- Teacher restates topic.

- Teacher reviews responses with students. The paragraph offers a description of a scientific study.

- Class discusses whether "interact" or "occur" is appropriate word choice.

- Teacher asks students to explain "stereotype” and "social skill."

- Teacher asks students to tell findings of study and points out that the Boston study contradicted stereotype.

- Class continues passage to discuss Indiana study.

- Teacher expands on brain anatomy mentioned in passage.

- Teacher asks students to compare behaviors based on active brain parts.

- Passage questions whether evidence supports claim by critics that violence in the media causes problems.

[clip length—7:31]

STUDENT:  Finished.

STUDENT:  I’m done.

TEACHER:  Anybody not done?

TEACHER:  Okay, Janine and everybody, listen up.

TEACHER:  All right. So the topic was violence in…

STUDENT:  The media.

TEACHER:  …the media. Okay. Uh, who wants to read the first sentence and tell me what they put? Stefan?

STUDENT:  The problem with violence in videogames and the media is a complex one.

TEACHER:  Complex. How many people had that? Complex. So we have complex.

STUDENT:  We fix it?

TEACHER:  Yeah. [inaudible] get it in the right spot, anyhow. Uh. Oh, no, you can write. Uh, you wanna do the next one?

STUDENT:  There have been many studies done that tried to link the playing of violent videogames or watching violent movies to aggressive behavior. Su— one such study at Massachusetts General Hospital uncovered some new information about teens and their violent games. The stereotype of a game shows them to be so— What is that?

STUDENT:  Solitary.

STUDENT:  Solitary and with no social skills. The new study found that kids who play videogames rated M for mature were more likely to occur in groups.

TEACHER:  Occur in groups.

STUDENT:  Interact.

TEACHER:  How many people had rated for the first word? Rated. Okay, that’s good [inaudible]. And how ’bout occurred? How many people had occur for the second?

STUDENT:  It’s interact.

STUDENT:  No, it’s interact.

TEACHER:  Wait. Uh, Rayshawn.

STUDENT:  Yes.

TEACHER:  Uh, the way we interact in here is you raise your hand first.

STUDENT:  Yeah.

TEACHER:  Okay? Rayshawn.

STUDENT:  Okay. It has to be interact because if you see in the bottom, when horrible crimes are committed by young people—

TEACHER:  Okay.

STUDENT:  Okay, forget that. It can’t be interact because occur sounds better on the bottom than it does up there.

TEACHER:  But does interact make sense up here?

STUDENT:  No.

STUDENTS:  Yes.

TEACHER:  Why?

STUDENT:  Because it says rated M for mature are— were more likely to interact in groups. You interact in the classroom.

TEACHER:  Okay, no but interact—

STUDENT:  In groups.

TEACHER:  Well, let’s look. I want—

Well, let’s look. I wanna [inaudible] the sentence before it said the stereotype of a gamer. What does that mean, a stereotype?

TEACHER:  What are— what are we talking about, Janine? [file jumps]

STUDENT:  Like, when you judge somebody just ’cause you see somebody else, um,

TEACHER:  Okay. So they judge people, or the gamers, as being what?

STUDENT:  Like, wanting to be alone.

TEACHER:  Wanna be alone. Okay. And ha— and they have no social skills. What does— what does that mean?

TEACHER:  Wait, wait. One person.

STUDENT:  They don’t socialize.

STUDENT:  Social skills probably like that…

TEACHER:  Ssh, ssh.

STUDENT:  …they’re probably participate ’cause since no skills, they would not, like, a good student or

TEACHER:  Well, their social— What do we mean by social skills, though? Skills, you’re right, but not as a student, but as…

STUDENT:  A person?

TEACHER:  A person. Yeah, getting along with other people. Skills of getting along. This is a stereotype. This is something that, uh, a judgment is put on these people. Did the study find out that that was true?

STUDENT:  Yeah.

STUDENT:  No.

STUDENT:  Yes.

STUDENT:  No.

STUDENT:  I don’t know.

STUDENT:  Maybe.

STUDENT:  Maybe.

TEACHER:  Raise your hand.

STUDENT:  rated.

TEACHER:  Janine, why don’t you come up and write it? Did the study find out that this was true?

TEACHER:  Did the study think that gamers are people who wanna be solitary and have no social skills? 

Kids who watch these movies are…

TEACHER:  Have no social skills and wanna be solitary.

STUDENT:  No.

STUDENT:  Yes.

STUDENT:  Yeah.

TEACHER:  They did?

STUDENT:  No, they didn’t.

STUDENT:  No, ’cause it’s a stereotype.

TEACHER:  It’s a stereotype. But what did— what’d the sentence tell ya?

STUDENT:  That—

TEACHER:  The study found… What?

STUDENT:  It says this new study found that the kids who played games rated M for mature were more likely to interact with

TEACHER:  So that does make them—

STUDENT:  So it’s a better chance—

TEACHER:  So if they’re more likely to interact in groups, are they solitary?

STUDENT:  No.

TEACHER:  No. Are they lacking in social skills?

STUDENTS:  No.

TEACHER:  No. Not necessarily. So the study found something different. That’s what I’m trying to get to. Does that make sense? That makes sense. Okay. Next one.

STUDENT:  The Indiana University School of Medicine conducted a similar study. Teenagers were asked to play one of two games for half an hour. One game was non-violent and the other was so violent that it was in the process of being banned.

TEACHER:  Banned, okay.

STUDENT:  Write it.

TEACHER:  We can write it. Okay.

TEACHER:  You wanna continue?

STUDENT:  Yeah.

TEACHER:  Okay. Antoine’s gonna continue.

STUDENT:  Banned was the word, too.

TEACHER:  Banned was the word. How many people had banned?

TEACHER:  Very good. Antoine.

STUDENT:  After playing, the teens underwent a brain scan. Researchers found that the teens who had played the mature game showed more activity in their a-mig-dul or amiglytis[sic].

TEACHER:  Oh, amigdala. Amigdala.

STUDENT:  Amigdala, a part of the brain that controls emotions. They also decrease in activity in their frontal lobes, the part of the brain that’s responsible— whatever.

TEACHER:  Responsible for…

STUDENT: self control.

TEACHER:  Very good. Hold up there. Amigdala. The amigdala— amigdala is a part of the brain—Janine—deep in your brain. It’s called amigdala because it means it’s almond shaped. That’s what that word means. And, uh, it controls your emotions. So if that’s very active, if they’re watching this after watching— if they’re looking at this and their— this part of their brain’s very active after watching this movie, what does that tell ya?

TEACHER:  That they’re— Well, what does that tell you about their emotions? Their emotions were up? Their emotions were down?

STUDENT:  Down.

TEACHER:  The— this part of their brain that’s controlling emotion’s very active now.

STUDENT:  Their emotions are up.

TEACHER:  Their emotions are up. They’re very emotional at this point.

STUDENT:  Right.

TEACHER:  Okay? After watching these kinda movies. Their frontal lobe, this part’a your brain right here, has to do with what?

STUDENTS:  With— with self-control.

STUDENT:  Self-control.

TEACHER:  Self-control. This is the part of your brain that’s developing right now, at your age. This is the part of your brain that tells you to think before you act and says, Hm, is that a good choice? Let me think about it. It’s, uh, an important part’a your brain. A lotta kids don’t have that well developed now. And so what do they do? They— what— which has more control? The frontal lobe or the amigdala?

STUDENTS:  Amigdala.

TEACHER:  Yeah. And do you see this in class? Kids get [snaps fingers] angry like— like that, and they— at each other at this age? You see that happen in middle school a lot?

STUDENT:  Yeah.

TEACHER:  Yeah. That’s what’s happening. So the amigdala’s taking control. The emotions are gettin’ ahead of ’em. The frontal lobe isn’t developed yet. They’re not thinking before they act.

TEACHER:  Okay. Read the rest.

STUDENT:  When horrible crimes are committed by young people, critics are quick to claim that such things occur because of violence in the media. Do we have evidence for this? Does— does what we watch or play have anything to do with how we act? I’m writin’.

TEACHER:  Okay. How many people had occur? And obviously, last word left—

 

 

Science Passage