide statistics in Japan, more specifically just for the teens, it really was hard to find an english site with detailed statistics. I was able to find an australian survey that was filled by Japanese college students, it didnt give me much information. I ended up googling suicide statistics for teenagers in Japan in Japanese. I came accross many sites, the most trusting one was the Japanese Metropolitan Police Department. They release statistics for all sorts of deaths and crimes, one which was suicides. The statistics were very detailed, helping me greatly in advancing on this project. Stress relievers and information on bullying was found in various places. My main stress reliever source was found on SIRS Discovery, a paid and trusted site by CA.
The three traits from the IB learner profile that I covered the most will be, reflective, knowledgable, and inquirer. I think i covered the IB learner profile, reflective through my video making and this blog post. In order to create my video, I had to reflect from the recent PSA Assessment. I went over what I did well and what I didn’t do well inorder to create a better product for this assignment. This blog post also requires us to reflect on my work since the investigate blog post. I think I also covered the IB Learner profile, knowledgable. I explored an global concept. It took me alot of knowledge inorder to understand and think about my topic and how to solve the problem. The last IB Learner profile I covered is inquirer. For choosing the topic of this project, It required us to seek natural curiosity in the problem/topic. In my case, I was curious on stress and its effect on Japanese teenagers. Knowing that Japan has an high suicide rate, I wanted to know its reality or current status. In these aspects, I covered three of the IB Learner Profile, Reflective, Knowledgable, and Inquirer.
The topic I chose for my end of year assessment will be “Stress on Japanese teenagers” . I will be using myself as a partial example, some ways to reduce for others. I, myself is an partial example because I live in a Japanese society. But the level of stress I receive from pressure is rather light weighted compared to the Japanese middle and highschoolers who face exams inorder to get into high school and university.
The reason I chose this topic is simply because I live in a country where many suicide happens. I know from reading Japanese news articles that many of teen suicides happen because of stress from education, peers, and from their family. By researching on this topic, I will learn on the present status of whats happening with the teens in Japan. I also tend to be very stressful from school work. So I will be implying my research inorder to find ways to cope from stress.
My main research will be based on the following,
Stressors, suicide rate relating to stress, and diseases caused by stress.
A questionnaire polled towards Middle school 2nd year and Highschool 2nd year resulted that the most popular stressor was academics, followed by, family, peers, then teachers. One of the reasons why stressors become harmful during the ages 13-18 is because of adolescence. Because of adolescence, the hormone balance within the teens body becomes unbalanced, which makes them become mentally sensitive.
Academic stressors – Exam studies, worried on failing entrance exams, failing entrance exams, school grades, busy study schedules (cram school, kumon, etc), and lack of sleep from studying.
Family stressors – Parents divorce, high expectations, financial problems, and rebellious phase.
Peers – Bullying, break ups, and isolation from other peers.
Teachers – Annoying teachers and hard graders.
Japan has high suicide rates. There were 31560 suicides in the year 2010. Japan resulted the 6th highest suicide rate in the world. Some statistics I found amongst men of 19 or younger in 2003. These statistics were taken upon men who left suicide notes.
Suicide statistics for 19 years old or younger (Men) – 2003 (statistics from people who left suicide notes)
Total – 157 people
Family Problems – 8.9%
Education Problems – 22.3%
Economic Problems – 4.5%
Relationship Problems – 17.2%
School Problems – 24.8%
Others – 5.8%
Unknown – 2.9%
As you see, education and school problems had the highest rates. School problems came in first because it includes many education problems and school bullying, stress from peers, etc.
Stress also causes harmful diseases, the most popular to be depression. In Japan, depression is known as a harmful disease called “utsu byou”. In Japan 1 in 25 people is said to have depression, which will be 4% of the whole population. In Japan, more than 70% of the suicide victims are said to have depression. More than half the depression patients who suicided have visited the doctor within a month. Depression is merely detected and hard to cure.
Mental symptoms of depression: The mental symtoms of depression will be the following, spacing out, become quiet, not talkative, not attending school, not being able to concentrate (school work, other people talking, activities, etc), being depressed and sad, emotions fading out, and not being able to have fun.
Physical symptoms: Severe headache, insomnia, stomach inflammation, and panicking.
Some broad ways to cope stress will be,
– Do something that relaxes you
– Get a hobby or do something enjoyable
– Think positive
– Accept what you cant change or do
– Talk to your peers or family about your problems
– Get sleep
Resources:
1. Depression. (2009). Retrieved from http://discoverer.prod.sirs.com/discoweb/disco/do/article?urn=urn%3Asirs%3AUS%3BARTICLE%3BART%3B0000216746
This is a valid source since it is retrieved from SIRS Discoverer, a paid website by CA.
2. Handling Stress. (2004). Retrieved from http://discoverer.prod.sirs.com/discoweb/disco/do/article?urn=urn%3Asirs%3AUS%3BARTICLE%3BART%3B0000217160
This is a valid source since it is retrieved from SIRS Discoverer, a paid website by CA.
3. Murray-Harvey, R. (n.d.). Life at school in Australia and Japan: The impact of stress and support on bullying and adaptation to school [Life at school in Australia and Japan]. Retrieved from http://www.aare.edu.au/01pap/mur01081.htm
This is a valid source because the author of this article is a staff member of the United States Department of Education.
5. Youth and Teen Suicide Statistics. (2009). Retrieved from http://web4health.info/en/answers/bipolar-suicide-statistics
This is a valid source because the source, Web4health was selected as finalist for the 2008 Stockholm Challenge Award
My final product turned out well. My PSA is simple and straight forward. It states the main point effectively through text and clips. I was also able to create the mood or atmosphere of the PSA by using music effectively. I lacked on being concise in my PSA and I had many struggles on technology. Even though most of my texts were on statistics, still i think i wasn’t able to state my main point through the clips. My clips were rather to support the text within the PSA. I also had many struggles on iMovie. It took me a lot of time going through youtube and exploring by myself inorder to learn the basics of using iMovie. I also needed to use other softwares I am familiar with inorder to fill the lack of knowledge. One of the program i used besides iMovie was Garage Band. Since I was unsure on how to crop music within iMovie, I had to use Garage Band inorder to trim the clips to the right length so that it doesn’t over lap other music tracks within the PSA. Still, I think I was able to do an solid job for my first video making.
Looking back from the beginning of this assignment, I think my group went along very well. Even though we had many conflicts with sports events (CA invitational, APAC) and missing people, we were able to come together well at the end. All four of us contributed well, giving opinions inorder to make each individuals part better. One part we weren’t able to decide as a group was choosing the topic. Since Alisa and I missed school for CA invitational, Peter and Marie chose the topics. In my opinion, our topic is very hard to create a PSA on since it doesnt have an clear answer or solution. How is sex positive for you, this question has many answers but all of them aren’t clear such as self esteem, immunity, and avoiding prostate cancer. We chose it lowers the chance of Prostate Cancer because if so we were able to research on statistics and include them in our PSA inorder to make the PSA more convincing. But in truth, our topic was an forced fact. Yes, having sex does lower the chance of Prostate Cancer, but still, just simply ejaculating lowers the chance of Prostate Cancer. So Prostate Cancer doesn’t require sex inorder to lower chances. Masturbating will simply be an solution to Prostate Cancer. In these ways, I struggles on creating my PSA.
If I were to describe my contribution in the assignment in three IB Learner Profile characteristics, it will be principle, open minded person and a communicator. Principle can be seen through all the blog posts I have done. I followed the rubrics that were given and finished my work on time. I characterize myself as open minded because I effectively followed the changes in schedules and topic. Even though I knew our topic wasn’t going to work, I kept working with it trying my best to create a PSA based on it. I also thought of myself and group as a communicator for all the communication we did within our group. I think our group required the most communication out of all the groups in the class. We had a member missing for two weeks and two people missing out on few of the classes for soccer events. When it came to blog post due dates, we all had to communicate inorder to decide our topics, schedules, roles, scenes, and so for.
Create (First Day)
I finished inserting the clips into Imovie. I am going to follow my Plan 2 blogpost to create my PSA. I began finding musics to use for my PSA. Some tracks (instrumental parts) I broadly selected were:
Fast Pace Happy Songs:
Spitz – Cherry
Gorillaz – Feel Good Inc.
Jay-Z – Empire State of Mind
Mint Royale – Singin in the Rain
Slow Sad Songs:
Rent – Seasons of Love
Sakamoto Ryuichi – Merry Christmas St.Lawrence
Def Tech – Catch the Wave
I decided to use Feel Good Inc. by Gorillaz and Merry-Christmas St.Lawrence. This is because both tracks had long instrumental parts which made it easy for me to crop and use for my PSA.
Create (Second Day)
I first put in the text, 75 % of CA students think that sex is bad for your body, next i put in the text, Sex has many benifits! I used bright colors for the text background inorder to have the audience sypathize a bright atmosphere. I had the footage of Marie and I (active couple footage) follow the text. Since i didnt know how to insert parts of music tracks into iMovie, I dragged the track, Feel Good Inc into garage band and trimmed it to 15 seconds. I put the track onto iMovie so that it plays for the past footages i put in. I made it so that the track will fade away over the span of 5 seconds.
Create (Third Day)
I worked on the second half of the video during class today. I put in the text, sex reduces the chances of having prostate cancer with a red background. The Feel Good Inc. stops here and changes to Merry Christmas St.Lawrence, a slow pace sad song. I put in a flashing transition into the inactive couple seen of Peter and Marie. I made the clip of inactive couple in to a glowing dark scene to bring out an gloomy atmosphere. I had the footage followed by the text, By 2010, there are over 2 million American men living with prostate cancer. I used a dark background which matched the song in the background. I added the scene with Peter at the hospital being told that he has prostate cancer. I used a black and white effect to bring out the gloomy atmosphere. Next, I put in the text, United States estimated to have around 32050 deaths from prostate cancer in 2010. I put in the clip which Peter is dead, lying on the bed. I put in a text that says, be sexually active to avoid prostate cancer! I made the text with a bright back ground in order to stop the gloomy atmosphere. I trimmed the Merry Christmas St.Lawrence music to 27 seconds on Garage Band so that it ends before the credits. In the credits I used the song Nyancat by Nyannyancat to bring back the bright atmosphere again.
Final Product
For creating my PSA, I will be using Imovie and Garage Band. Some tools I will be using in Imovie will be the video effect tool. I am going to be making some of my footages black and white or, sepia, in order to create a dark, sad atmosphere. This is my plan for my PSA.
1. Start with primary research fact. Talk about CA’s society. – 75 % of CA students think that sex is bad for your body – Fast pace happy song
2. Neglect the fact. – Sex had positive affects. – Footage on a active couple – Fast pace happy song
3. Inform about prostate cancer. – Sex reduces the chances of prostate cancer – Slow sad song
4. Footage on a inactive couple. – Slow sad song
5. Support 2 with a fact. – By 2010, there are over 2 million American men living with prostate cancer. – Slow sad song
6. Footage on Peter at the doctor. – Use black and white inorder to create the gloomy, sad atmosphere. – Peter has prostate cancer – Slow sad song
7. Support 2 with a fact again. – United States estimated to have around 32050 deaths from prostate cancer in 2010.
8. Remind and reinforce the idea of 7. – Footage of Peter dying. – Slow sad song
9. Bring back 2 again. – Fast pace happy song
10. Credits – Fast pace happy song
My PSA will be intended to audience at the age of 30 – 50.
These are some of the research results i will be using in my PSA:
Primary Research: 75 % of CA students think that sex is bad for your body
Secondary Research:
– By 2010, there are over 2 million American men living with prostate cancer.
– Sex reduces the chance of prostate cancer.
– United States estimated to have around 32050 deaths from prostate cancer in 2010.
In my PSA I will not promote but rather, encourage sex to my audience. This is to spread the knowledge of avoid prostate cancer and its dangers. These texts will be necessary in the video because it is hard to interprete what is happening just from watching the video. The statistics will also back up the texts.
First Day: On our first day of filming, we had Peter missing since he left for France. We decided to start filming with Scene 1 (doctor’s scene) since it only required Alisa for the scene. I filmed the scene as Marie helped Alisa memorize and fix the script. We borrowed a lab coat from Mr.Labreque. Since we needed a plain back ground, we went to ELAC. Though we found a plain background, we decided to go back to the theatre. We used the curtains for the plain background and the podium to make the scene have an more of an serious atmosphere. We rather got ready for the scene rather than taping. We wrote the script and had Alisa memorize it. We also went around numerous places to experiment where the scene will look the best in. Alisa was the doctor and Marie and I took the scene, got ready of the costume/script.
Second Day: Peter was back in Japan and everyone in our group was here. Since both Peter and I were wearing casual clothes, we weren’t able to tape scene 6 + 7. We decided to finish taping Scene 1 (doctor’s scene). Alisa had memorized the script so the process of taping went smoothly. Peter, Marie, and I taped while Alisa did the acting as a doctor.
Third Day: We decided to tape Scene 2 (Small room with door, preferably the health office). This is the scene in which Marie and I, act like we are going to go into a room and have sex. Taping when smoothly since everyone cooperated. Peter and Alisa helped on taping and creating the scenery, as Marie and I got ready to act.
Fourth Day: The fourth day didn’t go well. We had opposing ideas on our PSA. In my opinion, I thought that our topic was too hard to create a PSA on. Our topic doesn’t have an specific scene on focused on. For example, if our topic was on avoiding aids, our PSA will be straight forward, wearing condoms while having sex. When it is on benefits of sex, the answer or solution is too broad and unclear, such as it relieves stress, builds self confidient, etc. That really made it hard to design and organize our PSA. After debating whether we should change our topic or not, we decided to move on without changing the topic because of all the work and blogposts we did already. We decided to delete scenes 3, 4, 5, and 7. Instead, we planned on having a scene with Peter running into the bathroom and crying. We taped scene 6 in the health office.
Fifth Day: We were determined on what to do and work went smoothly. We taped scenes 3, 4, and 5 since all three takes place in the same place. Peter and Alisa acted while Marie and I taped.
Daiki Yamamoto's 