Today's Lesson: Decoding Advertisements

If you've ever watched television, flipped through a magazine, listened to the radio in the car, or used the Internet for more than five minutes, chances are that you've had the misfortune to come across some kind of commercial or advertisement.

Take a few moments to think back to the ads you've seen recently. You've probably been seeing them your whole life. Before scrolling down to see the rest of this lesson, please spend 60 seconds brainstorming about some of the trends you might have noticed in TV commercials.

All done? Great! You might have said that all commercials are designed to sell you something, which is absolutely true! In general, the goal of an advertisement is to get you, the consumer, to give them, the producer/manufacturer/company, money in exchange for goods or services. There are a few other trends you should be aware of as well. Let's examine them below.

• Some commercials aim to capture your attention through humor. Take a look at this Geico commercial. Some people might find this funny. I know I smiled a bit. There are two other components of this company's advertising strategy, though. A, they have a memorable mascot. That little gecko is cute and he'll stick in your memory long after the commercial is over. And B, they have a short, catchy slogan. '15 minutes can save you 15 percent or more.' It's memorable, straightforward, and it talks about two things that most people like: saving time, and saving money. Some other companies use similar strategies. Consider the 'Mayhem' character in many Allstate commercials. Also consider this jingle: 'Like a good neighbor, Statefarm is there." 
• Some commercials aim to impress viewers by subtlety implying that their lives will somehow be better and more fulfilling if they purchase the product in question. I've observed this trend in many of Coca-Cola's commercials. Take a look at this one. This commercial may be selling Cola, but that's not all it's trying to sell you. If it were just about selling you Coca-Cola, it would portray an actress or two opening a can and remarking on how refreshing and delicious it is. This particular commercial is selling a lifestyle as well. It's implying that drinking Cola will grant you access into the magical kingdom of the American Dream at the height of summer, complete with barbecues, fireworks, wild street parties, cannonballs into the lake, and ever-lasting friendship. The message is very subtle and subliminal, but it's still there. 
• Still other commercials try to glorify their product by showing you the lives of people before they purchased the product and the lives of the same people after they purchased the product. Take this commercial for example. Before this family purchased the Perfect Pancake maker, they were living in a dull, grey, sepia world where breakfast was an inedible disaster. But wait! The Perfect Pancake maker can fix all of their troubles! Just pour in the batter, and in seconds, you'll have perfect golden brown pancakes. Your breakfast table will be laden will artfully presented stacks of pancakes and your children's lives will be immensely improved. Making breakfast will be a breeze from now on, right? No. Let's analyze what's wrong with this commercial. 
• Unless you have the magic ability to snap your fingers and create whatever you want out of thin air, there is no way you can cook pancakes in the seconds it takes in the video. Even if you get pre-made pancakes out of the freezer, it'll still take you at least a minute to have them ready. And pancakes made from batter take a lot longer. This section is a bit of clever video editing, but don't be fooled by it. 
• Not even diners give you picture-perfect pancakes. Companies like this hire people to make and shape 'perfect' pancakes, arrange them 'perfectly,' artfully garnish them, and even paint and glue them to glaze over any imperfections. And do we really need our pancakes to look perfect anyway? If they're as good as the commercial says they are, they'll be gone in a few minutes anyway. 
• Have you ever watched your caregiver prepare breakfast? Chances are that they're tired and groggy and aren't going to be smiling like they just won ten thousand dollars at seven a.m. in the morning. 
• In the interest of honesty, I must confess that I fell for a similar commercial a few years ago. Let's just say that real life is a lot stickier, messier, and frustrating than TV land. 

Now that we know about some of the tricks commercials use to persuade us to buy their goods, let's talk about a few other things you should keep in mind while watching TV. 

• Does it sound too good to be true? If so, than it probably is. 
• Who do you think the intended audience for this commercial is? An ad for stuffed animals is going to have a different audience than an advertisement for car insurance. Consider the age, class, and gender of the commercial's target audience. 
• Read the small print at the bottom of the screen. If a cure-all medication for indigestion has cancer and heart disease listed under possible side effects, it's probably not worth it. 

Animalist News

While we're on the subject of news, I'd like to direct your attention to this Youtube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/user/AnimalistNetwork/videos

Before I tell you more, let me share a secret with you. From the time I was two to around the time I turned ten, I wanted to be a veterinarian so badly. I loved animals (and still do!) and I wanted to spend the rest of my life helping them. My career goals have shifted a bit since then, but I still have a massive soft spot in my heart for the furry, scaled, slimy, slithering, hopping, swinging, running, digging creatures we share this world with. I believe in respecting all living things, though I must confess that I am quite a bit more fond of my three dogs and my cat than my neighbor's garden snake or the raccoon that routinely terrorizes our neighborhood garbage pails.

Okay, back to today's resource. In a nutshell, Animalist News is all about animals! Recent episodes have taught viewers about crime-solving animals, the secret to a cat's cleanliness, and how exceptional members of the animal kingdom have inspired some of the coolest technology our species has ever invented.

Parents of younger children might want to note that a few of the episodes deal with reproduction. However, the majority of episodes can be enjoyed by all!

Current Events and Reading the News

Here at Infinite Potential Tutoring, we firmly believe in keeping up to date with current events. Students should have a basic understanding of major events happening in their own nation, and in this increasingly global world, a firm grasp of what is happening elsewhere as well.

You've undoubtedly been told time and time again in school that learning about history is a vital component of a good education, and while that is absolutely true, many of us forget that what is happening right now will be history in twenty, or fifty, or one hundred years. The world is changing every single day, and a well-educated, well-spoken, well-rounded person should be aware of those changes.

Please note that this doesn't always apply to elementary and middle school students. The world can be a violent, scary place and while it's still important for you to learn about history, there is no need to expose yourself to the sometimes brutal realities of life just yet.

High school students, however, should dedicate at least ten or fifteen minutes a day to catching up on world affairs, current events, and political developments. If you are an American high school student and you cannot tell me about the various instances of police brutality towards minority groups that occurred in 2014, you are missing a vital piece of knowledge that every American citizen should know about. You should also be able to connect these events to the history of African Americans in this nation, from the colonial slaves to the Civil War to the African American community's continuing struggle for equality, civil rights, and basic human rights.

Now that we've established that you should be reading the news a few times a week, let's discuss where you should go about finding that news. A simple google search reveals millions of results, but not all news sites are created equal. Some are biased, some are written from a radical perspective, and many of them aren't as neutral towards the events they're reporting upon as they should be.

I personally find BBC News to be a good source of mostly unbiased, reliable information. The site also has special sections dedicated to each region of the world, from Europe to North America to the Middle East to Africa to South America to Oceania. They also have science, business, and entertainment news sections in case you're looking for something specific.

http://www.bbc.com/news/ generally focuses on world news, so you'll find current stories and updates from all over the world.

The New York Times (http://www.nytimes.com/) is also one of the most trusted newspapers in the world, as is the Guardian (http://www.theguardian.com/us).

Feel free to explore other news sites as well. Don't take one site's word for it. Get a second, and a third, and a fourth opinion. Explore all the different perspectives of an issue. There's many sides to every story, and your job is to examine as many as possible to form an educated opinion of the issue at hand.

The best part of making a habit of reading the news (besides learning a lot and keeping up to date on what's happening in your world) is when you're able to impress your teachers and friends by making an insightful connection between a conflict going on right now and a historical event that's been over for a century or two.

So, got out there into the digital forest. Chances are that something important is happening somewhere in the world right this very second. Be the first to know about it. :)

Making TV Time Count

Let's talk about TV for a few minutes. Sure, you can spend the weekend watching cartoons, but wouldn't you rather be watching cool, messy, explosive fun while learning about the scientific principles that govern our world instead?

The following shows are ones that my co-partner and I regularly watch and enjoy. Give them a try. You might be surprised at what you learn.

Dirty Jobs is one of the grossest shows on Television. If you love playing in the mud and poking bugs, this might be the perfect show for you. Host Mike Rowe gets himself into all kinds of sticky situations. You can watch him wade through animal dung, stick his arms into vats full of crickets, and get down and dirty with some of the muddiest, stinkiest, ickiest jobs on the planet.

Mythbusters is great for science lovers and kids who love watching things blow up. You can watch the hosts test all sorts of urban myths and legends. They also do a Shark Week special and routinely put movie myths to the test. Just remember not to try anything you see on the show at home for the safety of yourself and others.

How It's Made is also awesomely cool to watch. This is great for more sensitive or younger viewers who may be frightened of the occasion boom on Mythbusters or grossed out by Dirty Jobs. How It's Made takes you into the factories of America to see how the products you use every day are manufactured.

Planet Earth is an amazing series of documentaries produced by the BBC. You'll be able to explore the furthest reaches of our world in amazing high-definition while learning about the lives of other creatures and the dynamics of how our planet works. I'd advise parents of younger children to change the channel, though, as the show depicts the raw realities of hunting, birth, and death.

So grab a remote and some popcorn and settle down for some fun educational programs!

Learn a New Language with Duolingo

Duolingo is a website that offers free language learning. Whether you want to learn Spanish, French, Italian, German, or Danish, Duolingo has you covered. It also offers a cool diagnostic tool so you can improve your skills in a language you've already started learning elsewhere. It'll test your proficiency and start you off at a level that'll leave you feeling challenged, but not completely stumped.

Check it out here: https://www.duolingo.com/

Credible Sources

I promised you a post on credible sources, so here it is. Your imaginary teacher assigned you an imaginary four-page research paper about American involvement in World War II.

Let's take a moment to talk about all that research you're going to be doing. My co-partner has a sort of Golden Rule when it comes to research papers - one hour for every page. Oh my gosh, you might be thinking. There's no way I'm going to be spending four hours on this paper before I've even started writing it! First of all, relax. That rule applies more to college-level papers than the papers your average high school student is going to be writing. I would cut that number in half for you and say that you'll need to spend a good two hours researching for this paper.

So, what kind of research do you want me to do? You might ask. Let's go over the kind of research you aren't going to be doing first.

When you google World War 2, 519,000,000 results come up. You aren't going to be using the vast majority of them. You also aren't going to be using the first result, which looks something like this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_War_II

That's Wikipedia. Wikipedia is good for a great many things. If you need to find out whether your cat is an American shorthair or a Toyger, Wikipedia is your go-to guy. If you need to settle a bet with your best friend, Wikipedia is the way to go. If you need to find out what that new TV show you've been hearing about lately is all about, Wikipedia is your best shot. But if you need to write a high school research paper, Wikipedia is a fast-track to an angry teacher and a big fat C- (or worse!)

Moving on. Now that we've established that Wikipedia is a definite NO, what about this site: http://www.worldwar-2.net/

That's a .net site. It's good for getting a general idea of what the war was about, but that's about it. Use it to get into the researching mood, but don't bookmark it to cite.

Now we're going to get into the kinds of site you can use. Take a look at this one: http://www.ushmm.org/wlc/en/article.php?ModuleId=10005137

That's a website from the United States Holocaust Museum. While it's not exactly about American involvement in WWII (which is what your paper is about, remember), it is managed by a museum and was probably written by WWII scholars. These are the kinds of sites you're going to want to research from and cite.

That's a .org site, though. It's still not your best bet if you want to be absolutely sure you're getting the most accurate information available. For that, you're going to want to go to .gov and .edu sites. Government managed sites and those run by universities are some of the most credible sources out there, and should be your go-to research domains.

A government site: http://www.archives.gov/research/military/ww2/

A .edu site: http://www.digitalhistory.uh.edu/era.cfm?eraID=15&smtid=1

You also want to use a couple of primary sources in your essay. Good luck!

Research Paper Pacing Guide

Let's take a moment to discuss credible sources. Say that your history teacher just assigned you a research paper about World War II. Your task is to summarize American involvement in the war in four double-spaced pages. Your due date is in two weeks. Oh no!

First of all, don't panic. Two weeks is more than enough time to write this kind of paper, even with all the geometry homework you have and the physics test you need to study for and your little sister's dance recital on Thursday night and that sleep-over you'd been planning over the weekend. Four double-spaced pages is only about 1,000 words.

On behalf of your teacher, I'd like to caution you against using any 'tricks' to get out of writing the full thousand words. You can try to set the spacing to 2.5 or use a HUGE font, but don't think you're fooling anyone. Your teacher has seen it all before, and s/he will not be impressed. In fact, s/he might be rather cross with you, and more often than not, teachers take out their frustrations with your little tricks by knocking down your grade a couple of points. That might not seem like a lot, but it could make the difference between an A and a B at the end of the semester.

Okay, back to our plan. After you've taken a few deep breaths and repeated 'I can do this' once or twice, you're going to need to set up a pacing guide for yourself. Start as soon as possible. And by 'as soon as possible,' I do not mean Sunday night at eight p.m. on the Monday before it's due. The best time to start is right now. (There's no time like the present, after all!) If that's not possible, carve out a space in your schedule to begin your research in the next two days. More on this later.

Alright, let's pretend that you've done all your research and gathered all your facts. You're confident that you know enough about WWII to write 1,000 words about it, and you're pumped. You are so ready to write this thing. Your history teacher won't know what hit her/him! You might want to start with an outline to organize your thoughts, or you might want to dive right in. Either way, give yourself three to five days to get through the writing stage.

Time jump. You've got 1,000 words on a Word document and you still have an entire week until your essay is due. At this point, you'll want to start the editing process. Read through your paper to make sure it makes sense. Check to see if it flows. Watch out for spelling and grammar errors. Read it aloud to catch those sneaky mistakes. You might want to get a second opinion as well. Ask a friend, parent, or tutor to give it a quick look through for you. They may be able to spot mistakes you might have missed. If your teacher has office hours or is open to helping students, you might want to give them a visit as well. Don't drop in unexpectedly, though. Shoot them a quick e-mail respectfully asking if they could take a quick look at your essay. Check out the sample e-mail below.

Dear Ms. Robinson,

I've been working on the WWII essay due at the end of the week. I'm in the final stages of editing, and I was wondering if you could take a quick look at it to see if there's any way I could make it better. I would greatly appreciate your input, but I totally understand if you're too busy. 

See you in class tomorrow,

Jane

A word of caution: DO NOT send this e-mail to your teacher the day before the paper is due. If your teacher responds at all, it probably won't be anything to want to hear. No one likes being asked to do things last minute. Also, don't take advantage of your teacher. Asking for help with major papers and requesting general advice on how you can do better in their class is fine. Running to them for every little assignment is not.

This is also the time you want to start working on your bibliography as well. Make sure to cite every source you used. Also, do not plagiarize. This should totally go without saying.

You might also want to add a cover page. Make this part as fancy as you want. Use that weird font you've been eyeing for forever. Just make sure that if you use an image you found online, cite it!

Flash forward to The Dreaded Due Date. You're not stressed, though, because you started (and finished) early. You didn't lose a minute of sleep last night. Just make sure you don't forget your paper in the printer tray. That'd be tragic. (You might want to e-mail your paper to your teacher the night before just in case. Add a joking little note that you're so forgetful and you'd hate to accidentally come to class without your paper.)

Now all that's left to do is sit back and wait for the A's to start rolling in. Check out our next post on credible sources for more help with the 'research' part of your paper.

University of Minnesota Digital Archive

The University of Minnesota offers an amazing free resource that allows anyone with an Internet connection to browse their extensive collection of digital materials. Students can learn about anything from horticulture to the history of computers. Art students can browse a beautiful collection of landscape paintings, drawings, and sketches done by Minnesota artist Francis Lee Jaques. An extensive collection of maps lets students find the perfect compliment to any history paper. Students can also browse a Children's Library, a collection of African American literature, an immigration archive, and a variety of Native American related documents.

The site is here: https://umedia.lib.umn.edu/node/88821

Remember, if you use any of the resources on this site, be sure to cite them accordingly! (The same goes if you use any other resource on this blog, or on the Internet in general, in the course of gathering information for your research paper.)

iTunes U

In their own words, "iTunes U is the best way to create and experience courses on iPad. The iTunes U app gives you access to complete courses from leading universities and other schools — plus the world’s largest digital catalog of free education content — right on your iPad, iPhone, or iPod touch. Whether you’re majoring in molecular biology at a university, taking Spanish in high school, or just interested in European history, you now have a valuable tool to help you learn anytime, anywhere."

Check it out here: https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/itunes-u/id490217893?mt=8

Free Books

Many sites provide free digital books. A few are listed below.

Project Gutenberg: https://www.gutenberg.org/wiki/Main_Page

Open Library: https://openlibrary.org/

Penn State Electric Classics: http://www2.hn.psu.edu/faculty/jmanis/jimspdf.htm

The Online Books Page: http://onlinebooks.library.upenn.edu/

You can also try searching the Amazon Kindle Store for free books. Amazon has thousands of free digital books, and you don't need a Kindle to access them, either. All you need is some kind of electronic device (a computer, tablet, or smart phone) and the free-to-download Kindle app.

If you're looking for a specific book, you might want to try a quick Google search using the keywords 'Title pdf' or 'read Title online free.' Use your judgement when doing so, however, because searches like these can direct you to virus-laden downloads if you click on a suspicious site.