Introduction
|
Do you ever get the feeling that you aren’t getting the full story? That the authorities are keeping something from you? That the truth is out there, just beyond your grasp, laughing at you?
You know the kind of stuff I mean: your parents tell you Santa won’t come if you don’t fall asleep - but how would he be able to know your state of consciousness from OUTSIDE THE HOUSE? Or how about this: your teachers tell you not to come into school because it’s a “staff day”, but your sister who’s in middle school says she saw them playing soccer, wearing giant plastic spheres. People tell you stuff all the time, and expect you to just accept it. And it doesn’t get any better when you’re an adult: now you are supposed to vote, and there are literally thousands of websites giving “news” about the candidates. Some of it sounds totally crazy: one website tells you that Hillary Clinton is a secret satanist. Another tells you that Donald Trump’s campaign manager has been receiving secret payments from foreign governments. How are you supposed to sort out what’s true from what’s false? That’s what this project is all about: finding the truth in a crazy world, so you never need to take what adults tell you at face value ever again. |
Essential Questions: How do I find the truth in this crazy world? How can I use my new powers to deceive others?
Conspiracy Theory Presentation
|
|
Each pair had chosen a conspiracy theory they either found or heard about and their task was to research and make a presentation about it, trying to make it as believable as possible.
Me and my partner chose MK ultra Project, it was very hard to find information because most of the files and info was erased from the internet since the government didn't want people to find out about what they were doing, but some paper work was leaked. We watched various of videos involving this "conspiracy" and many websites that stated this was true and it was proven in court that it was an actual event that occurred. At first I thought this was crazy and that it couldn't possibly be true, maybe just bits and parts of it that did actually happen. The first time I had an encounter with MK ultra was in a video that included many people stating in court about how they were victims of the project, I was very interested in this since it was very shocking to me. |
|
Since this was the start of spotting fake news and finding what is real and what isn't, our teacher had given us a website to look closely into and see if we can prove if the information and or just the website wasn't fake or real. Our class first started pointing out that the website had an author and looked into that person, he ended up being a teacher at a High Tech High North County and found out that our teacher and the "author" had worked together in a project before. So something was a bit fishy..but we kept looking and then saw some of the pictures on the website that were used were on the internet for anyone to look at and download. We also pointed out that the website had the url and had been made with weebly.com. A program where anyone can create their own website or blog page, which kind of gave it away that this didn't seem legit because it was not a reliable source. |
Original Hoax Story
|
This article may contain graphic,
violent information to some readers. ____________________________________________________ Horrible Accident in 2011 Caused There to be no Gym at High Tech High? By ANNA-NICOLE BARREIRO JAN. 23, 2017 A construction worker was killed in (2011?). It was said that a “wire rope” on the site had been tense and traveled fast enough that it sliced through a worker's neck. The accident occurred sometime at the construction site of High Tech Middle Chula Vista; a project based school, where work was being done to create an elementary school, middle school, and, school gym. When he was walking to his site a wire had detached from the school building, the speed it was traveling caused it to slice through his neck killing him from the loss of blood. The unidentified worker, around age 40-47, was dead by the time emergency workers arrived. The “wire rope” was around 2-10 microns in thickness with the tensile strength of ¼” steel cable. There was not that much of an investigation in determining why the wire detached. Their preliminary findings indicated that the cause was from the wire’s attachment not being secure. Some believe that from seeing it was not investigated properly, this was done purposely after finishing the building before moving onto the gym; which is not a required building. This is also because of HTHs “low budget”, but it was concluded to be an accident. This incident resulted of not building the school gym because it was not necessary at the time. But not much information has been said about this to disturb the students and educators. The blueprint designs for the school gym were leaked years after the tragic event, only few have seen them. |
We were put into partnerships and our assignment was to create a hoax story "prank" our school with the fake story we created. So in total in the classes there was many stories to choose from. Me and my partner thought of the idea about basing it off why our school doesn't have a gym because we know many people who want our school to have a gym and a football field and all the things regular schools have. We were planning to also leak some blueprints that were already created because a few years ago someone made their senior project about creating a gym at our school and made a Google Sketch up Design of it, so all we would really have to do its talk about it for a while and leak the designs and it would have everyone talking about it.
This was an interesting process to write because we were doing a lot of research and finding backstory so out story made sense and everything would tie together using dates the school was built..etc. But we realized when we had to put a reason why they stopped the making of the gym there had to be a reason and we needed off saying someone had been killed so they stopped the work which I didn't really like, but there was no other choice. So from there we really had to make it sound good and believable so it didn't sound ridiculous. It was a long and hard process using diagrams creating the storyline but it was really fun and interesting seeing how hard it is, and seeing what people go through to create these fake articles that are on the internet. |
|
My role in hoaxing the school was to The Department of Forgery" which was creating evidence to convince the students this was not just a "rumor". But, after realizing hoaxing the school wasn't going to work everyone wrote their "Story so Far", and starting reflecting on the whole project and our thoughts on what should happen next.
Below are some cool things we created in our department. |
My Story so FarI started this project thinking that we were going to get a bunch of conspiracy theories, debunk them, write statements/articles including why they are fake, and why people might believe them.
I thought it was gonna be easy, like mind control? That’s totally fake, right? It ended up being really hard and hours of research to get proof and a statement of why it’s real or fake. When we created our presentations I was very proud because I tried to make it the best possible with a lot of research to back it up. I liked learning about how I can tell what fake news is and learning the background info like pizza-gate, Ms Regina’s story, buzzfeed unsolved, hoaxes etc. The excitement started dialing down but I knew it would lead to something better. I loved creating our news articles, it was so fun to try making it sound like an actual article and using better vocabulary. Once we chose our hoax I was excited to convince people this was occurring. At first I wanted to do iTech High, then I didn’t, then I did.. When I started working with the forgery group I felt so great and excited to come to class these past days, I even did work at home about this and I was excited to put everyone's work together and watching it come along and how we were actually going to make this happen was so shocking. I felt like everything was in control, and with the coordinators and their “meetings” with all of us. I felt like I was apart of something and that my work was valuable! But yesterday you were telling us we might have to switch our ideas on this project I was honestly sad because I really wanted to do this. I started reflecting with Jackie about how we felt she was telling me her opinions and how she honestly did not like the project. I just kind of had to sit there saying nothing because I really didn’t agree with the points she was making. I realized when I was talking to her about my thoughts I had an idea, and remembered something. When we were brainstorming ideas about hoaxes I wrote on the board about how in order to make someone believe something, triggering your emotions...etc. I honestly think we should do something like the freshman's did last year with the haunted house project. They wrote stories and researched the triggering points of scaring someone.. I think we should do something “educational” first, then hit everyone with that High Tech High spark and “prank” everyone. Maybe when we cut the plug, we should interview some people who were believing our hoax. And maybe write about if I would believe it or not, or I don’t even know. But I really do think we should continue doing this project but not launch till we learn more about creating stories or writing with detail and vocabulary and tie it into our project with triggering feelings-believing things… Then we come into iTech High make a few changes about what we learned and launch. I honestly would be proud to show my work for this. I even want to post this stuff right now on my weebly(this is how anxious I am). Sorry if this reflection is everywhere I just had many different feelings about this project. |
Police ReportOutline
Jenny Goodheart the local newspaper girl was doing her usual stops, one of her stops was at Winston Peacock's home. Winston Peacock lived on his own and it had been said the he had a fortune tucked away in his home. Usually Winston would come out of his home and wave to Jenny. Events On January 1st of 1932 the newspaper girl, Jenny, did not see Winston Peacock at his usual spot to greet her like every other morning. This seemed odd for Jenny but she assumed he was hungover from New Year's festivities. The next day Jenny still did not see Winston. Not seeing him for two days was very unusual so she peeked into his home through a window. She found Winston’s dead body lying on the floor. He had a gunshot wound to the right side of his head and had a gun in his right hand. His glasses were on the floor next to his body and he was found next the carpet that had been obviously lifted. EVIDENCE AND WARRANTS When Winston was found he had a wound on right side of his head. The pen from his desk was on the right side of the paper and the gun was in his right hand as well. You can tell from this evidence, that Winston was right handed. Most people shoot guns with their dominate hand. In this case, Winston was right handed and could have shot himself with his right hand. Another piece of evidence was that the gun in his hand is the one that is missing from the nails holding the other pistol. He took one of the nearest guns, and shot himself. On his desk was a small note saying “phone bill…”, Winston also lived alone. Some of the reasons why people commit suicide is because they are having financial issues. Winston was reputed to have a fortune tucked away somewhere in his house, the carpet was lifted in a certain position that could have not been accidental. This could be evidence that someone was looking for the “fortune” he had hidden and they could have murdered him. |
We were given 2 stories to look into about whether if a "victim" committed suicide, or if it was a murder. We had to look for clues or any small thing that could be part of the reason proving what really happened to the victim. With the we got a better understanding about evidence and warrants and how we could write them. For example of evidence and a warrant-"When Winston was found he had a wound on right side of his head. The pen from his desk was on the right side of the paper and the gun was in his right hand as well. You can tell from this evidence, that Winston was right handed. Most people shoot guns with their dominate hand. In this case, Winston was right handed and could have shot himself with his right hand."
|
|
We learned different topics like about journalism and how it could be a danger right now and why, we learned about native advertisement, we watched videos about Dan Rather, we dissected a quote from Thomas Jefferson and many other things. We were then given the assignment to write a short essay answering the question, "What's the biggest threat facing journalism right now and what should we do about it?". Answering this questions we were given the freedom to go in whichever route felt the best and most knowledge to us.
I do still agree with what I wrote about since I was very brief about what I was talking about and it is something I believe in looking at what I learned throughout this project. |
The Biggest Danger Facing Journalism TodayWhat’s the biggest threat facing journalism right now and what should we do about it?
Journalists are experts on telling us what we need to know. Constantly having to seek the truth, it’s their job. Without journalists… What will happen? “If a nation expects to be ignorant and free...It expects what never was and never will be.” -Thomas Jefferson, president (1816) Ignorance is being unaware of something, individuals who… deliberately choose to ignore. And as an individual you have the right and the freedom to be ignorant. But where will that get you? If being ignorant means ending up under control of someone who manipulates you; is that really freedom? Ignorance is freedom, but freedom is not ignorance. Journalists give us the freedom we need. They speak news to power, and seek out truth. We deserve to know what’s going on in this crazy world we are living in. We need to know. With that said journalism is facing the biggest threats, why? Journalists are getting things published everywhere; the news, internet, media, etc. A lot of the things they are writing about are trying to be hidden from us. This means that someone out there doesn’t want us to know. Which puts that person writing at risk and for speaking the truth. People don’t want to be living from lies. “What the public needs to know is what somebody, somewhere- especially somebody in power- doesn’t want them to know. Thats news.” -Dan Rather, journalist (1902) |
Ad Campaign |
The assignment was to create an advertisment for a pill that supposably would let you live for 300 years. My group thought it was a good idea to create a price for the pills so it sounded more like a click add to buy the pills. We enlarged the 300 so it would be the main reason why people would buy this pill and people would be more engaged. We added lines around the whole text so it looked like it was glowing like it was something very important. Last thing we did was write limited supply so it would sell faster.
|
|
Our group thought it was relevant to create an article about something political and making it very biased. We all contributed into the writing and writing each sentence but we were all split up into different roles. What I did was making it aesthitcally look like a real news article from a real news site.
|
Fake News Olympics Story
|
Final News Story
I came up with the idea to write a story about this because I felt like fashion right now is being very talked about popular, and one of the biggest things I've seen lately and in the past was YEEZYs. And I thought if some people start hearing negative things about this very popular trend it would be very talked about and many people would be interested in reading about this.
Some of the red flags I included in my article were, the people that were "interviewed" were completely made up and fake people, the news site they got interviewed from is bbc.com.co and that is a fake news site, I also threw in a fake published future date to throw people off, the author was an author from a real news article, the url was fake below the page, we used abc news' logo but added .co at the end, and the sneaker expert and speeding up the factories causing defects are all fake information. But I used a method that can really throw people off. When using known true statements and information and tying in small but fake information to that will make it sound more believable.
With multiple drafts and critiques my article improved in using more professional language making it sound more believable and legit coming from a news site. I added more information having to do with the background of the shoes ad how they are made which is where the root of the "problem" is. Then I just made it very real using different texts and inserting pictures and logos and urls bringing the whole article together.
When we shared these with 8th graders from the middle school they said it looked very real by just looking at it and read it quickly and believed it. When they then got a 2nd chance to read it they were given a red flags paper including everything that might have been a flag to being fake news. They then realized it was fake by looking closely at the date and the url. Many of the students said that if they wouldn't of had the paper help them they would end up believing the article, which is why and how it is so easy to fall for fake news on the internet nowadays.
Some of the red flags I included in my article were, the people that were "interviewed" were completely made up and fake people, the news site they got interviewed from is bbc.com.co and that is a fake news site, I also threw in a fake published future date to throw people off, the author was an author from a real news article, the url was fake below the page, we used abc news' logo but added .co at the end, and the sneaker expert and speeding up the factories causing defects are all fake information. But I used a method that can really throw people off. When using known true statements and information and tying in small but fake information to that will make it sound more believable.
With multiple drafts and critiques my article improved in using more professional language making it sound more believable and legit coming from a news site. I added more information having to do with the background of the shoes ad how they are made which is where the root of the "problem" is. Then I just made it very real using different texts and inserting pictures and logos and urls bringing the whole article together.
When we shared these with 8th graders from the middle school they said it looked very real by just looking at it and read it quickly and believed it. When they then got a 2nd chance to read it they were given a red flags paper including everything that might have been a flag to being fake news. They then realized it was fake by looking closely at the date and the url. Many of the students said that if they wouldn't of had the paper help them they would end up believing the article, which is why and how it is so easy to fall for fake news on the internet nowadays.
Exhibition
When walking into exhibition you were greeted in the front door and someone handed you a paper, had quickly explained our project and what you were going to do at our exhibition. The room was filled with people on tables with jazzy music like a cafe, everyone sitting down was reading an article that they chose from a wall full of articles where YOU had to determine if it was real or fake by using the red flags list. On the corner was where a couple of students were selling muffins, coffee, and many other pastries so our guests would feel comfortable and entertained with a small snack while reading. I was in the front explaining our exhibition to each person and brought them in. I remember when greeting the people I ran into many of my past middle school teachers and they gave me a lot of good feedback and how it was so cool we created "fake news". Also many people loved the concept and idea of this project because it really gave a heads up to people that they should keep an eye on what they are reading online. I think next time if someone else was going to do an exhibition like this I would say they should prepare everyone to know exactly what to tell people about our project because I saw many people getting stuck on that and I had to run in to help the person out. I also think making the room ahead of time to create it into an actual cafe blocking out the walls making it look very professional would add a lot to this exhibition.
|
|
|
