Next week (9/30)
Syidah confidential: "How to not suck at life"

Keep polishing your speeches!

Be ready to perform your speeches on October 7 at the beginning of class.  Remember, your speech should be a call to action on your issue in two minutes or less.  This is important.

On October 7, we will also work on (as scheduled) making change through creative means.  Please watch this video before then:
JR, French street artist, proposes to use art to turn the world inside out

Saw this article on a youth activism summit--a "Youthquake"--where members spoke to the power of social media--and immediately thought of your mission and our Be The Change projects this semester!  Enjoy!

One Young World Mobilizes Youth to Create Positive Change

Awesome work yesterday, everyone!  I heard afterward that quite a lot of people had taken notice and spoken about what we were up to!  This is terrific!

Let's continue this next week! 

For next week, we're working on rhetoric and speeches.

Come in next week with a piece of about one minute that uses the power of speech to raise awareness for a specific social or political issue.  In your groups, you will work on techniques to make the speech better. 

One really good way to write a speech is to imitate a famous speech. 

You might imitate Dr. King's famous I Have a Dream speech, which you read yesterday, and which you can listen to here.  If you did that, you could begin with "I have a dream..." and then go on to explain what *your* dream is. 

Another cool thing to reference and imitate would be the Declaration of Independence (which you all know very well now): "We hold these truths to be self-evident..." What truths do YOU hold to be self evident?

Still another might be the beginning of the Constitution: "We the people..."  What declaration do YOUR people want to make today in 2011?

Or, you could imitate another amazing speech of your choice!

Remember, speeches don't just have to be formal addresses!  Students in the past have done very powerful spoken word (think Def Poetry) pieces as their speeches--feel free to get creative! 

What is required?
-That the speech be one minute long, plus or minus ten seconds.  Rehearse it!
-That the speech be SPOKEN.  Using your mouth.  Formal speech, spoken word, rap, poetry, whatever.
-That the speech serves as a call to action or a complaint about something SPECIFIC that is wrong in the world today--a social or political problem.  Hunger.  Poverty.  The environment.  Jobs.  Violence.  Police brutality.  Prejudice.  Drug abuse.  Rape.  These are just a few of the specific problems you might speak out against.

Surprise, surprise, we're going to work on these in class and then speak them publicly too!

Also, for Friday: practice reading The Constitution of the United States aloud.

Friday marks "Constitution Day".  In honor of this BHCC will have a guest speaker, Pauline Maier, on Wednesday, tomorrow, at 1:00 PM in C-202--I encourage you to come.

But we, America Speaks, will honor the Constitution in another way, with our first practice in public demonstration, on Friday.  We, as a class, will read the constitution aloud in a public space at BHCC.

The White House will soon launch some cool online petitioning tools at http://www.whitehouse.gov/wethepeople

These could be awesome for your projects!

Awesome class today!  I can't wait for next Friday!

Here are the two TED talks we watched in class:

How to Start a Movement

How To Make a Splash in Social Media (Mr. Splashy Pants) 

Week 2 (9/16) New media

Read or watch before class on September 16.
Clay Shirky, "How Cellphones, Twitter, and Facebook Can Make History"
“How Obama Tapped into Social Networks’ Power”
“QR Code Campaign Fights for Education Equality in Iran”

CHALLENGE (work in groups in class): Identify a social or political problem. What would be the most effective way to use Facebook, Twitter, smartphone apps like foursquare, etc. to raise awareness or make change for your chosen political or social problem? SHOW US!

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