Here comes Ms. Whiting's Health Class...
Yet another SMS pioneer - Diane Whiting has approached me to develop
some curriculum for her health class in SL! We met today and I asked
her simply, "What is it you want your students to know or be able to
do as a result of this project?" She blew my mind when she told me
that the unit is a health unit examining BODY IMAGE and self esteem!
WOW! How perfect is the virtual world to support this investigation!
Some of the issues that Ms. Whiting explores in this unit are self
image, factors that influence body image such as media portrayal, the
different pressures for males and females, consequences of trying to
fit unrealistic goals, and self-acceptance.
We have come up with a tentative plan: The first thing that the class
will do is to watch the video:
http://www.campaignforrealbeauty.com/flat4.asp?id=6909 This is a movie
produced by The Dove Campaign for Real Beauty. It is powerful!
(We are considering having the students all hide their avatar names
for this assignment - for complete anonymity)
Day 1: Login/join group "Reflections". Kids will then create their
avatar IN THEIR OWN IMAGE (or as close to it as they are able.) The
instruction will be to really try to make the avatar look as much as
they do in real life. I will make as many skins, shapes, hair
attachments, etc. available to them in a build we will call The Salon.
They will then take a snapshot of themselves and save it to a folder
entitled "Body Image" in their inventory and save the snapshot as
"Myself".
So, we are accomplishing 2 things right off the bat- the kids are
learning some of the skills they will need in SL AND they are creating
their own perception of "self". They will complete the session with a
short reflective piece about their appearance guided by questions
provided in a group notecard.
Day 2: Ms. Whiting will now assign the kids each a number, and assign
certain tasks to certain numbers in order to create heterogeneous
groups. Again - we are striving for anonymity whenever possible.
Certain kids will be assigned the task of creating the most
"attractive" avatar according to how popular media portrays beauty.
Again they need to take a snapshot when they are finished and keep it
in their inventory . This one is named "Beauty".
A second group of kids will do just the opposite, and create an avatar
who is very unappealing - according to popular media, whatever that
may be to them. Save it and name it "Beast" .
The third group will change gender and be as attractive as possible ,
naming their snapshot "beauty2".
The fourth group will change gender and create an unattractive avatar,
saving snapshot as beast2.
The last twenty minutes of each class will be used for mixed
discussions in the facilitator's pods. Members from all four groups
will hold a discussion about how they look, how they react to each
other and why.
All chats will be logged for reflection and assessment of the topics
that are addressed.
At this point, scheduling is open as we can't really predict how much
time will be needed until we get to see the skill set of the group,
but the next step will be for everyone to once again create a
"beautiful" avatar - and see if their criteria has changed-I will ask
them to place their first snapshot of "beauty" on one side of a prim
and the second impression of beauty (post-discussion) on the other
side of the prim. The prims will rotate for effect. (Of course the
kids will have options to display their snapshots in any manner they
choose) We will then host these in a location for all to visit.
The final day will be the avatars as themselves - however they want to
appear and a final reflection.
This is just a rough draft but we welcome ideas, suggestions,
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