13.3 "Ring Tone Meant to Fall on Deaf Ears" RI4./RI6.

For Classwork:

We're starting our third thematic unit this week, entitled "Groups, Technology, Power." We'll be reading articles, essays, short stories, and nonfiction narratives about power - which we are going to define as the ability to make other people do what we choose for them to do. We'll be asking questions like:

• Are groups inherently bad or good? Neither?
• Is our ever-growing use of technology good for us or bad for us?
• When is it okay to control somebody else? When is it not?
• Is it okay to manipulate others if you think that it's for their own good?
• If we don't agree with a group that we're part of, when is it best to go along? When is it best to resist?
• Does technology make us more or less free of the power of other people?

So, to start off, let's read an article about technology and power that I hope illustrates how these themes might impact a teen's life.

While you are reading:

1. Input three words into your spreadsheet and conduct the analysis. Make sure to practice the "Three Boxes" technique to analyze the context of the words.

2. Write an Author Purpose Statement in a new document called [YOUR NAME] Ring Tone AP.

Here's a model:

In the article, "Men Without Women," the author's primary purpose is to inform the reader that, in many areas of Asia, more boys are being born than girls because of social values, and this has consequences.

3. Choose one of the words and type up how you did the Three Boxes. Here's a frame to use, use this as a model:

First, I looked at the sentence and realized that because it came after the subject and there wasn't another verb, that it must be a verb, an action word. So, denigrate means "to _____________."

Then, I read over the paragraph. The main idea is that the man doesn't want to be made to feel like he's worthless. So, I am inferring that "denigrate" must mean to do something that makes somebody feel bad about themselves. The Central Idea of the article is about how people saying cruel things to others makes their physical health worse, which corroborates my guess. I am going to guess that "denigrate" means to say something to make somebody feel bad.

4. Respond to this question with a SEE paragraph:

What is ironic about the situation that the author presents in the article?