INDYKIDS

Event: developing and writing for IndyKids November issue

Location: Indypendent Media Office W.43rd st.

Amount of hours: Three 2 hour meetings (6 hrs in all)

Reflection:

At the first meeting there were not many IndyKid's members present, so we were immediately welcomed to contribute ideas to the November issue of IndyKids. Amanda, who serves as the head of IndyKids, showed us past issues and explained the format of the newspaper to us. We then went through different ideas for each page of the newspaper, keeping to the format. We discussed the current economy, the election, and other current events. The experience was very informative to me because I got to see first hand how a newspaper (be it small) is developed. By following the format and brainstorming ideas freely on a white board, we were able to come up with the skeleton of the newspaper and assign jobs in only 2 hours. Because I immediately felt like a valued member of the team and contributed ideas, I wanted to continue my involvement with IndyKids and contribute more. I volunteered to write an article, do a back page puzzle, and do the comic strip for the November issue. The past week I had seen a great documentary, called "Darius Goes West," and was moved by Darius's aspiration to spread awareness about Duchenne's Muscular Dystrophy and raise money for its cure, so I decided to write a review in IndyKids to help him out. 

I really enjoyed writing the article, and making the puzzle and comic strip. At the next meeting, we all brought our work in to be edited. They were very grateful for our contributions, and again I felt like I was a member of their team. I read all the articles-and learned about some current events while doing so-and edited them. It was fun to read each other's articles, edit, and then make the final decisions about where everything would go in the newspaper, because again we were able to accomplish so much in only 2 hours and discuss current events candidly as we put the newspaper together. 

At the final meeting I attended, we bundled and mailed all the newspapers. It was exciting to see them in print and find out that some of them are mailed as far as Japan. It was even more exciting to then bring them to my students and do two literacy lessons on the newspaper. My students loved the newspaper. We read almost every article the first day because my students wanted to look at all of them and they love taking turns reading out loud. One student asked why 'To Ban or Not to Ban" had the word 'homosexual' in it. This was the day after our class discussion, so I told them what it means, what it means in 'Tango Makes Three,' and why people want the book to be banned, and then I asked them if they think it should be banned. They all chanted, "No banning books, no banning books!" This is probably because I introduced the article by mentioning that their all-time favorite book, 'Harry Potter,' was almost banned because some people think books about witchcraft should not be read. They especially liked my comic because they love comics. It was really funny though, because they took it so literally (they are all on the autistic spectrum). One student said, "I get the punch line, 'I spent all my money!' but he didn't spend all his money, he still has two cents left. He should say, 'I spent all my money except two cents!'" After the lesson, one student started his own newspaper. 

The next day we looked at the newspaper again. I had each student take a turn reading one of Obama's plans and then asking the students a debate question, like, "Should there be more border control?" and then having the student count and record how many for and against. The students were really into it and were even more liberal than IndyKids!