Lesson 1 (estimated 2 days): Tobacco Advertising

Introduction:Goal for this second half of this unit is to become media savvy advertisers. We’re going to take a close look at the messages we see all the time in society, but instead of just giving them a quick glance or ignoring them, we’re going to de-construct them. In other words, we’ll use the same analysis skills we practice all the time in history or English class – but we’re going to apply those skills to ads. Once we’ve learned what it takes to make an effective ad, we’re going to use those skills to make our own positive advertisement.

PART I:

  1. Warm Up: Can you think of any cigarette ads you’ve seen over the years? What images do cigarette companies use to sell cigarettes? What message do they try to send?
  2. Now we will look at some cigarette ads together.

(Visual Image Protocol: Teacher uses these three prompts to deconstruct the ads, and look at them with a critical eye.)

  1. What do you see going on here?
  2. Why do you think the image-maker made those choices? What you think the image-maker wants you to think?
  3. What do you think? Do you think the ad is effective?
  4. Now we will look at some anti-cigarettes advertising using the same questions.
  5. Discuss: Which advertising do you think is more effective with teenagers? Why?
  6. Journal Writing: Answer these questions so we can refer back to your notes when we have to complete our own project:
  7. What images does tobacco advertising use to encourage smoking?
  8. What messages does tobacco advertising try to send to society?
  9. How effective do you think these images or messages are in promoting smoking? Why?
  10. What did you think of the anti-cigarette ads? How effective do you think they were? Why?
  11. If NYC offered to pay you to come up with an anti-cigarette advertising campaign directed at teenagers, what ideas do you have for images and messages?

PART II:

  1. Read “Big Tobacco and Advertising”. Stop every paragraph or two, just to check for comprehension – and to see if there are any questions.
  2. Discuss:
  3. What do you think about the article?
  4. Do you believe what he is saying about the conscious and unconscious minds? That advertising seeks to get into our unconscious minds?
  5. Why do you think cigarette companies spend $15 billion a year in advertising? Do you think it’s successful?
  6. Look at this graph or U.S. cigarette smoking rates, from the 1940’s to the 2000’s. What do you seeing go on? Why do you think smoking rates have decreased since the 1940s?

e. Smoking is not just an issue in the United States. In fact, of the 1.2 billion smokers world-wide, about 80% of them live outside of North America and Europe. What do you think about this last graphic?

  1. Journal Writing: Tomorrow we move on to alcohol advertising. But before we do, write any final thoughts about cigarette advertising – about unconscious and conscious minds, how much money is spent on advertising, or smoking rates in the US and worldwide.