Lesson 1 Assignment #2: Monitoring Contemporary Concerns in the Media – Discussion Board
Chapter 1 of Child Development indicates that significant contemporary concerns in child psychology are changes in the family, child healthcare, educational reform, and sociocultural issues such as gender roles and ethnic minorities. Monitor a newspaper, radio news program, or television news program, or internet news program for a few days to a week and keep a record of stories that reflect each of these concerns. That is, search the paper for news items or listen to news broadcasts, and make a record of stories that reflect these concerns. When you are done, tally the number of stories that reflect each concern. Post your findings and answers to the following questions on the Discussion Board. In addition, I would like you to respond to the posting of at least one other student in a way that extends that student’s response. Provide references.
Questions
1. What was the most frequently expressed concern?
2. Were the concerns you encountered in each category focused on one particular kind of story? Or were there a number of different kinds of news items that reflected a variety of concerns within each category? Explain your answer.
3. Did the stories reflect a life-span or developmental perspective? Or did they reflect some other way of viewing the contemporary concerns about adolescence? Explain your answer.
4. Can you find information in Child Development that is related to each story and that helps you to understand it better? Explain your answer.
5. What information do you wish you had in order to understand the story better?
