Overview
These SEL activities support the learners in identifying the importance of context in framing the emotional response of the viewer. In other words, determining the intended meaning behind the statement and the importance of understanding the surrounding conversations, context and commentary.
Prompt Questions
These questions are provided as examples to initiate and guide discussions around the topic in this focus area.
- Can you think of a situation you or a friend have experienced where someone got the “wrong end of the stick”?
- What happened? How did the misunderstanding occur?
- What happened to resolve the misunderstanding and ensure you all correctly understood?
- Words and phrases can have different meanings depending on their context and use. Can you think of any examples?
- Can you think of any examples of “coded language” online? (e.g. slang words/phrases created by a group referring to people/objects/activities that only members of the group would understand.)
- What factors might be involved in inferring the meaning of a word/phrase/message?
- e.g. current situation, who said it, who the intended audience are, current emotional state of reader, native language of speaker/audience.
- What feelings might people have when there is a miscommunication that…
- ...targets them individually?
- ...targets a group they belong to?
- ...targets someone else?
Warm Up Activity
The SELMA project short definition of hate speech is:
“Any online content targeting someone based on protected characteristics with the intent or likely effect of inciting, spreading or promoting hatred or other forms of discrimination.”
Crack the code
This activity has been designed to help learners explore the premise that words can have different impacts on the audience, depending on their understanding of the words.
You will need:
- Three groups of learners, one small group (three learners) and two larger groups, depending on total group size.
- Code cards.
- Answer cards printed and stuck to straws, sticks or tubes.
Give the small group (the code givers) the following text, or project it onto a board:
Mauris facilisis iaculis vulputate morbi in rhoncus nisi? Ac gravida rhoncus massa, iaculis imperdiet non mollis ut? Sed finibus!
Explain that the other two groups will have to use their decoder keys to decode part of the statement that will be read out to them.
Each of the other groups will be the code-breakers.
There are two versions of the decoder key for the code-breakers which, when used correctly, will result in the two groups having different viewpoints to each other about the given statement.
Make sure that each group’s instructions are not disclosed to the other group.
After the statement is read out, ask the groups to read out their translation of the extract.
Discuss the different responses from each group.
Explain that the purpose of this activity is to demonstrate that one statement can be interpreted in different ways.
Ask if the learners can think of a situation, online or offline, where something similar may have occurred to them. If a learner shares a situation, you might like to unpick this with them to understand why the content was interpreted differently to how it was intended.
Main Activity
The SELMA project short definition of hate speech is:
“Any online content targeting someone based on protected characteristics with the intent or likely effect of inciting, spreading or promoting hatred or other forms of discrimination.”
Context is key
This activity aims to explore some examples of hate speech statements, how they make the learners feel, and the importance of context in understanding hate speech.
The slide pack contains a series of hate speech statements, with the context of the statement displayed afterwards.
For each statement, learners need to decide if the statement is a hate speech statement or not. Then once you have shared the context they should review their decision. Does their decision change once they see the context of the statement, or does it stay the same?
Note that, for the purposes of this activity, learners should treat Xenovia as if it was a real country in the world.
After working through some/all of the slides, ask learners to identify the factors they considered in order to judge the context of each example message (and whether or not it could be considered helpful).
These factors could include:
- Use of other words/language in the message
- The identity of the author of the message
- Relationship between author and recipient(s)
- The method in which the message was shared (e.g. private message vs. public social media post)
- Images/visual cues
- Any other factors that influenced perception of the message
You may wish to record these ideas on sticky notes or large sheets of paper; they will prove useful as factors to consider in the ‘Spotting hate: creating an algorithm’ activity.
Tasks
Individual/group specific task linked to the themes developed in the activity
Ask learners to work in small groups/pairs to make a list of coded words/phrases that they have seen/experienced online. This could include:
- slang words used by peers in their school community.
- slang words used by young people generally online.
- specific words/phrases used by different online groups/users (e.g. gaming lingo, abbreviations, etc.).
- words/phrases that specifically target a protected characteristic (e.g. race, gender, sexuality, disability etc.).
Note - These words/phrases are likely to be offensive (as this is their intention) so it should be made clear to the learners that these are being recorded purely for identification and not to be used towards any member of the group or the school community. It is not recommended to allow learners to research online to find more words for this category, so learners should draw from their own knowledge.
Ask learners to sort these words into three categories: positive emotions, neutral (factual) and negative emotions. Are there any words that sit in more than one category depending on context?
The words sorted into the negative category can provide a useful start to a database of key vocabulary/expressions for designing a “hate speech” algorithm in the Media Analysis activity.
Resources
Recognise that a statement can be interpreted in different ways, with context being key. Understand that something that is harmless in your peer group may be harmful or offensive to someone else.
