Teacher’s Guide Part 1

Teacher’s Guide Will expose students to the problem of overconsumption and its effects on the society and the environment. The one-hour program takes a hard, sometimes humorous look at the American passion for shopping, and how it leads to debt and stress for families, communities, the nation and the world. It also explores the strategies used by marketers to sell products to young people. The program is appropriate for students grade 6-12, and in universities, and will be a useful resource for teachers of communications, economics, mathematics, social studies, environmental studies and the arts. Each activity in this guide references a clip from the video, and discussion questions, which can be used before and after viewing the clip. Counters differ on VHS machines, so the starting and ending points for clips are approximate. Many activities also have background information and reproducible worksheets. LANGUAGE ARTS/SOCIAL STUDIES WHAT IS AFFLUENZA? OVERVIEW: Students are introduced to “affluenza” and the symptoms of changing expectations for the American standard of living. Students will practice interviewing/ researching skills and report on their findings. MATERIALS: TV/VCR, a copy of the Affluenza video, and copy of the Family Interview worksheet. BACKGROUND INFORMATION In 1958, only 4 percent of American homes had dishwashers. Now more than half do. Less than 1 percent had color televisions. Now 97 percent do. In addition, in the ’50s there were no microwave ovens, VCRs, or personal computers. Today, many new homes have three-car garages and are nearly 900 square feet (the same as an entire house in the 1950s). Americans fly 25 times as may passenger miles as they did in the 1950s. Although Americans had fewer material goods, the number of Americans who say they are very happy peaked back in 1957. Seventy percent of Americans visit malls each week, more than attend churches or synagogues. On average, Americans shop six hours a week and spend only 40 minutes playing with their children. START video at the beginning: “Pew Charitable Trusts” logo (set the counter at 0). STOP video when screen reads: “So what keeps us on the workand-spend treadmill?” (about 6:03 on the counter) ASK students: (1) When do you have money to spend? How do you earn the money you spend? (2) Do you prefer to spend your money right away? (3) What kinds of things would you save for? (4) Do you buy things only when you need them? (5) How do you differentiate between what you “want” and what you “need?” (6) Do you shop when you have to, or do you shop for other reasons? (7) Do you have time to yourself? How do you spend it? (8) How do you get to the places you want to go? How would you get there if you could? INTERVIEW: Tell students they will have an opportunity to interview their parents or other adults in their family about the types of products they had growing up and about how they spent their time. After students have conducted their interviews, discuss their findings as a class. WRITING: Ask students to write one to two pages about their family interviews on one of the following topics: (1) Compare and contrast their attitudes about possessions and money with those held by their parents or grandparents. (2) Ask students to explore how having greater or fewer material goods has affected their own family. WORKSHEET Family Interview Use the following questions to interview a parent or other adult member of your family. Did your family eat dinner together? How often? Did they eat other meals together? What kinds of things did you do with your family? Did your family have a color television, VCR, answering machine or personal computer? What kinds of electronic equipment did you have? Did you share a bedroom or bathroom with a brother or sister? Was the house you grew up in bigger or smaller than the home you live in now? As a teenager, did you have a job? What did you do with the money you made? Where did you go shopping? What did you buy? How did you pay for things? Did you have a credit card? Did you drive or own your own car? What fashions were popular? Was it important to wear certain brand names? COMMUNICATIONS, BUSINESS, ECONOMICS ACTIVITY #1: WHAT ARE ADVERTISERS REALLY SELLING ? OVERVIEW: Students gain greater understanding of the underlying structures of advertising and marketing. They will search for hidden messages in advertising and the “hidden audience.” MATERIALS: TV/VCR, advertisements from magazines or television commercials for products of interest to youth. For health education, you may want to use ads for products such as alcohol and cigarettes. BACKGROUND INFORMATION By the age of 20, the average American has seen one million commercial messages. Advertising accounts for 2/3 of the space in newspapers, and 40 percent of our mail. The average American spends one year of their lives watching TV commercials. Children are the fastest growing segment of the consumer market. In 1995 alone, companies spent $1 billion marketing their products to young people. Each year advertisers spend millions of dollars trying to convince people to buy products. Most people don’t know that advertising is not free to the buyers of products. This business expense is added to the cost of the product so that we pay more at the store. In fact, you are paying for products you don’t buy! There are other, less obvious ways we “pay” for advertising. Ads play on our feelings of envy and anxiety. Ads often suggest that a person could be more successful, attractive, even lovable if they use “Brand X.” People, both young and old, need tools to separate the message from the advertiser’s intention to make a sale. We are all cynical about the above, because it seems so obvious...but we are bombarded with advertising daily. If we hear something often enough, we start to believe it, and this can affect our self esteem. Sometimes when people don’t feel good about themselves, they want to do a little “shopping therapy”— buying things because they think it will make them feel better. This is a symptom of Affluenza. START video when screen reads: “So what keeps on the work and spend treadmill?” (about 6:03 on the counter) STOP video when screen reads: “Empowered child?” (about 10:54) ASK students to bring ads they think are targeted at them, or show them copies of magazine or television ads for products of interest to their age group, for example, cars, makeup, deodorant, tooth paste, jeans, tennis shoes, candy, fast food, alcohol or cigarettes. DISCUSS the following questions: (1) How does the message make you feel? (2) What product is being advertised? (3) What are the advertisers trying to sell? (4) Note the body language of the people in the ad. What does the body language say? (5) Does the ad play on the emotion of envy or anxiety? (6) Who is the message intended for? (7) Does the ad “work?” Would you like to buy the product? ASK students to list the ways in which products are marketed to young people. WRITE about how students feel about marketing to young people. Or, choose a product and make a marketing plan for it. ACTIVITY #2: WHO ARE ADVERTISERS SELLING TO? OVERVIEW: Students will explore how product producers, product distributors, advertisers and the public interact. MATERIALS: TV/VCR. BACKGROUND INFORMATION Marketing companies are only interested in “market share”—what 1,000 people will buy as a group. Advertisers sell market shares of the “under 25” or “upper income,” etc. These markets are determined with surveys and focus groups. As students will see in Affluenza, marketers are watching children shop, and going into their bedrooms to find out what kinds of products children like. In Affluenza, marketers say that using antisocial behavior to sell products to children is “a good thing.” They also speak of “capturing” and “owning” children, and that messages showing aggressive behavior are a good way to sell products to boys. DISCUSS: Most people think advertising is about selling products. In truth, advertising is about selling audiences to the advertiser, not selling products to the buyer. The system looks like this: Product Producer Distributor Advertiser The Public The product producer interacts with the distributor, who also interacts with advertisers. The advertiser interacts with the distributor and the public. The product producer does not directly interact with the public and the public only interacts with the advertiser. ASK students: Who do you think makes the most money from advertising? The product producer, the distributor or the advertiser? Option for younger students—choose one or two products that the students use. Find examples of print and broadcast advertising that the students feel is aimed at them. How do they think advertisers decided that they would like to buy those products? ACTIVITY #3: ADVERTISING IN SCHOOLS OVERVIEW: Students will become aware of advertising already in the schools and will work on critical thinking and debating skills. MATERIALS: TV/VCR. BACKGROUND INFORMATION Advertising is moving into American schools in corporatesponsored curriculum, in school buses and hallways, and during television programs shown in classrooms. Some educators believe that accepting advertising benefits students. In exchange for showing Channel One, an in-school broadcast service that includes advertisements, schools get to use video equipment for free. Others feel that advertising will give schools additional funding. In Affluenza, the superintendent of a school district decides to accept advertising to increase school funding because voters haven’t approved a levy in his district since 1972. Others say schools should be ad-free zones. Requiring students to view advertising is unfair, they say, because students are a captive audience, and because advertising messages may get more credibility from the school setting. Students have been taught to trust what they learn in school, they say and they worry that advertising distracts from education. START video when screen reads: “Empowered child?” (about 10:54 on the counter) STOP video after this scene: “So it’s a big deal? Yes!” (about 12:43) DISCUSS the following questions and create a pro-and-con list on the board. (1) Where is advertising in school now? (2) Do you think advertising belongs in schools? (3) What about advertising that we wear to school, like logos? (4) How could schools be funded? (5) Where should the money that funds schools come from? (6) Should there be some ad-free zones within your community? WRITING: Ask students write about whether or not advertising should be in schools. DEBATE: Divide students into teams and create a classroom debate. Ask one team to argue in favor of advertising is schools, and the other team against. Option for younger students: ask them to create an advertisement that either promotes or speaks out against advertising in schools. ACTIVITY #4: BE AN ADBUSTER ! OVERVIEW: Students will have an opportunity to be an “adbuster” and to speak back at companies who make products that are unhealthy for young people, or who might make a fine product, but use questionable messages to sell the product. MATERIALS: TV/VCR, magazines (students could bring magazines from home), paste, scratch or colored paper, scissors and crayons, pens or paints. BACKGROUND INFORMATION In Affluenza, “Adbusters” use the energy and the message of an advertiser to express a very different point of view. They do this by using parody—taking an advertisement that is intended to be serious—and altering it to make fun of the product or the message. START video at the Buy Nothing Day commercial: “...the Average North American consumes five times more than a Mexican, 10 times more than a Chinese person and 30 times more than a person from India...” (about 20:88 on the counter) STOP video after this scene: “... I feel that we are at the early stages of a second American revolution to reconsider this consumption binge that we’ve been on for almost half a century now. It’s going somewhere along the line even the economists will come on board.”(about 22:12) ASK students cut out advertisements of their own. (You may wish to limit the advertisements to products like alcohol or cigarettes.) Invite students to identify key messages in an advertisement, for example, that cool people drink beer, or that smoking makes a person more adventurous. ASK students to consider the following common arguments of advertisers from the book, Consuming Passions by Ellen Mohr Catalano and Nina Sonenberg: If you use this product you will... (1) Join a wonderful group of people. (2) Feel appreciated. (3) Be rewarded. (4) Be held in high esteem by others. (5) Will have more love or sexual gratification in your life. (6) Will enjoy the adventure or escape that you want. (7) Will be more like famous or wealthy people. (8) Will be associated with success, humor, tradition or modernity. (9) Will find deep satisfaction. And, if you do not use this product you will ... (10) Face social isolation or career failure. (11) Face failing health or death. ASK students to alter the advertisements so they say the opposite of what the advertiser intended. For example, an advertisement for “Cool Beer” could be made to say “Fool Beer,” or pictures intended to make smoking look adventurous could be altered to show people looking bored. MATHEMATICS / ECONOMICS / LIFE SKILLS CREDIT QUANDARIES OVERVIEW: Students will learn how credit and credit cards work. MATERIALS: TV/VCR, copies of worksheet Credit Cards: The Fine Print and applications for different credit cards. Collect applications from local businesses, or search the Web for credit card applications. BACKGROUND INFORMATION Eleven percent of teenagers own their own credit cards and 40 percent use their parents’ cards. Americans have more than one billion credit cards. Fewer than one-third of all Americans pay off their credit card balances each month. In fact, the average cardholder is $2,700 in debt and is paying 16 percent interest. More Americans declared bankruptcy in 1996 than graduated from college. Arguments about money play a major role in 90 percent of divorce cases. BEFORE VIEWING THE VIDEO, DISCUSS: Credit cards are not “free money.” Nor are credit card companies doing people a favor when they give them credit. Credit cards are money-makers for the card companies because they must be paid off, and often the payments include high interest and other fees. These charges add up very quickly—credit purchases can cost buyers much more than cash purchases. Credit card companies try to bring in new customers when they are 18 years old, and many offer cards to college students. Credit cards are so convenient to use that people forget they are paying finance charges. Sometimes it’s easy to get more than one card, making it easier to get even deeper into debt. If you decide to use credit, do so responsibly. Read the fine print and understand what charges you will have to pay! START video when screen reads: “Symptom: A Rash of Bankruptcies.” (about 12: 61 on the counter) STOP video when screen reads: “Symptom: Social Scars.” (about 16:03) ASK students: (1) What happens when people got so far into debt that they can’t pay their bills? (2) The Adams family in Affluenza nearly got a divorce because of their debt. What could happen in families if bills can’t be paid? (3) What are other ways children can be affected by their parents’ debt? REVIEW the following credit terms with students. Annual Fee: The amount of money the lender charges per year for the use of their card. This is different than Annual Interest Rate. This amount is billed to you even if you do not charge anything on the card for that year. Grace Period: The time in which you can pay off all new purchases without incurring finance charges. Typically, if you do not pay off your entire bill, all new purchases begin accruing finance charges immediately. Late Fee: A penalty assessed if your monthly payment is made after the due date or Grace Period. Over-the-Limit Fee: A penalty assessed if you exceed your maximum credit limit. Finance charges can sometimes put you over your limit without you even realizing it. Cash Advance: These are charged when you receive cash against your credit line and are paid in addition to the interest rate. There is usually no grace period on cash advances. Finance Charge: The cost of borrowing money. Usually this is a percentage of how much you borrow. Minimum Payments: The minimum amount you are required to pay the issuer each month. By making only the minimum payment on the average credit card, a $2,000 loan can take more than 11 years to repay. By that time, they buyer will have paid $1,900 in interest! MATH: Split students into teams of two. Give each student a copy of the worksheet Credit Cards: The Fine Print. One member of each team receives a credit card application, and the other team member an application for a different credit card. Ask students to fill out the worksheet, and DISCUSS the results with the class. Using information from the worksheet, test out the interest rates on the credit card applications: (1) What happens if you pay the minimum amount on a balance of $2,000 for 10 months? (2) How long will it take to pay off a $1,000 balance if you only pay the minimum amount each month? (3) How much would they have to pay each month to pay off $1,000 in six months? In nine months? Compare payments and fees. Which card would students rather use? WORKSHEET Credit Cards: The Fine Print Using a credit card application, fill in the following information. Name of Lender: Annual Fee: Interest Rates: a. On transferred balance b. On purchases c. On cash advances Computation of Variable Rate (if applicable): Grace Period: Late Fee: Over-the-limit Fee: Cash Advance Fee: