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7th Grade  Project 1 week

Red Scarf Rhetoric Remix

Tashia B
Updated
CCSS.ELA-Literacy.WHST.6-8.7
CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RH.6-8.9
CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RST.6-8.9
CCSS.ELA-Literacy.SL.7.2
CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RH.6-8.2
+ 5 more
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Purpose

Students investigate how persuasion works in historical and modern media to decide when a message informs, persuades, or tries to control thinking. Using Red Scarf Girl, source comparison, short research, and feedback from peers and community experts, they build media literacy and analyze how propaganda shaped daily life during the Cultural Revolution. Their learning culminates in a public Clue Hunter Gallery Walk board that shares annotated evidence, growth in analysis, and reflection on how persuasive messages affect people today.

Learning goals

Students will analyze how headlines, slogans, images, and quotes use persuasive tools to inform, persuade, or manipulate in historical and modern media. They will compare primary, secondary, print, and multimedia sources to determine central ideas, audience, purpose, and impact on daily life. Students will gather and annotate evidence for a gallery walk board, revise their thinking through critique, and reflect on the clues that helped them judge each source.

Standards
  • [Common Core] CCSS.ELA-Literacy.WHST.6-8.7 - Conduct short research projects to answer a question (including a self-generated question), drawing on several sources and generating additional related, focused questions that allow for multiple avenues of exploration.
  • [Common Core] CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RH.6-8.9 - Analyze the relationship between a primary and secondary source on the same topic.
  • [Common Core] CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RST.6-8.9 - Compare and contrast the information gained from experiments, simulations, video, or multimedia sources with that gained from reading a text on the same topic.
  • [Common Core] CCSS.ELA-Literacy.SL.7.2 - Analyze the main ideas and supporting details presented in diverse media and formats (e.g., visually, quantitatively, orally) and explain how the ideas clarify a topic, text, or issue under study.
  • [Common Core] CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RH.6-8.2 - Determine the central ideas or information of a primary or secondary source; provide an accurate summary of the source distinct from prior knowledge or opinions.
Competencies
  • Critical Thinking & Problem Solving - Students consider a variety of innovative approaches to address and understand complex questions that are authentic and important to their communities.
  • Effective Communication - Students practice listening to understand, communicating with empathy, and share their learning through exhibiting, presenting and reflecting on their work.
  • Collaboration - Students co-design projects with peers, exercise shared-decision making, strengthen relational agency, resolve conflict, and assume leadership roles.
  • Content Expertise - Students develop key competencies, skills, and dispositions with ample opportunities to apply knowledge and engage in work that matters to them.
  • Self Directed Learning - Students use teacher and peer feedback and self-reflection to monitor and direct their own learning while building self knowledge both in and out of the classroom.

Products

Students will create a short portfolio of annotated headlines, images, slogans, and quotes from historical and modern sources, with captions naming persuasive tools, source purpose, and growth in analysis. Midway through, each student will bring one annotated image or slogan to a critique circle for revision with peer and librarian or media literacy specialist feedback. By the end, teams will produce a Clue Hunter Gallery Walk board comparing propaganda and information with labeled media examples, growth statements, and sticky-note reflection prompts. Students will also give a brief oral explanation to peers and adult guests about the clues they used to judge intent and how propaganda shaped daily life during the Cultural Revolution.

Launch

Start with a fast “Propaganda or Information?” gallery sprint using historical and modern headlines, posters, slogans, and short clips tied to the Cultural Revolution and Red Scarf Girl. In teams, students sort each source as inform, persuade, or control and post one clue that shaped their decision, then debrief using the essential questions about persuasion, propaganda, and daily life. End with a quick comparison of one primary source and one secondary or multimedia source on the same topic, and introduce the librarian or media literacy specialist who will help students test source intent throughout the project.

Exhibition

Host a Clue Hunter Gallery Walk where students display interactive boards with annotated historical and modern media examples showing whether each source informs, persuades, or tries to control thinking. Invite peers, families, a librarian or media literacy specialist, and a local journalist, graphic designer, or marketing professional to circle persuasive clues and leave sticky-note reflections. Students serve as docents, explaining connections to Red Scarf Girl, the Cultural Revolution, and how their analysis grew over the project.