Teacher Guide
IB DP Language and Literature
For IB Diploma Language A: Language and Literature
10 cases about media, law, policy and the decisions that shape your life. For every case: the opener, the case file, a reasoning page, a worked example and a one-period workshop plan.
How this edition works
IB Diploma Programme Language A: language and literature classes at SL and HL, using selected cases for Paper 1 practice and one individual-oral rehearsal. Each case starts from something people actually saw or argued about and works toward something students decide or make. Objectives stay explicit for you; students meet the ideas through what they investigate and create.
- A momentsomething people saw, shared or argued about
- A questionworth investigating
- The evidenceand the context around it
- Your calla decision or something you make
- Feedbackwhat your choice changes, and for whom
- Real worldwhere this decision actually gets made
By the end, students can
- Analyze how non-literary texts construct meaning through content, form and audience.
- Enter an unseen text through a guiding question and sustain a focused analysis.
- Frame a transnational global issue and trace it through a literary work and a body of non-literary work.
- Organize analysis clearly and write in precise academic language.
What’s different in this edition
- Only cases with a genuine non-literary text or a literary work are used; ten cases are marked not recommended
- Paper 1 routes supply a guiding question and hold contextual sources back until after drafting
- The one individual-oral rehearsal (Matilda) requires a literary work studied in class
- Feedback describes the published assessment areas without predicting IB marks
Real, or made for this lesson?
Real source links to reporting, research or an official page you can check yourself. Fictional case material was written for the story, so you can practice on it safely.
Plan the edition
Preparation
- Use only cases marked strong or partial; the fit reason explains any extra text you need.
- For partial-fit cases, select the longer real text the route calls for.
- Hold contextual sources back until students have drafted, as the Paper 1 routes specify.
- Use the individual-oral rehearsal only if the class has studied the literary work it names.
Materials
- The case text and any teacher-selected companion text
- The route’s guiding question printed above the text
- Annotation layers from the route’s supports
Timing
Plan 75 minutes for a Paper 1 practice analysis and about 90 minutes for the individual-oral rehearsal, including preparation.
Assessment
Give practice feedback on understanding and interpretation, analysis of the writer’s choices, focus and organization, and language; do not predict IB marks or treat rehearsals as assessed components.
Supports that don’t lower the bar
- VocabularyKeep a glossary of text-type conventions and multimodal terms for each case’s text type.
- Read-aloudFor practice, read the unseen text aloud once before timed analysis, then withdraw the support as the course progresses.
- Bilingual planningAllow annotation in any language during practice; the analysis is written in the language of the course. Never ask a student to disclose a disability, immigration status, family finances or private records to take part.
- Oral rehearsalFor the individual oral, rehearse the opening minute and practice answering follow-up questions with a partner.
- Other ways to respondEarly in the course, allow a recorded spoken commentary as a step toward written Paper 1 analysis.
Framework
IB Diploma Programme Language A: language and literature (guide for first assessment 2021)
- Three areas of exploration: Readers, writers and texts; Time and space; Intertextuality: connecting texts
- Paper 1, guided textual analysis: two previously unseen non-literary passages from different text types, each with a guiding question; SL students write one analysis and HL students write two
- Individual oral: a prepared 10-minute response followed by 5 minutes of teacher questions, examining how a global issue of the student’s choice is presented through the content and form of one literary work and one body of non-literary work studied in the course
- A global issue should be significant on a wide scale, transnational, and visible in everyday local contexts
Checked 2026-09-24. Alignment is described here, not certified or endorsed.
The companions in the margins
LupaEvidence
DudaQuestions
PautaRules
OndaImpact
NexoConnections
VozNext steps
What’s inside
1Before you repostWhat can a screenshot actually prove?5
3The apology is not the repairWhat makes a correction more useful than “sorry”?12
6Who gets to see your school records?If your family helps pay for school, what are they allowed to see?19
7Who decides what stays on the shelf?A group chat says one complaint got a novel “banned.” What actually happened, and who decides?26
8Is it a recommendation or an ad?If a creator got the product free, do viewers need to know?33
9Your ballot is more local than your feed.What’s actually on your ballot, and where do you find out?40
12A protest is not one legal questionWhen does a school get to limit what students say?47
15Internship, or someone’s unpaid job?When is an unpaid internship really a job that should be paid?54
16“It’s our policy” is not the endWhen a new building rule appears, who wrote it and who does it affect?61
20Looks real. What proves it?A realistic image says the courtyard flooded today. What would it take to post that as true?68
Case 1
Before you repost
What can a screenshot actually prove?
Most news about school closures, rule changes and events reaches students as a cropped clip in a group chat. Checking the original and posting a useful update keeps a whole community from acting on half a sentence.
In the real world
- CrashCourse (YouTube), 2019Check Yourself with Lateral Reading: Crash Course Navigating Digital Information #3
- PolitiFact, 2022Viral image shows fake story from The Atlantic about Biden
- You’ll make
- Guided analysis, 600–800 words, written in 75 minutes
- Time
- About 75 minutes
- Level
- IB DP Language and Literature
MateoDale, I wanted that clip to be fake so badly I almost told everyone to ignore it. Let me find the full transcript first.
The case file
Look at what’s actually here before deciding what it means.
- 1Fictional case material
Forwarded screenshot in the crew’s group chat, Friday 4:52 p.m.
“They’re removing access tonight. Screening canceled?”
Attached clip, 7 seconds.
Coordinator: “…we are removing access—” The clip ends there.
- 2Fictional case material
Room coordinator, full meeting transcript, Friday 3:30 p.m. meeting
“The side-door reader is broken. We are removing access through that reader tonight. Existing room bookings remain in place. Use the staffed front entrance while we repair it.”
- 3Fictional case material
Booking confirmation emailed to Mateo, sent Tuesday 10:14 a.m.
Friday, 6–9 p.m. Screening confirmed. Front entrance: step-free. Staff member at the desk from 5:30 p.m. Contact the coordinator for arrival support.
- 4Fictional case material
Jordy, holding message in the same chat
“We’re checking the original. Hold your plans for a moment.”
- 5Fictional case material
“My friend is already on the train. “We are figuring it out” does not tell her whether to keep coming.”
Gia, 21, leaving for a café shift
Outside the story
The case is fictional. The questions in it are not. Here is where they show up in the real world.
Still missing
Whether every visitor can use the staffed front entrance (the email says step-free, not that every arrival need is covered), who first cropped the clip and why, and how many people already changed their plans.
Real-world evidence
Real sourceSociety of Professional Journalists, SPJ Code of EthicsSummary, not a quotation: the code asks journalists to take responsibility for the accuracy of their work, verify information before releasing it and avoid distorting facts or context, including visual information.
videoCheck Yourself with Lateral Reading: Crash Course Navigating Digital Information #3CrashCourse (YouTube), 2019-01-22Shows the move the crew makes: leave the screenshot, open new tabs and check who made it and what other sources say.
articleViral image shows fake story from The Atlantic about BidenPolitiFact, 2022-08-01A real fact-check of a fabricated news screenshot: the image looked official, but the outlet never published it.
Discuss before deciding
- Which item did you trust first, and why?
- What would you need to see before repeating the strongest claim?
- Who is missing from these documents?
What the evidence can hold up
Draw an arrow from each piece of evidence to the claim it supports or challenges. Which claim is left standing, and which gap still needs a check before you post?
| Evidence | Claim 1The screening is canceled. | Claim 2The screening is on; use the staffed front entrance. |
|---|---|---|
| 1The clip: “we are removing access…” ends mid-sentence. | Supports | — |
| 2The transcript: access is removed “through that reader,” and existing bookings remain in place.Also narrows evidence 1 | Challenges | — |
| 3The booking email: Friday 6–9 p.m., screening confirmed, step-free front entrance. | Challenges | Supports |
Still open
- Can every visitor use the temporary entrance?
One student’s draft
Write a holding statement and a follow-up correction for the same chat, twenty minutes apart. Add a two-sentence rationale.
Message 1 (5:05 p.m.): Hey everyone, we saw the clip about the Common Room. We’re checking the full meeting update right now, so please don’t cancel your plans yet. We’ll post again by 5:25 with a real answer.1 Message 2 (5:25 p.m.): Update: the screening is NOT canceled3. It’s still Friday 6–9 p.m. The clip cut off the part where the coordinator said they’re removing access “through that reader,” meaning the broken side door2. Use the front entrance instead. It’s staffed from 5:30 and it’s step-free. I think whoever posted it was trying to start drama.4 Rationale: I didn’t repeat the word “canceled” in my first message because people might only read that one word. I gave a time for the next update so people know when to check back.
- 1Strong holding move: a specific time tells people already traveling when to look again.
- 2Precise evidence. Quoting the exact words the crop removed shows readers why the clip misled them.
- 3A clear verdict, but naming the booking email or the transcript here would let readers check it for themselves.
- 4Revise: nothing in the sources tells us why the clip was shared. A guess about motive weakens the correction and can start a new argument.
Works wellUses evidenceGap to fixThink about the reader
One revision
BeforeI think whoever posted it was trying to start drama.
AfterI checked the coordinator’s full transcript and Mateo’s booking email. Need help getting in? Message the coordinator before you leave.
The revision swaps an unsupported guess for a named source and a contact, which gives readers something to verify and something to do.
Teacher commentary
This response handles the holding statement well and uses the transcript precisely, and the rationale explains a real word choice. The correction slips by adding a motive and never naming its source or a contact for arrival help. One targeted revision moves it from Developing to Proficient on the Evidence and Audience rows.
Teach it in one period
IB DP Language and Literature
Write a guided textual analysis of the group-chat screenshot and its caption in response to the guiding question. Treat it as a non-literary text: analyze the crop, the caption’s punctuation, the placement of “canceled?” and the reader it assumes.
- Sources
- The screenshot and caption as the unseen text. The transcript and booking email are held back until after the first draft, then used to test the reading.
- Product
- Guided analysis, 600–800 words, written in 75 minutes
- Objective
- Students practice the Paper 1 move of analyzing how a non-literary text’s form and language position its reader, entering through a guiding question.
- Assessed by
- The teacher gives practice feedback on understanding and interpretation, analysis of the writer’s choices, focus and organization, and language; no IB marks are predicted.
| 45 minutes | You | Students | Check for |
|---|---|---|---|
| 5 minHook: the post only | Project evidence A alone. Ask: what would you do if this landed in your chat right now? | Write privately: what happened, and what am I assuming? | Each student has one observation and one assumption written separately. |
| 8 minQuestion the clip | Introduce Lupa’s question: where is the original? Model turning a reaction into a checkable question. | Pairs write one question that could change their view. | Questions are answerable with a document, not a vote on the poster. |
| 12 minOpen the receipts | Hand out the transcript and booking email on separate pages. Read the transcript aloud. | Highlight the words that narrow “access.” Place each document beside the claim it supports. | Pairs point to “through that reader” and “Existing room bookings remain in place.” |
| 10 minChoose the message | Walk through decision 1: cancel now, holding message, or “it’s fake.” Ask what each makes a reader do. | Vote, then defend the choice with one line of evidence. | Students explain why “fake” overstates: the clip is real, the context is missing. |
| 7 minDraft the update | Give the frame: “The post claims __. The original says __. We still need __.” | Write a 40–70 word group-chat update. | Draft names the screening time, the entrance change and a contact. |
| 3 minExit ticket | Ask for one detail that changed their mind. | Write the exact words that changed their interpretation. | Quotes a phrase from the transcript or email, not the screenshot. |
Before class
Prepare the case documents, one set per pair:
- Forwarded screenshot in the crew’s group chat, Friday 4:52 p.m.
- Room coordinator, full meeting transcript, Friday 3:30 p.m. meeting
- Booking confirmation emailed to Mateo, sent Tuesday 10:14 a.m.
- Jordy, holding message in the same chat
Every document is fictional case material, printable from the online field guide.
Questions to keep asking
LupaThe clip ends one sentence early. “Through that reader” is the evidence the screenshot cut.
DudaWhat would the poster have needed to see before adding “canceled?”
Onda“Come like normal” could send Sami to the broken side door. Name the entrance.
Support every student, then assess
Success looks like
- Responds directly to the guiding question
- Analyzes how specific formal features create meaning
- Supports each claim with precise reference to the text
- Sustains an organized line of analysis in clear academic language
Supports at this level
- Guiding question printed above the text
- Annotation layers: content, form, effect on the reader
- Model opening paragraph on a different text type
Access
- Give the three documents on separate half-pages with the key sentence enlarged
- Read the transcript aloud and provide a recorded version for replay
- Spanish glossary: afirmación, contexto, fuente, entrada
- Students with IEPs or 504 plans may dictate the update or build it from sentence strips
- Reduce the load to the screenshot and booking email only
Stretch
- Map how the rumor would travel through three different chats and who would miss the correction
- Write a one-paragraph policy for how the Common Room posts urgent updates
Challenge: Practice framing a global issue through this text, such as how the power to edit shapes public belief, knowing that a real individual oral uses extracts from a literary work and a body of work studied in the course.
| Rubric | Beginning | Developing | Proficient | Advanced |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Evidence | Repeats the screenshot’s claim or ignores the documents. | Mentions a source but not the detail that changes the meaning. | Uses the transcript or email to correct the claim accurately. | Uses both documents and names what they still cannot confirm. |
| Reasoning | Treats the clip as fake or as final. | Corrects the claim but adds a guess about motive. | Explains the difference between an entrance change and a cancellation. | Explains how the crop produced the wrong conclusion and avoids inventing motive. |
| Audience & purpose | Message would not help someone decide whether to leave. | Gives the verdict but leaves out time or entrance. | Gives time, entrance and a contact. | Anticipates access needs and people who saw only the original post. |
| Revision | No change after feedback. | Surface edits only. | Adds a missing fact or removes an unsupported claim. | Explains why each edit makes the update more usable. |
Standards this can show
Language A: language and literature — Readers, writers and textsIB DPTheory of Knowledge — Knowledge and technology (optional theme)IB DP
Case 3
The apology is not the repair
What makes a correction more useful than “sorry”?
Clubs, schools and companies all post things that turn out to be wrong, and how they fix it decides who keeps trusting them. Students who can tell a real correction from a nice-sounding apology can hold groups, including their own, to a higher standard.
In the real world
- NPR Public Editor, 2022That was wrong
- NPR, 2017Dove Expresses 'Regret' For Racially Insensitive Ad
- You’ll make
- Guided analysis, 600–800 words, written in 75 minutes
- Time
- About 75 minutes
- Level
- IB DP Language and Literature
AnikaWe were carrying chairs at 5:30. Don’t tell me how sorry you feel. Tell people what actually happened.
The case file
Look at what’s actually here before deciding what it means.
- 1Fictional case material
The crew’s published recap caption, Saturday 11:08 a.m.
“Great night, once the younger crowd finally got organized.”
- 2Fictional case material
Jordy’s setup log, Friday evening
5:40 p.m. Projector failure reported. 6:00 p.m. Attendees seated. 6:20 p.m. Replacement projector connected. Note: Anika and Dec helped carry chairs before doors opened.
- 3Fictional case material
Anika, 16, message to the crew
“We were helping you set up. Why are we the problem in this post?”
- 4Fictional case material
Gia’s first correction, drafted Saturday 2:15 p.m., not posted
“Sorry if this came across wrong. We love our younger neighbors and would never want anyone to feel excluded.”
- 5Fictional case material
“My log says Anika and Dec were carrying chairs before doors opened. The caption turned them into the reason we started late.”
Jordy, 20, kept Friday’s setup log
Outside the story
The case is fictional. The questions in it are not. Here is where they show up in the real world.
Still missing
What each attendee actually experienced, whether any latecomers affected the start at all, how far the recap was reshared, and whether Anika wants any public response.
Real-world evidence
Real sourcePublic Relations Society of America, PRSA Code of EthicsSummary, not a quotation: the code names honesty among its core values and, in its provisions of conduct, expects members to correct promptly any erroneous communication they are responsible for.
articleThat was wrongNPR Public Editor, 2022-10-21How a real newsroom corrects mistakes: name the error, fix it on the story and keep a public list.
articleDove Expresses 'Regret' For Racially Insensitive AdNPR, 2017-10-08A real brand apology after an ad played into a racial stereotype; compare the words with what changed afterward.
Discuss before deciding
- Which item did you trust first, and why?
- What would you need to see before repeating the strongest claim?
- Who is missing from these documents?
Same moment, different accounts
Place the four accounts side by side. Where do they agree, where do they split, and which one was written down at the time?
Caption: the night went well once the younger crowd got organized.
Event log: projector failed at 5:40; replacement connected at 6:20; Anika and Dec carried chairs.
Anika: “We were helping you set up.”
Where they agree
The screening started late.
Where they differ
What caused the delay: a group’s behavior or an equipment failure?
Check: Which account was recorded at the time rather than remembered afterward?
One student’s draft
Write a correction and a short repair plan with a named owner and a date to check it.
Correction: Our recap said the screening started late because the younger crowd wasn’t organized. That was wrong, and we’re sorry.1 Jordy’s event log shows the projector failed at 5:40 p.m.2 and the new one wasn’t connected until 6:20. Anika and Dec actually helped carry chairs before doors opened. Repair plan: Gia will edit the original caption today so the correction is where people saw the mistake. We will also ask Anika to post that she’s okay with the correction so people know it’s resolved.3 Before we post any recap, Jordy will check claims about what caused a problem against the event log. We’ll check on Friday whether the next recap went through that step.4
- 1Good order: the correction names the error before it apologizes, so it does its main job first.
- 2Precise evidence with a time lets readers see why the caption’s explanation doesn’t hold.
- 3Revise: this puts repair work on the person who was blamed. The crew can offer a private way to respond, but Anika shouldn’t have to vouch in public.
- 4Strong measure: it checks whether the promised process happened, not just whether the comments stopped.
Works wellUses evidenceGap to fixThink about the reader
One revision
BeforeWe will also ask Anika to post that she’s okay with the correction so people know it’s resolved.
AfterWe’ll message the people the caption blamed to say it’s corrected, and they can reply privately if we missed something.
The crew still reaches the people who were harmed, but the work of fixing the record stays with the crew.
Teacher commentary
The correction is accurate, leads with the error and cites the log with times. The repair plan names an owner, a process and a date, which many drafts miss. Asking Anika to vouch for the crew is the one line that shifts the burden onto the person harmed; fixing it moves the plan to Advanced on Audience.
Teach it in one period
IB DP Language and Literature
Write a guided textual analysis of the crew’s published correction, reading it against the caption it replaces. Then apply the same guiding question to one longer real correction or apology statement the teacher selects.
- Sources
- The original caption, the posted correction from the case and one teacher-selected published correction from a newsroom or organization.
- Product
- Guided analysis, 600–800 words, written in 75 minutes
- Objective
- Students practice analyzing how a non-literary text type, the public correction, constructs accountability through structure and agency.
- Assessed by
- The teacher gives practice feedback on understanding and interpretation, analysis of the writer’s choices, focus and organization, and language; no IB marks are predicted.
| 45 minutes | You | Students | Check for |
|---|---|---|---|
| 5 minRead the caption | Show the caption alone. Keep discussion on the fictional event. | Silently note the claim and the group it blames. | Students name “younger crowd” as the group blamed. |
| 10 minBuild the timeline | Hand out Jordy’s event log. | Build a timeline from 5:40 to 6:20 and mark which entry challenges the caption. | Timelines show the projector failure as the cause of delay. |
| 8 minExamine the apology | Project Gia’s first draft. Ask: what does it correct? | Highlight words about intent in one color, facts in another. | Students find zero corrected facts in the draft. |
| 15 minWrite the plan | Introduce the plan parts: goal, audience, key message, channel, repair owner, measure. | Draft a 70–100 word correction plus one repair with an owner and a check. | Correction names the error, the evidence, the fix and who does what. |
| 5 minEditorial desk | Assign roles: fact-checker, reach-checker, responsibility-checker. | Partners check one role each and suggest one edit. | Each draft receives one specific edit tied to a role. |
| 2 minExit | Frame: “Our next recap will change because __.” | Complete the frame. | Answer names a repeatable process, not a feeling. |
Before class
Prepare the case documents, one set per pair:
- The crew’s published recap caption, Saturday 11:08 a.m.
- Jordy’s setup log, Friday evening
- Anika, 16, message to the crew
- Gia’s first correction, drafted Saturday 2:15 p.m., not posted
Every document is fictional case material, printable from the online field guide.
Questions to keep asking
Lupa5:40 p.m. projector failure. The log answers the question the caption guessed at.
OndaAnika helped set up and got blamed in public. That shapes whether she comes back.
PautaA wrong post isn’t automatically a legal problem. It’s still an ethical one to fix.
Support every student, then assess
Success looks like
- Responds directly to the guiding question
- Analyzes sequence, agency and word choice with precise references
- Connects the text type’s conventions to its purpose
- Sustains an organized line of analysis in clear academic language
Supports at this level
- Guiding question printed above the text
- Annotation layers: sequence, agency (who did what), hedging
- Checklist of conventions for corrections and apologies as a text type
Access
- Pre-build the timeline with blanks for three times
- Read Anika’s message aloud in a neutral voice
- Spanish vocabulary: corrección, estereotipo, reparación
- Allow students to annotate a provided draft instead of writing from scratch
- Reduce the plan to three parts: fix, owner, check
Stretch
- Draft how the crew would measure whether younger neighbors come back
- Compare a real published correction policy from a newsroom with the crew’s plan
Challenge: Compare how agency is assigned in the caption (“the younger crowd”) and in the correction (“we”), and explain the effect on the readers who were wronged.
| Rubric | Beginning | Developing | Proficient | Advanced |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Evidence | No evidence about the delay. | Mentions “technical issues” vaguely. | Cites the projector failure from the log. | Cites specific times and corrects who actually helped. |
| Reasoning | Apologizes for feelings only. | Admits error but not what it was. | Names the inaccurate claim and replaces it. | Explains why the claim harmed a group and how the repair prevents a repeat. |
| Audience & purpose | Does not consider who saw the post. | Speaks to readers in general. | Reaches the people who were blamed. | Reaches the original audience and the blamed group through appropriate channels. |
| Revision | No change. | Softens tone only. | Adds facts and a repair. | Adds facts, an owner, a check and removes shifting of blame. |
Standards this can show
Language A: language and literature — Readers, writers and textsIB DPGlobal Politics — key concepts: power and legitimacyIB DP
Case 6
Who gets to see your school records?
If your family helps pay for school, what are they allowed to see?
Grades, schedules and discipline records follow students for years, and the rules about who can see them change at 18 or when a student starts college. Knowing which record, which permission and which office to ask keeps family support from turning into giving away every login.
In the real world
- U.S. Department of Education (YouTube), 2013Student Privacy 101: FERPA for Parents and Students
- U.S. Department of Education, Student Privacy Policy OfficeMust postsecondary institutions provide a parent with access to an eligible student’s education records?
- You’ll make
- Guided analysis, 600–800 words, written in 75 minutes
- Time
- About 75 minutes
- Level
- IB DP Language and Literature
RafaSige, they can help with the bill. I just want to read what I’m signing before I hand over my grades too.
The case file
Look at what’s actually here before deciding what it means.
- 1Fictional case material
§ Parent and family access authorization form mailed to Rafa, August 28 (illustrative)
Section 1, Billing and payments: allow the person named below to view account statements and make payments. Yes / No. Section 2, Academic records: allow the person named below to receive information about grades, enrollment and academic standing. Yes / No. Section 3: this authorization stays in effect until the student changes or withdraws it in writing.
- 2Fictional case material
College annual FERPA notice posted on the registrar’s page, fall term (illustrative)
Students have the right to inspect their education records, to request corrections and to consent to disclosures, except where the law allows disclosure without consent. Questions go to the Office of the Registrar.
- 3Fictional case material
Rafa’s family group chat, Sunday 8:47 p.m.
Mom: Did the tuition form come? We want to help with the bill.
Dad: Send us the login and we’ll take care of everything.
Rafa: Sige, the bill part I can share. Let me read the rest first.
- 4Fictional case material
“Then we need the actual exception and the actual facts. “Privacy law” is not a magic sentence that answers every request.”
Caio, 24, helping Rafa read the request
Outside the story
The case is fictional. The questions in it are not. Here is where they show up in the real world.
Still missing
Which form and exceptions Rafa’s own college uses, whether his family claims him as a tax dependent, exactly what help his family wants, and how the college lets a student change an authorization.
Real-world evidence
Real sourceU.S. Department of Education, Student Privacy Policy Office, FAQ “What is FERPA?”Summary, not a quotation: FERPA gives parents certain rights over their children’s education records, and those rights transfer to the student at age 18 or when the student attends a school beyond the high school level. A student who holds the rights is called an eligible student.
Real sourceAmerican University, parent-access guide (AU Central)Summary, not a quotation: the guide separates parent online access for student-account activity and bill payment from authorization to discuss academic records, and says parent billing access does not include viewing grades.
videoStudent Privacy 101: FERPA for Parents and StudentsU.S. Department of Education (YouTube), 2013-11-07The Education Department’s own short explainer of FERPA rights and when they move from parents to students.
Discuss before deciding
- Which item did you trust first, and why?
- What would you need to see before repeating the strongest claim?
- Who is missing from these documents?
Who actually gets to decide?
Who actually decides each question: Rafa, the rule or the college? Mark where paying the bill and seeing grades split into two separate decisions.
Who may see Rafa’s grades?
Rafa, the eligible student, through written consent
FERPA: rights transfer to the student at 18 or on entering college
Rafa’s family, who help pay tuition
The registrar or records office explains which form and which exceptions apply
Who may see and pay the tuition bill?
Rafa, the eligible student, through written consent
Rafa’s family, who help pay tuition
One student’s draft
Write Rafa a one-page guide separating paying the bill from seeing grades.
Paying vs. Seeing: A Guide for Rafa Since you’re 18 and in college, the FERPA rights to your education records belong to you now, not your parents. The Department of Education FAQ says rights transfer at 18 or when you start college1. Paying tuition is a different thing from seeing your grades. In the university guide, parent access for the bill does not include viewing grades2, so that needs a separate authorization. So your parents can never see your grades unless you say yes.3 Before you sign anything, ask the records office three questions: which record would be shared, who would get it, and how you can change your mind later4. Talk with your family first about what help you actually want.
- 1Accurate statement of the transfer rule, attributed to the right source.
- 2Precise use of the university guide, and the writer correctly presents it as one school’s process.
- 3Revise: this overstates the rule. FERPA has exceptions, including one for parents who claim a student as a tax dependent. Say that exceptions exist and send Rafa to the records office.
- 4Strong next step: specific, answerable questions for the office that actually holds the records.
Works wellUses evidenceGap to fixThink about the reader
One revision
BeforeSo your parents can never see your grades unless you say yes.
AfterUsually your family would need your permission to see grades, but the law has exceptions, so ask the records office which ones your college uses.
The revision keeps the main rule clear while being honest that exceptions exist, which is what the success criteria ask for.
Teacher commentary
The guide gets the transfer rule right, separates billing from grades and ends with a useful set of questions. The one absolute claim, “never,” is the kind of overstatement that can mislead a student in a real situation. Qualifying it moves the guide from Developing to Proficient on Reasoning.
Teach it in one period
IB DP Language and Literature
Write a guided textual analysis of the university’s parent-access guide in response to the guiding question, treating it as an institutional text written for families and students at once.
- Sources
- The American University parent-access guide linked in the case as the text; the federal FAQ is used only as background after drafting.
- Product
- Guided analysis, 600–800 words, written in 75 minutes
- Objective
- Students practice analyzing how an institutional non-literary text uses structure and address to manage two audiences.
- Assessed by
- The teacher gives practice feedback on understanding and interpretation, analysis of the writer’s choices, focus and organization, and language; no IB marks are predicted.
| 45 minutes | You | Students | Check for |
|---|---|---|---|
| 5 minOpen the envelope (not literally) | Read the conversation where Rafa hasn’t opened the envelope. Set the norm: no one shares real records. | Write: what does Rafa want his family to help with? | Answers name a specific task, not “everything.” |
| 10 minRead the rule | Read the FERPA FAQ lines on rights and transfer aloud. | Answer the case quiz: a student starts college at 17—who holds the rights? | Students answer “the student” and cite why. |
| 10 minSeparate the routes | Hand out the parent-access guide excerpt. | Sort billing, grades and adviser conversations into “covered by this form” or “needs something else.” | Grades land in “needs separate authorization.” |
| 12 minDraft the question | Model a records-office question: record, recipient, authority. | Write Rafa’s question and the smallest access that would actually help. | Question names one record, one person and asks which permission applies. |
| 5 minCheck the limits | Ask Caio’s question: what if there’s an exception? | Add one line saying what they still need to confirm. | Line admits an exception may apply without guessing which. |
| 3 minExit | Ask for one difference between paying and permission. | Write it in one sentence. | Sentence separates billing access from academic records. |
Before class
Prepare the case documents, one set per pair:
- Parent and family access authorization form mailed to Rafa, August 28 (illustrative)
- College annual FERPA notice posted on the registrar’s page, fall term (illustrative)
- Rafa’s family group chat, Sunday 8:47 p.m.
- Caio, 24, helping Rafa read the request
Every document is fictional case material, printable from the online field guide.
Questions to keep asking
PautaAt 18 or entering college, FERPA rights move to the student. Paying tuition doesn’t move them back.
LupaThe guide says parent billing access does not include viewing grades. That’s a separate form.
DudaWhat is the smallest access that gives Rafa the help he actually wants?
Support every student, then assess
Success looks like
- Responds directly to the guiding question
- Analyzes structure, address and diction with precise references
- Explains effects on both audiences
- Sustains an organized line of analysis in clear academic language
Supports at this level
- Guiding question printed above the text
- Annotation layers: question-and-answer structure, headings, forms of address, conditional wording
- Model paragraph analyzing a different institutional text
Access
- Provide a one-sentence summary of each source above the original text
- Read the FAQ aloud and show a timeline visual
- Spanish vocabulary: expediente, consentimiento, divulgación, derechos
- Students with IEPs may use a fill-in guide instead of writing from scratch
- Never ask students to describe their own family arrangements
Stretch
- Find your own school’s FERPA notice and summarize what it says about directory information and opting out
- Compare FERPA with your state’s student-privacy law, if it has one
Challenge: Analyze how the guide addresses its readers, for example through headings and forms of address, and what that reveals about whose permission the institution centers.
| Rubric | Beginning | Developing | Proficient | Advanced |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Evidence | No source cited. | Refers to “privacy law” generally. | Cites the transfer rule and the separate-access guide. | Cites both and notes that exceptions exist. |
| Reasoning | States the rule backwards. | Gets the transfer right but merges billing and grades. | Separates paying from permission correctly. | Explains why least access is a reasonable choice. |
| Audience & purpose | Tells Rafa what to do. | Gives advice without a next step. | Leaves the decision with Rafa and names the records office. | Respects Rafa’s family relationship while protecting his choice. |
| Revision | No change. | Fixes one fact. | Fixes the rule and adds a next step. | Explains why each correction matters for Rafa’s decision. |
Standards this can show
Global Politics — key concepts: rights and libertyIB DPTheory of Knowledge — Knowledge and politics (optional theme)IB DP
Case 7
Who decides what stays on the shelf?
A group chat says one complaint got a novel “banned.” What actually happened, and who decides?
School and public libraries across the country are deciding how to handle challenges to books, and the rules vary by district and state. Students who can tell a complaint from a final decision, and who know where to speak, can take part without spreading rumors or silencing other readers.
In the real world
- Chalkbeat Colorado, 2025Colorado bill to curb school library book challenges clears first legislative hurdle
- Chalkbeat Tennessee, 2024Under stricter Tennessee law, some school library books quietly disappear
- You’ll make
- 10-minute recorded oral plus 5 minutes of teacher questions, with a one-page outline
- Time
- About 90 minutes
- Level
- IB DP Language and Literature
MariMira, I found a character in a book like this who made me feel less alone. That’s why I care. Now what does the policy actually say?
The case file
Look at what’s actually here before deciding what it means.
- 1Fictional case material
Group chat, Thursday 10:12 p.m.
“One parent complained, so that novel is banned. It’s gone from the library.”
- 2Fictional case material
§ District reconsideration notice, posted Friday by the school library
“A request for reconsideration has been received for one title in the library collection. Under district policy, the title remains available during the review. A review committee will read the full work and evaluate it against the district’s selection criteria. Written input may be submitted by the 15th. The committee’s decision may be appealed.”
- 3Fictional case material
§ Review committee input form, due the 15th
Name and role (student, parent, staff or community member). Have you read the entire work? Yes / No. Which selection criteria does your input address? Comments, 300 words maximum.
- 4Fictional case material
“Mira, I found a character in a book like this who made me feel less alone. That’s why I care. Now what does the policy actually say?”
Mari, 19, bookseller and zine maker
Outside the story
The case is fictional. The questions in it are not. Here is where they show up in the real world.
Still missing
Which novel is under review and what the request says, who sits on the review committee, what the district’s selection criteria say in full, and what state law, if any, adds to the district policy.
Real-world evidence
Real sourceAmerican Library Association, Selection and Reconsideration Policy Toolkit: formal reconsiderationSummary, not a quotation: ALA’s example procedure has a review committee whose members read or view the entire work, evaluate it against the collection policy’s criteria and vote, with the material remaining available until a formal decision and with an appeal route. ALA presents this as guidance for libraries to adapt, not as law.
Real sourceRoald Dahl, Matilda, authorized extract published by PenguinSummary, not a quotation: in the extract, four-year-old Matilda finds the village public library on her own; the librarian, Mrs Phelps, helps her choose books, and over the following months she reads widely, including classic adult novels.
articleColorado bill to curb school library book challenges clears first legislative hurdleChalkbeat Colorado, 2025-02-10A state debated requiring clear reconsideration policies, showing a challenge is a process, not an instant ban.
Discuss before deciding
- Which item did you trust first, and why?
- What would you need to see before repeating the strongest claim?
- Who is missing from these documents?
Who actually gets to decide?
Replace “banned” with the real chain of decisions. Who decides at each stage, which rules bind them, and where can a student’s input land?
Keep, restrict or remove the novel after review
The school review committee, which reads the whole work and votes
District-level appeal and, finally, the school board
District reconsideration policy and selection criteria
State law and unsettled First Amendment case law (Pico had no majority opinion)
Written input on the committee form by the 15th
One student’s draft
Write input to the review committee using the published selection criteria.
To the Review Committee, I’m a student at this school, and I’m writing about the novel under review. The district’s selection criteria ask the committee to judge each book as a whole1, not by one passage. Read as a whole, this book follows a character dealing with isolation2 and slowly finding people she can trust, and that is why readers my age connect with it. I understand the parent who filed the request is worried about one scene with mature content, and that concern deserves a real answer3. But honestly, anyone who wants a book removed is just trying to control what other people read4. I’m asking the committee to keep the novel available and, if the concern is about age level, to consider an age note in the catalog rather than removal. Thank you.
- 1Strong: the argument is anchored in the committee’s own published criterion.
- 2Good use of the whole-work standard, though one specific scene or detail would make the evidence stronger.
- 3Good: the writer acknowledges another reader’s concern with respect.
- 4Revise: this assigns a motive to everyone who files a request and contradicts the respect shown one sentence earlier. The committee needs reasons tied to criteria, not judgments of people.
Works wellUses evidenceGap to fixThink about the reader
One revision
BeforeBut honestly, anyone who wants a book removed is just trying to control what other people read.
AfterBut the criteria ask about the whole work, and that scene is part of how the story shows the character’s isolation.
The revision keeps the disagreement about the book, where the criteria apply, instead of about the parent, which the committee cannot weigh.
Teacher commentary
The input is organized around the committee’s criteria, reads the book as a whole and makes a constructive request. One sentence undoes the respectful acknowledgment by attributing a motive to everyone who files a request. Replacing it with a criteria-based reason moves the input to Advanced on Audience, and adding one specific scene would strengthen Evidence.
Teach it in one period
IB DP Language and Literature
Rehearse the individual oral. Choose a short extract from Matilda, such as the library scene with Mrs Phelps, and a short extract from a body of non-literary work on book challenges, such as a library association’s public statements or a district’s reconsideration notices. Prepare a 10-minute response examining how the global issue of who controls young people’s access to books is presented through the content and form of both extracts, followed by 5 minutes of teacher questions.
- Sources
- An extract from Matilda studied in class (the publisher’s authorized extract is a starting point), and an extract from one body of non-literary work on book challenges chosen with the teacher.
- Product
- 10-minute recorded oral plus 5 minutes of teacher questions, with a one-page outline
- Objective
- Students rehearse the individual oral by examining how a global issue is presented through content and form in a literary extract and a body of non-literary work.
- Assessed by
- The teacher gives practice feedback on knowledge of the extracts, analysis of authorial choices, focus and organization, and language; this rehearsal is not an assessed individual oral and no IB marks are predicted.
| 45 minutes | You | Students | Check for |
|---|---|---|---|
| 5 minThe library scene | Read the authorized Matilda extract where Mrs Phelps helps Matilda find books. | Write what the library gives Matilda. | Answers go beyond “books” to access or belonging. |
| 8 minThe chat claim | Show the group chat: “One parent complained, so that novel is banned.” | List what you’d need to know to confirm it. | Lists include stage, policy and who decides. |
| 12 minRead the process | Hand out the district policy excerpt and the ALA reconsideration steps. | Map the stages and mark where the novel is now. | Maps show “under review, still available.” |
| 8 minThe legal layer | Explain Pico in two minutes and that state laws vary. | Write one sentence on what the law does and doesn’t settle. | Sentence avoids claiming the law clearly forbids or allows removal. |
| 9 minPrepare input | Model a comment tied to criteria. | Draft a 90-second comment or written input for the committee. | Input names a criterion and a reader’s perspective without speaking for everyone. |
| 3 minExit | Ask: whose reading experience is missing? | Name one and how to hear it respectfully. | Answer doesn’t put a classmate on the spot. |
Before class
Prepare the case documents, one set per pair:
- Group chat, Thursday 10:12 p.m.
- District reconsideration notice, posted Friday by the school library
- Review committee input form, due the 15th
- Mari, 19, bookseller and zine maker
Every document is fictional case material, printable from the online field guide.
Questions to keep asking
LupaThe notice says “under review.” The chat says “banned.” Those are different stages.
PautaALA guidance isn’t law. The district’s adopted policy and state law govern the process.
OndaMari found a character who made her feel less alone. That’s why readers care.
Support every student, then assess
Success looks like
- Frames a global issue that is transnational and visible in local contexts
- Analyzes content and form in both extracts
- Balances attention between the literary work and the body of work
- Answers questions with textual evidence
Supports at this level
- Global-issue planner: the issue, where it appears in each text, how form shapes it
- Outline template for a 10-minute response
- Practice questions for the 5-minute discussion
Access
- Offer an audiobook or read-aloud of the Matilda extract (Mari moves between print and audio)
- Provide the process as a visual flowchart
- Spanish vocabulary: biblioteca, reconsideración, criterios, apelación
- Allow oral input
- Never ask students to share personal reasons a book matters to them
Stretch
- Find your district’s reconsideration policy and summarize its stages
- Research how your state’s laws about school library materials have changed recently
Challenge: Explain one way the literary extract’s form, such as Dahl’s narrative voice, presents the issue differently from the institutional voice of the body of work.
| Rubric | Beginning | Developing | Proficient | Advanced |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Evidence | Repeats “banned.” | Mentions a complaint without stage. | States the current stage from the policy. | States stage, next steps and input route. |
| Reasoning | Declares a legal verdict. | Treats outrage as the argument. | Separates complaint, review and decision. | Connects input to criteria and notes legal uncertainty. |
| Audience & purpose | Attacks people. | Rallies without direction. | Gives a useful participation route. | Invites participation while respecting other readers and the parent. |
| Revision | No change. | Tone only. | Corrects the stage and removes attacks. | Explains how each change helps the chat act accurately. |
Standards this can show
Language A: language and literature — Readers, writers and textsIB DPGlobal Politics — key concepts: rights, liberty and legitimacyIB DP
Case 8
Is it a recommendation or an ad?
If a creator got the product free, do viewers need to know?
Much of what students see online is shaped by relationships between creators and brands, and many students are creators too. Knowing what a clear disclosure looks like helps them judge recommendations and post honestly, whether they have fifty followers or fifty thousand.
In the real world
- NBC News, 2023Influencers warned by FTC over ‘inadequate’ disclosures of artificial sweetener promotions
- ABC News, 2019Popular YouTuber chimes in on federal product disclosure guide for influencers
- You’ll make
- Guided analysis, 600–800 words, written in 75 minutes
- Time
- About 75 minutes
- Level
- IB DP Language and Literature
CaioCalma, the cut is good. Watch it once like a stranger with the sound off. Can they tell the book was free?
The case file
Look at what’s actually here before deciding what it means.
- 1Fictional case material
Publisher email offering a review copy, sent two weeks before posting
“Hi Gia, we love your book reviews! We’d be glad to send you a free copy of our spring novel for review. There’s no obligation to post, but if you do, we’d appreciate a tag. Best, the publicity team”
- 2Fictional case material
Gia’s review video, first cut, Friday evening (script and caption)
Spoken: “Okay, you guys, I have to tell you about this book because I literally could not put it down!” On-screen text: none. Caption, below the video: “@publisher #booktok”
- 3Fictional case material
Watch once as a stranger, phone on mute. 0:00–0:03: does anything say free copy? Caption sits below the video; most people won’t open it. Tag = brand name, not relationship.
Caio’s edit notes, Saturday 1:30 p.m. - 4Fictional case material
Viewer comment on a similar review by another creator (illustrative)
“wait was this sponsored?? kind of feels like an ad now”
Outside the story
The case is fictional. The questions in it are not. Here is where they show up in the real world.
Still missing
Whether Gia has any other relationship with the publisher, what label the platform itself would show, how many of her viewers watch without sound, and whether the review’s strongest claims are supported beyond her own reading.
Real-world evidence
Real sourceFederal Trade Commission, Disclosures 101 for Social Media InfluencersSummary, not a quotation: FTC staff guidance says to disclose any financial, employment, personal or family relationship with a brand, including free or discounted products; to place the disclosure where it is hard to miss, with the endorsement; and, in a video, to put the disclosure in the video itself, ideally in both audio and on-screen text, not only in the description.
Real sourceFederal Trade Commission, FTC’s Endorsement Guides: What People Are AskingSummary, not a quotation: the FTC’s question-and-answer guide explains how the agency applies its Endorsement Guides, which interpret the FTC Act’s prohibition on deceptive practices, to reviews, social media posts and other endorsements.
articleInfluencers warned by FTC over ‘inadequate’ disclosures of artificial sweetener promotionsNBC News, 2023-11-15Real creators were warned for not clearly saying they were paid, the exact question this case asks.
Discuss before deciding
- Which item did you trust first, and why?
- What would you need to see before repeating the strongest claim?
- Who is missing from these documents?
If this, then what?
Follow both choices forward. Which consequences can Gia control, which depend on viewers, and what test tells her the disclosure worked?
Post the first cut with only a brand tag in the caption
Sound-off viewers never learn the book was free
Viewers deciding whether to buy or borrow the book
Disclose aloud and on screen in the first seconds
Viewers weigh the recommendation knowing the relationship
Viewers deciding whether to buy or borrow the bookSome viewers may discount the review as an ad
One student’s draft
Write a revised script and caption and a short note on why a tag alone isn’t enough.
Revised script: At 0:00, spoken and on screen: “Heads up, the publisher sent me this book for free1.” Then: “Okay, you guys, I could not put this down. The sisters felt so real, and the ending wrecked me. I finished it in two nights.” Caption: Publisher sent me a free copy for review. @publisher #booktok Note: A tag alone isn’t enough because a lot of people watch with the sound off and never open the caption3, and a tag just names the brand without saying the book was free2. Now the disclosure is spoken and on screen in the first seconds. Honestly the disclosure is just a formality, because my opinion is real either way.4
- 1Plain words that name the relationship, placed at 0:00 where every viewer meets it.
- 2Precise reasoning that matches the case: a tag identifies a brand, not the relationship.
- 3Good audience thinking: the writer considers how viewers actually watch.
- 4Revise: an honest opinion and a disclosed relationship answer different questions. Viewers need the relationship to decide how much weight to give the opinion, so it is not a formality.
Works wellUses evidenceGap to fixThink about the reader
One revision
BeforeHonestly the disclosure is just a formality, because my opinion is real either way.
AfterMy opinion is honest, but viewers still deserve to know the book was free so they can decide how much to trust it.
The revision separates the two ideas the task asks about: whether the opinion is sincere, and whether viewers know the relationship that could shape it.
Teacher commentary
The script puts a plain-language disclosure in the first second, spoken and on screen, and the note explains why a tag alone fails. The closing sentence undercuts the work by calling disclosure a formality, blurring the opinion-versus-relationship distinction the task asks for. With that sentence revised, the response reaches Proficient on Reasoning and Advanced on Audience.
Teach it in one period
IB DP Language and Literature
Write a guided textual analysis of Gia’s first-cut review (spoken script, on-screen text and caption) in response to the guiding question, treating it as a multimodal non-literary text.
- Sources
- Gia’s first-cut script and caption as the text; the revised version and the FTC guidance are used only after drafting.
- Product
- Guided analysis, 600–800 words, written in 75 minutes
- Objective
- Students practice analyzing how a multimodal non-literary text builds intimacy and trust and how placement shapes what readers notice.
- Assessed by
- The teacher gives practice feedback on understanding and interpretation, analysis of the writer’s choices, focus and organization, and language; no IB marks are predicted.
| 45 minutes | You | Students | Check for |
|---|---|---|---|
| 5 minWatch the review | Describe Gia’s fictional review: enthusiastic, publisher tagged, no mention of free copy. | Rate how much you trust the review, 1–5, and say why. | Ratings come with a reason. |
| 8 minReveal the connection | Reveal the publisher’s email offering the free copy. | Rate again. What changed, and why? | Students explain context, not dishonesty. |
| 10 minRead the guidance | Read the FTC Disclosures 101 key points aloud. | List three things a good disclosure does. | Lists include clear words, in the video itself, noticeable. |
| 12 minBuild the plan | Introduce comms-plan pieces: audience, key message, channel, consistency. | Rewrite the video’s opening and caption with a spoken and on-screen disclosure. | Script names the relationship in plain words in the first seconds. |
| 7 minStranger test | Caio’s check: watch it like a stranger on a phone, sound off. | Swap scripts; can a sound-off viewer catch the connection? | Each partner confirms or suggests a fix. |
| 3 minExit | Frame: “I can like the review and still want to know __.” | Complete the frame. | Answers reference the relationship. |
Before class
Prepare the case documents, one set per pair:
- Publisher email offering a review copy, sent two weeks before posting
- Gia’s review video, first cut, Friday evening (script and caption)
- Caio’s edit notes, Saturday 1:30 p.m.
- Viewer comment on a similar review by another creator (illustrative)
Every document is fictional case material, printable from the online field guide.
Questions to keep asking
LupaThe publisher’s email says “free copy for review.” That’s the relationship to disclose.
PautaFTC guides explain how the FTC Act’s ban on deception applies to endorsements.
DudaWould someone watching with the sound off know the book was free?
Support every student, then assess
Success looks like
- Responds directly to the guiding question
- Analyzes spoken, visual and written features with precise references
- Explains how the text constructs intimacy and trust
- Sustains an organized line of analysis in clear academic language
Supports at this level
- Guiding question printed above the text
- Annotation layers: address to the viewer, intensifiers, placement of the brand tag
- Glossary of multimodal terms: caption, overlay, direct address
Access
- Provide a storyboard with the first frame completed
- Read the FTC key points aloud with icons
- Spanish vocabulary: anuncio, patrocinado, divulgación, recomendación
- Allow students to record or draw instead of write
- Reduce to one disclosure line and placement
Stretch
- Analyze three real posts from brands’ own accounts (not individual creators) for disclosure
- Compare FTC guidance with another country’s advertising standards body
Challenge: Compare the first cut with the revised version and analyze how disclosure changes the implied relationship between creator and viewer. For oral practice, frame a global issue such as the commercialization of trust online, remembering that a real individual oral pairs a literary work with a body of work studied in the course.
| Rubric | Beginning | Developing | Proficient | Advanced |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Evidence | No disclosure or claim support. | Tag only. | Names the relationship clearly. | Names the relationship and supports the product claim. |
| Reasoning | Treats opinion as a substitute for disclosure. | Discloses but can’t explain why. | Explains why placement and clarity matter. | Distinguishes opinion, relationship and product claim. |
| Audience & purpose | Ignores viewers. | Assumes viewers read captions. | Works for sound-off viewers. | Works across channels with consistent wording. |
| Revision | No change. | Adds a hashtag. | Adds spoken and on-screen disclosure. | Explains each placement choice for different viewers. |
Standards this can show
Language A: language and literature — Readers, writers and textsIB DPTheory of Knowledge — Knowledge and technology (optional theme)IB DP
Case 9
Your ballot is more local than your feed.
What’s actually on your ballot, and where do you find out?
National races dominate feeds, but many decisions that shape students’ lives, like school boards, judges and local measures, appear lower on the ballot. Knowing how to find your own official ballot and deadlines matters whether you’re voting soon or learning how the system works before you can.
In the real world
- NPR, 2023Some states are trying to boost youth voter registration. Here's what they're doing
- Ballotpedia News, 2025Most states allow teenagers to pre-register to vote before turning 18, and some let them vote in primaries
- You’ll make
- Guided analysis, 600–800 words, written in 75 minutes
- Time
- About 75 minutes
- Level
- IB DP Language and Literature
MateoDec doesn’t need us picking for him. He needs his own ballot and a registration check before November. Honestly, so do I.
The case file
Look at what’s actually here before deciding what it means.
- 1Fictional case material
§ Illustrative sample ballot, November general election
Federal: U.S. Representative. State: State Senator; Superior Court judge (retention). Local: Board of Education, District 3 (vote for two); City Council, Ward 5. Measures: Measure T, transit improvements bond.
- 2Fictional case material
Creator’s voter guide, posted three weeks before the election
“Everything you need for November!! Registration closes the 14th. School board: vote Candidate B, the only one who actually cares about students. Measure T: yes, obviously.”
- 3Fictional case material
Gia’s group-chat reminder draft, Sunday 6:30 p.m.
“Check your registration and your own sample ballot at vote.gov. Deadlines depend on your state. Please don’t post your address here.”
- 4Fictional case material
“I turn 18 in October. I don’t need someone picking for me. I need to know what’s on my ballot and whether I’m registered in time for November.”
Dec, 17, theater crew - 5Fictional case material
“Dec’s feed is all the big race. Then you flip the sample ballot: school board, city council, a transit bond. Nobody’s posting about Measure T.”
Mateo, 22, moved from New Bedford for college
Outside the story
The case is fictional. The questions in it are not. Here is where they show up in the real world.
Still missing
Dec’s own state, registration status and deadline, the actual sample ballot for his address, what each local office is responsible for where he lives, and who wrote and funds the creator’s guide.
Real-world evidence
Real sourceVote.gov, Preparing to vote: age 18 and underSummary, not a quotation: Vote.gov explains that in most states, the District of Columbia and U.S. territories people can preregister before turning 18, that you must be 18 to vote, that several states let 17-year-olds vote in primaries if they will be 18 by the general election, and that each person should check their own state’s rules.
Real sourceU.S. Constitution, Twenty-Sixth Amendment, Section 1 (text as published by the National Constitution Center)“The right of citizens of the United States, who are eighteen years of age or older, to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of age.”
articleSome states are trying to boost youth voter registration. Here's what they're doingNPR, 2023-08-06Explains preregistration and other state steps that let teens sign up before they turn 18.
Discuss before deciding
- Which item did you trust first, and why?
- What would you need to see before repeating the strongest claim?
- Who is missing from these documents?
Who actually gets to decide?
Separate the two questions Dec has: what is on his ballot, and can he vote. Which rules and offices answer each, and which source should he check first?
Which contests and measures appear on Dec’s ballot
His address and district lines, drawn through redistricting
Vote.gov, which links to his state or local election office
Whether Dec can register and vote in November
Twenty-Sixth Amendment: the vote at 18 cannot be denied on account of age
State rules on preregistration, deadlines and 17-year-old primary voting
Vote.gov, which links to his state or local election office
One student’s draft
Write a nonpartisan explainer on one local contest: what the office does, what’s on the ballot and where to verify it. Compare how two guides describe the race.
School Board, District 3 What the office does: The school board sets the district budget, hires the superintendent and approves policies like the school calendar. It doesn’t run individual classrooms.1 What’s on the ballot: Two seats are open, with four candidates. There’s also a transit measure, but that’s a city question, not a school board one2. Where to verify: Look up your own sample ballot through vote.gov, which sends you to your state’s election office. The creator guide says Candidate B is the only one who cares about students, so you should probably vote for her3. Comparing guides: The county guide prints each candidate’s statement in their own words.4 The creator guide adds opinions about who is best.
- 1Good: saying what the office does not control keeps readers from asking it for the wrong things.
- 2Strong jurisdiction thinking: the writer separates two contests on the same ballot.
- 3Revise: an explainer must stay nonpartisan. Report what the guide claims as the guide’s opinion and leave the choice to the reader.
- 4Good comparison: the writer identifies how the two guides differ in purpose.
Works wellUses evidenceGap to fixThink about the reader
One revision
BeforeThe creator guide says Candidate B is the only one who cares about students, so you should probably vote for her.
AfterOne creator guide recommends a candidate; that is the guide’s opinion, so check each candidate’s own statement in the county guide.
The revision keeps the explainer nonpartisan while still teaching readers to tell a recommendation from a fact.
Teacher commentary
The explainer describes the office accurately, including its limits, separates the school board from the city measure and compares the two guides by purpose. One sentence slips from explaining into recommending a candidate, which the task rules out. Replacing it with a clearly labeled description of the guide’s opinion moves the response to Advanced on Audience.
Teach it in one period
IB DP Language and Literature
Write a guided textual analysis of a teacher-selected voter guide aimed at young or first-time voters, responding to the guiding question.
- Sources
- One teacher-selected voter guide aimed at young people, balanced across the class with guides from different organizations, and the case’s sample ballot for context.
- Product
- Guided analysis, 600–800 words, written in 75 minutes
- Objective
- Students practice analyzing how a voter guide, as a non-literary text, uses address, layout and word choice to move from informing to persuading.
- Assessed by
- The teacher gives practice feedback on understanding and interpretation, analysis of the writer’s choices, focus and organization, and language; no IB marks are predicted.
| 45 minutes | You | Students | Check for |
|---|---|---|---|
| 5 minYour feed vs. your ballot | Show a feed full of one national race. Ask: what else might be on the ballot? | List guesses. | Lists include local offices. |
| 10 minRead a sample ballot | Hand out an illustrative sample ballot with federal, state and local contests. | Circle one local office and one measure. | Students find the school board race and a local measure. |
| 8 minWhat does the office do? | Model looking up an office’s responsibilities. | Match three offices to three issues students care about. | Matches are accurate (e.g., school board → school budgets). |
| 10 minGuide vs. ballot | Show a creator’s voter guide. | Highlight checkable facts in one color, recommendations in another. | Students separate facts from picks. |
| 9 minOfficial checklist | Show Vote.gov and the age guide; emphasize rules vary. | Write a personal checklist: election office, registration, deadlines, sample ballot. | Checklist uses official sources only. |
| 3 minExit | Ask: if you can’t vote yet, what’s one way to take part? | Write one. | Answer names a real route. |
Before class
Prepare the case documents, one set per pair:
- Illustrative sample ballot, November general election
- Creator’s voter guide, posted three weeks before the election
- Gia’s group-chat reminder draft, Sunday 6:30 p.m.
- Dec, 17, theater crew
Every document is fictional case material, printable from the online field guide.
Questions to keep asking
NexoYour address decides your ballot. A friend two districts over sees different local races.
PautaThe voting age is 18, but some states let 17-year-olds vote in primaries. Check yours.
LupaThe guide’s picks are recommendations. The sample ballot is the official list.
Support every student, then assess
Success looks like
- Responds directly to the guiding question
- Analyzes language and design with precise references
- Locates and explains the shift from informing to persuading
- Sustains an organized line of analysis in clear academic language
Supports at this level
- Guiding question printed above the text
- Annotation layers: address to the reader, layout and hierarchy, the move from fact to recommendation
- Checklist of conventions for voter guides as a text type
Access
- Provide an illustrated sample ballot with offices color-coded
- Read office descriptions aloud
- Spanish vocabulary: papeleta, inscripción, elección, medida
- Many election offices provide Spanish materials; show where
- Reduce to matching two offices
Stretch
- Find your county’s sample ballot for the next election
- Research the history of the Twenty-Sixth Amendment
Challenge: Analyze how design choices such as headings, icons or checkmarks do persuasive work that the sentences do not state.
| Rubric | Beginning | Developing | Proficient | Advanced |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Evidence | Copies one person’s deadlines. | Mentions official sources vaguely. | Points to official sources for each person’s state. | Points to official sources and explains why rules differ. |
| Reasoning | Treats a guide as the ballot. | Mentions the ballot but not local contests. | Separates ballot, guide and registration. | Explains why local offices matter to the audience. |
| Audience & purpose | Collects private info. | Generic hype. | Useful, private, nonpartisan. | Includes people not yet eligible. |
| Revision | No change. | Adds a link. | Replaces copied deadlines with official routes. | Explains how each change helps friends in different situations. |
Standards this can show
Global Politics — key concepts: power and legitimacyIB DPTheory of Knowledge — Knowledge and politics (optional theme)IB DP
Case 12
A protest is not one legal question
When does a school get to limit what students say?
Students speak up at school through shirts, posters, walkouts and posts, and they often hear either “you have free speech” or “you have no rights here.” Both are too simple, and knowing how precedent really works helps students speak effectively without walking into avoidable trouble.
In the real world
- PBS NewsHour, 2021Student free speech makes it to the Supreme Court in former high school cheerleader's case
- PBS NewsHour (Associated Press), 2021Supreme Court rules in favor of cheerleader who published critical social media post in First Amendment case
- You’ll make
- Guided analysis, 600–800 words, written in 75 minutes
- Time
- About 75 minutes
- Level
- IB DP Language and Literature
AnikaThe feeling is real. But “free speech, end of story” isn’t a fact pattern. What did the poster say, where did it go up, and under whose rule?
The case file
Look at what’s actually here before deciding what it means.
- 1Fictional case material
Anika’s poster, first version, printed Tuesday 3:15 p.m.
“KEEP OUR LIBRARY OPEN AT LUNCH. Wear blue Thursday.” A photo of the school’s sign and logo runs across the top. No student name or group appears anywhere on the poster.
- 2Fictional case material
§ Student handbook, posting policy, p. 14 (illustrative excerpt)
Students may post materials on the student bulletin boards outside the cafeteria and the library. Materials must be approved by the main office and must show the name of the student or group responsible.
- 3Fictional case material
Group chat suggesting a walkout, Wednesday 9:02 p.m.
“If they take the poster down we walk out Thursday. Tinker says they can’t touch us.”
Reply: “Wait, wear blue AND walk out??”
- 4Fictional case material
“I put the school sign across the top because it looked good. Now it reads like the school is announcing it. It isn’t.”
Mateo, 22, did the photo and layout
Outside the story
The case is fictional. The questions in it are not. Here is where they show up in the real world.
Still missing
What the attendance policy says about leaving class, whether the school has objected to the poster or only might, whether the people shown in the photo agreed to its use, and what process the school follows before any discipline.
Real-world evidence
Real sourceU.S. Courts, Facts and Case Summary: Tinker v. Des MoinesSummary, not a quotation: public-school students were suspended for wearing black armbands to protest the Vietnam War. The Supreme Court ruled for the students, reasoning that a school could not restrict their expression because of a mere fear of disruption.
Real sourceTinker v. Des Moines Independent Community School District, 393 U.S. 503 (1969), majority opinion“It can hardly be argued that either students or teachers shed their constitutional rights to freedom of speech or expression at the schoolhouse gate.” … “But, in our system, undifferentiated fear or apprehension of disturbance is not enough to overcome the right to freedom of expression.”
videoStudent free speech makes it to the Supreme Court in former high school cheerleader's casePBS NewsHour, 2021-04-28Explains the Snapchat case the Court used to ask when a school can punish off-campus student speech.
Discuss before deciding
- Which item did you trust first, and why?
- What would you need to see before repeating the strongest claim?
- Who is missing from these documents?
What the evidence can hold up
Test the slogan against the facts. Which evidence supports each claim, which challenges it, and which fact would you still need?
| Evidence | Claim 1Tinker means nobody can face consequences for walking out. | Claim 2The wear-blue plan closely matches Tinker’s facts. | Claim 3The poster should carry a student byline instead of the school logo. |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1Tinker’s facts: silent armbands, no substantial disruption, a public school | Narrows | Supports | — |
| 2A walkout means leaving class, which falls under the attendance rule | Challenges | — | — |
| 3The logo photo makes the poster look like school-sponsored speech | — | — | Supports |
Still open
- What does the attendance policy say, and what process follows?
One student’s draft
Write a fact-pattern brief comparing Tinker with the wear-blue plan and the walkout.
Facts: In Tinker (1969), public-school students wore black armbands to protest the Vietnam War and were suspended. Rule: The Supreme Court said students keep free-speech rights at school unless their expression would substantially disrupt school or invade others’ rights1. Application: Anika’s wear-blue Thursday plan is a lot like the armbands. It is silent and doesn’t stop class, so Tinker probably protects it.2 The walkout is also protected because it is a protest just like Tinker.3 Open questions: We don’t know what the attendance policy says4 or whether the school would count a walkout as a disruption. We also need to know whether the school has any rule about clothing.
- 1Accurate rule, including the limit most first drafts leave out.
- 2Good application: the writer matches specific facts and says “probably” instead of promising a legal outcome.
- 3Revise: leaving class is conduct under an attendance rule, which Tinker does not settle. Calling both “protest” hides the fact that changes the question.
- 4Strong open question: it names the exact missing fact that would decide the walkout issue.
Works wellUses evidenceGap to fixThink about the reader
One revision
BeforeThe walkout is also protected because it is a protest just like Tinker.
AfterThe walkout is different: the message may be similar, but leaving class is conduct covered by the attendance policy, so Tinker alone doesn’t answer it.
The revision separates the message from the action, which is the distinction the case turns on.
Teacher commentary
The brief states the rule accurately and applies it carefully to the wear-blue plan. It then treats the walkout as the same fact pattern because both are protests, which is the slogan the case warns against. Separating speech from conduct moves it to Proficient on Reasoning, and adding the logo question would reach Advanced.
Teach it in one period
IB DP Language and Literature
Write a guided textual analysis of a passage from Justice Fortas’s majority opinion in Tinker (1969) that includes the “schoolhouse gate” sentence, responding to the guiding question.
- Sources
- A teacher-selected passage of 300–400 words from the majority opinion, taken from a court-hosted or official copy.
- Product
- Guided analysis, 600–800 words, written in 75 minutes
- Objective
- Students practice analyzing how a legal opinion, as a non-literary text, uses imagery and structure to persuade several audiences.
- Assessed by
- The teacher gives practice feedback on understanding and interpretation, analysis of the writer’s choices, focus and organization, and language; no IB marks are predicted.
| 45 minutes | You | Students | Check for |
|---|---|---|---|
| 5 minThe slogan | Write on the board: “Tinker means nobody can face consequences for walking out.” | Agree, disagree or unsure, with one reason. | Students commit to a position before reading. |
| 10 minRead the precedent | Read the U.S. Courts Tinker summary aloud: facts, ruling, reasoning. | Fill a fact-pattern card for Tinker: expression, place, school action, reason. | Cards name armbands, public school, suspension, no substantial disruption. |
| 12 minCompare fact patterns | Introduce Anika’s poster, the wear-blue plan and a friend’s walkout idea. | Build a three-column comparison and mark which facts match Tinker. | Students separate quiet expression from leaving class. |
| 8 minThe logo problem | Explain school-sponsored speech (Hazelwood) in one minute. | Decide what to change so the poster reads as student speech, not an official notice. | Revisions remove the logo photo or add a clear student byline. |
| 7 minDraft the next questions | Model: “Which rule is the school citing, and what process follows?” | Write two questions for a school contact about the posting policy. | Questions are about specific rules and procedures, not slogans. |
| 3 minExit | Frame: “A fact that would make Tinker less useful here is __.” | Complete the frame. | Answer names a changed fact like conduct, sponsorship or private school. |
Before class
Prepare the case documents, one set per pair:
- Anika’s poster, first version, printed Tuesday 3:15 p.m.
- Student handbook, posting policy, p. 14 (illustrative excerpt)
- Group chat suggesting a walkout, Wednesday 9:02 p.m.
- Mateo, 22, did the photo and layout
Every document is fictional case material, printable from the online field guide.
Questions to keep asking
PautaTinker covers public schools. A private school isn’t bound by the First Amendment the same way.
LupaThe armbands were silent and caused no substantial disruption. That’s the fact the ruling leaned on.
DudaDoes the logo photo make this look like the school is speaking?
Support every student, then assess
Success looks like
- Responds directly to the guiding question
- Analyzes imagery, structure and diction with precise references
- Explains how the text balances rights and authority
- Sustains an organized line of analysis in clear academic language
Supports at this level
- Guiding question printed above the passage
- Annotation layers: images of place, sentence balance, concession and limit
- Glossary of legal terms kept separate from the analysis
Access
- Provide an illustrated two-page Tinker summary
- Read case summaries aloud and pause for paraphrase
- Spanish vocabulary: precedente, expresión, perturbación, política escolar
- Allow oral responses or a chart instead of a paragraph
- Reduce to one comparison: armbands vs. wear-blue
Stretch
- Read about Bethel v. Fraser (1986) and Morse v. Frederick (2007) and add them to the comparison
- Find your district’s student expression or posting policy and compare it with Tinker
Challenge: Compare how the opinion addresses students with how it addresses school officials, and explain what that double address suggests about its purpose.
| Rubric | Beginning | Developing | Proficient | Advanced |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Evidence | No case facts. | Names Tinker without its rule. | States Tinker’s facts and substantial-disruption test. | Adds a second precedent or the walkout exercise accurately. |
| Reasoning | Treats a slogan as the answer. | Applies Tinker to everything. | Compares facts and separates speech from conduct. | Varies facts to show where the precedent stops fitting. |
| Audience & purpose | Tells others to break rules. | Argues for one side only. | Recommends a clear next question for the school. | Balances effective expression with respect for process. |
| Revision | No change. | Softens tone only. | Adds the rule’s limit and removes a legal conclusion. | Explains how each edit makes the argument more precise. |
Standards this can show
Global Politics — key concepts: liberty, rights and legitimacyIB DPTheory of Knowledge — Knowledge and politics (optional theme)IB DP
Case 15
Internship, or someone’s unpaid job?
When is an unpaid internship really a job that should be paid?
Internships open doors, but unpaid ones favor people who can afford to work for free, and some “internships” are just unpaid jobs. Knowing the questions the law asks helps students ages 16–24 evaluate an offer before they give it a summer.
In the real world
- PBS NewsHour (YouTube), 2023Why unpaid internships still exist despite hardships for young workers
- NPR, 2013Internships: Low-Paid, Unpaid Or Just Plain Illegal?
- You’ll make
- Guided analysis, 600–800 words, written in 75 minutes
- Time
- About 75 minutes
- Level
- IB DP Language and Literature
RafaSige, I want the experience. I also work at the shop. So what would I actually learn, and who’s teaching me?
The case file
Look at what’s actually here before deciding what it means.
- 1Fictional case material
Studio internship listing, posted on the campus job board in April
“Summer Editing Intern (unpaid). Join our fast-paced studio! You’ll run the customer inbox all summer, help with client files and get great exposure to the industry. College credit available.”
- 2Fictional case material
Studio reply to Rafa, Tuesday 11:20 a.m.
“Thanks for your interest, Rafa! Since interns get college credit, it’s totally legal for us not to pay. We’d love for you to start right after finals.”
- 3Fictional case material
Gia and Rafa talking it through, Tuesday lunch
Gia: Didn’t they pay someone to do the inbox last year?
Rafa: Yeah, their assistant.
Gia: And it’s your summer, not theirs. What about your shifts at the shop?
- 4Fictional case material
“Sige, I want the experience. I also work at the shop. So what would I actually learn, and who’s teaching me?”
Rafa, 18, first-year commuter who works at his family’s shop
Outside the story
The case is fictional. The questions in it are not. Here is where they show up in the real world.
Still missing
What training and supervision the studio actually provides, how many hours a week the role takes, whether Rafa’s school will grant credit, and how many paid shifts at the family shop Rafa would give up.
Real-world evidence
Real sourceU.S. Department of Labor, Wage and Hour Division, Fact Sheet #71: Internship Programs Under the Fair Labor Standards ActSummary, not a quotation: for-profit employers use the “primary beneficiary test” to decide whether an intern is an employee who must be paid under the FLSA. The fact sheet lists seven factors, including whether the internship is tied to formal education or academic credit and whether the intern’s work complements rather than displaces paid employees, and says the test is flexible with no single factor determinative.
videoWhy unpaid internships still exist despite hardships for young workersPBS NewsHour (YouTube), 2023-08-26Reports that nearly half of U.S. interns were unpaid in 2022 and who can afford to take those jobs.
articleInternships: Low-Paid, Unpaid Or Just Plain Illegal?NPR, 2013-05-18Explains when an unpaid internship can break wage law, using the ‘Black Swan’ intern lawsuit.
Discuss before deciding
- Which item did you trust first, and why?
- What would you need to see before repeating the strongest claim?
- Who is missing from these documents?
What the evidence can hold up
Test the studio’s claim against the factor list. Which evidence points toward training, which toward a job, and what is still unknown?
| Evidence | Claim 1College credit makes the unpaid internship legal. | Claim 2The role looks more like a job than training. |
|---|---|---|
| 1DOL: credit is one of seven factors, and no single factor decides | Challenges | — |
| 2The listing: Rafa runs the customer inbox all summer | — | Supports |
| 3A paid assistant ran the inbox last year | — | Supports |
| 4The role is openly unpaid and offers credit (factors 1 and 3) | — | Challenges |
Still open
- Is there a learning plan, and who supervises?
One student’s draft
Turn the seven DOL factors into an internship questions sheet, fill it in with the studio’s answers and write a 150-word summary.
Summary: Using the seven factors, Rafa’s internship looks more like a job than training. The studio says it’s unpaid and gives college credit, so factors 1 and 3 point toward an internship1. But the listing says Rafa would run the customer inbox all summer, and a paid assistant did that job last year, so factor 6 points toward a job2 because he would be replacing a worker. We don’t know about training or supervision because the studio didn’t answer that question.3 Since the studio says credit makes it legal, and credit is one of the factors, the internship is probably legal.4 Rafa should ask for a written learning plan and the weekly hours before he decides.
- 1Accurate and fair: the writer credits the evidence that cuts the other way instead of ignoring it.
- 2Strong: specific evidence tied to the displacement factor.
- 3Good: unknowns are marked as unknown rather than guessed.
- 4Revise: this repeats the studio’s claim and contradicts the summary’s own reasoning. No single factor decides the test, and the displacement evidence points the other way.
Works wellUses evidenceGap to fixThink about the reader
One revision
BeforeSince the studio says credit makes it legal, and credit is one of the factors, the internship is probably legal.
AfterCredit is only one factor, and no single factor decides the test, so the studio’s answer doesn’t settle it.
The revision matches the conclusion to the flexible test and to the writer’s own evidence instead of adopting the employer’s claim.
Teacher commentary
The summary weighs factors in both directions, ties the displacement factor to specific evidence and marks unknowns honestly. One sentence then adopts the studio’s claim that credit settles the question, contradicting the rest of the analysis. Removing that verdict moves the response to Proficient on Reasoning, and completing the remaining factors on the sheet finishes the task.
Teach it in one period
IB DP Language and Literature
Write a guided textual analysis of the studio’s internship listing in response to the guiding question, then test your reading against one real internship listing the teacher selects.
- Sources
- The studio listing from the case and one teacher-selected real internship listing.
- Product
- Guided analysis, 600–800 words, written in 75 minutes
- Objective
- Students practice analyzing how a job listing, as a non-literary text, uses prestige language and vagueness to construct an ideal applicant.
- Assessed by
- The teacher gives practice feedback on understanding and interpretation, analysis of the writer’s choices, focus and organization, and language; no IB marks are predicted.
| 45 minutes | You | Students | Check for |
|---|---|---|---|
| 5 minThe offer | Read the studio listing: unpaid, run the customer inbox all summer, college credit, “great exposure.” | Underline what you would do each day. | Students find that duties are mostly inbox work. |
| 10 minThe seven factors | Read DOL Fact Sheet 71’s factors aloud in plain language. | Rewrite each factor as a question Rafa could ask. | Seven questions, one per factor. |
| 10 minApply them | Provide the studio’s answers to some questions; leave others blank. | Mark each factor: points toward training, toward job, or unknown. | Students leave unknowns as unknowns. |
| 10 minThe life around the offer | Share Gia’s point about time, rent and the family shop. | List Rafa’s practical costs. | Costs include lost paid hours and transport. |
| 7 minWrite to the studio | Model a respectful clarifying email. | Draft Rafa’s email asking for the learning plan and supervision. | Email asks specific questions without accusing. |
| 3 minExit | Ask: which single fact would most change your view? | Write it. | Answer names a factor like displacement or training. |
Before class
Prepare the case documents, one set per pair:
- Studio internship listing, posted on the campus job board in April
- Studio reply to Rafa, Tuesday 11:20 a.m.
- Gia and Rafa talking it through, Tuesday lunch
- Rafa, 18, first-year commuter who works at his family’s shop
Every document is fictional case material, printable from the online field guide.
Questions to keep asking
PautaDOL lists seven factors. No single one, not even credit, decides the answer.
LupaThe listing says “run the customer inbox.” That’s the work. Where’s the training?
OndaUnpaid summers are easier for people who don’t need a paycheck.
Support every student, then assess
Success looks like
- Responds directly to the guiding question
- Analyzes diction, address and omission with precise references
- Explains the ideal applicant the text constructs
- Sustains an organized line of analysis in clear academic language
Supports at this level
- Guiding question printed above the text
- Annotation layers: prestige vocabulary, second-person address, what is left vague
- Checklist of conventions for job listings as a text type
Access
- Provide factor cards with icons and one-line explanations
- Read the listing aloud
- Spanish vocabulary: pasantía, empleado, salario, capacitación
- Offer a partially completed questions sheet
- Reduce to three factors: training, credit, displacement
Stretch
- Look up whether your state has its own internship or minimum-wage rules
- Compare the for-profit test with guidance for volunteering at nonprofits
Challenge: Analyze how the listing’s vagueness about hours and duties functions as a choice, and what kind of reader it rewards.
| Rubric | Beginning | Developing | Proficient | Advanced |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Evidence | Relies on rumor. | Mentions pay only. | Asks about several factors. | Asks about factors and notes what the credit claim doesn’t settle. |
| Reasoning | Declares legal or illegal. | Asks for a verdict. | Gathers facts before deciding. | Connects each question to a reason it matters. |
| Audience & purpose | Gives away leverage or accuses. | Polite but vague. | Specific, respectful questions. | Specific questions plus Rafa’s own constraints. |
| Revision | No change. | Tone only. | Replaces rumor with factor-based questions. | Explains how each question helps Rafa decide. |
Standards this can show
Global Politics — key concepts: equality and developmentIB DPLanguage A: language and literature — Readers, writers and textsIB DP
Case 16
“It’s our policy” is not the end
When a new building rule appears, who wrote it and who does it affect?
Housing rules decide whether people can work, gather and get in and out of their own homes, and renters often have less power than whoever posts the notice. Asking who issued a rule and how it lands on different residents is how neighbors protect each other without spreading rumors.
In the real world
- Gothamist, 2019Brooklyn Landlord Does An About Face On Facial Recognition Plan
- HUD (YouTube), 2014The Federal Fair Housing Act and Reasonable Accommodations
- You’ll make
- Guided analysis, 600–800 words, written in 75 minutes
- Time
- About 75 minutes
- Level
- IB DP Language and Literature
SamiI’m not canceling my workshop over an unsigned notice. I’m also not ignoring it. Who wrote it, and how do I get in after eight?
The case file
Look at what’s actually here before deciding what it means.
- 1Fictional case material
§ Unsigned notice beside the common-room door, found Monday morning
“NOTICE TO ALL RESIDENTS. Effective immediately, the rear door will be locked at 8:00 p.m. nightly. The common room is for resident social use only. NO BUSINESS USE.” No issuer, date or contact appears on the page.
- 2Fictional case material
§ Building house rules, last year’s version, distributed at lease signing (illustrative excerpt)
“Residents may reserve the common room for gatherings, classes and resident-run workshops. Reservations are made through the building office.”
- 3Fictional case material
Building entrance plan from the lobby directory
Front entrance: four steps, no ramp. Rear door: step-free, opens to the elevator hallway. Side door: service use only.
- 4Fictional case material
“Rear door locked at 8. That’s the only door I can get through. My workshop runs later. So, questions. Plural.”
Sami, 23, lives in 3B and runs a workshop in the common room - 5Fictional case material
“All caps, bold, no name, no date. That’s a design choice. It isn’t authority.”
Caio, 24, reading last year’s house rules beside the notice
Outside the story
The case is fictional. The questions in it are not. Here is where they show up in the real world.
Still missing
Who issued the notice and why, whether it replaces or adds to the house rules, what Sami’s lease says, whether there has been a security problem at the rear door, and how the building handles accommodation requests.
Real-world evidence
Real sourceU.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, Fair Housing Act overviewSummary, not a quotation: HUD’s overview lists the characteristics the Fair Housing Act protects (race, color, national origin, religion, sex, familial status and disability) and says housing discrimination is illegal in nearly all housing, including private, public and federally funded housing.
articleBrooklyn Landlord Does An About Face On Facial Recognition PlanGothamist, 2019-11-21A throwback about a door rule: the landlord needed state permission to change how tenants got in, and tenants used that process to object.
videoThe Federal Fair Housing Act and Reasonable AccommodationsHUD (YouTube), 2014-01-31HUD explains how a person with a disability can ask for an exception to a building rule.
Discuss before deciding
- Which item did you trust first, and why?
- What would you need to see before repeating the strongest claim?
- Who is missing from these documents?
Who actually gets to decide?
Map who made this rule, which rules it has to fit, who it affects and where residents can take a question. Which box is still empty?
Lock the rear door at 8 p.m. and ban business use of the common room
Unknown issuer: the owner, the manager or someone else?
Last year’s house rules allowed resident-run workshops
Fair Housing Act: disability is a protected characteristic
Sami and other residents who need the only step-free entrance
A local tenant or housing help line, or HUD for a fair-housing concern
One student’s draft
Write Sami’s message to the building manager asking about the rule and requesting access after 8 p.m.
Hi, I’m Sami in 3B. On Monday I saw a new notice by the common-room door. It says the rear door will be locked after 8 p.m. and that business use of the room is banned.1 I use a wheelchair, and the rear door is the building’s only step-free entrance2. If it’s locked, I can’t get into my own building at night. This notice is illegal under the Fair Housing Act, so please take it down.3 Also, who issued the notice, and does it replace last year’s house rules, which allowed resident workshops?4 Thank you, Sami
- 1Accurate summary of the notice, so the manager can see exactly which parts Sami means.
- 2Strong: a concrete, checkable fact about access, taken from the entrance plan.
- 3Revise: the facts don’t establish a violation yet, and removing the notice wouldn’t guarantee Sami’s access. Ask for an accommodation instead.
- 4Good question about authority: it points to a specific document the manager can check.
Works wellUses evidenceGap to fixThink about the reader
One revision
BeforeThis notice is illegal under the Fair Housing Act, so please take it down.
AfterI’d like to request an accommodation so I can get in after 8, such as a key fob for the rear door.
A specific accommodation request is something the manager can say yes to, and it keeps the legal question open instead of declaring an answer.
Teacher commentary
The message quotes the notice accurately, states a concrete access need and asks the right question about authority. The one legal conclusion undercuts it: it accuses before asking and requests something that would not guarantee access. Swapping it for a specific accommodation request moves the message to Proficient on Reasoning and Audience.
Teach it in one period
IB DP Language and Literature
Write a guided textual analysis of the unsigned notice, then apply the same guiding question to one longer real building or institutional notice the teacher selects.
- Sources
- The unsigned notice as the first text and one teacher-selected public notice or policy announcement as the second.
- Product
- Guided analysis, 600–800 words, written in 75 minutes
- Objective
- Students practice analyzing how a public notice uses layout, typography and imperative language to position its readers.
- Assessed by
- The teacher gives practice feedback on understanding and interpretation, analysis of the writer’s choices, focus and organization, and language; no IB marks are predicted.
| 45 minutes | You | Students | Check for |
|---|---|---|---|
| 5 minRead the notice | Project the notice. Ask: who wrote this? | List what the notice tells you and what it doesn’t. | Lists include missing issuer, date and contact. |
| 10 minCompare the documents | Hand out the older house rules excerpt. | Mark what changed and whether the notice claims to replace the older rule. | Students identify the new 8 p.m. rear-door lock and business-use ban. |
| 10 minMap the effects | Draw a people map: Sami, other residents, guests, the manager. | Add how each person is affected and what each needs. | Map includes step-free access and workshop use. |
| 10 minThe legal layer | Introduce the Fair Housing Act and reasonable accommodation as questions, not conclusions. | Write one question about access and one about authority. | Questions don’t declare a violation. |
| 7 minRewrite or respond | Offer two options: rewrite the notice fairly, or write Sami’s question to the manager. | Draft 60–100 words. | Draft includes issuer, scope and contact, or a precise question. |
| 3 minExit | Frame: “One fact that would change my view is __.” | Complete the frame. | Answer names a missing document or fact. |
Before class
Prepare the case documents, one set per pair:
- Unsigned notice beside the common-room door, found Monday morning
- Building house rules, last year’s version, distributed at lease signing (illustrative excerpt)
- Building entrance plan from the lobby directory
- Sami, 23, lives in 3B and runs a workshop in the common room
Every document is fictional case material, printable from the online field guide.
Questions to keep asking
PautaNo issuer, no date, no contact. Bold type isn’t authority.
OndaLocking the rear door at 8 p.m. closes the building’s only step-free entrance for Sami.
DudaDoes this notice replace last year’s house rules, or just add to them?
Support every student, then assess
Success looks like
- Responds directly to the guiding question
- Analyzes layout, typography and language with precise references
- Treats omissions as meaningful choices
- Sustains an organized line of analysis in clear academic language
Supports at this level
- Guiding question printed above each text
- Annotation layers: layout, typography, imperatives, what is omitted
- Checklist of conventions for public notices as a text type
Access
- Provide the notice and older rule side by side with changes highlighted
- Read HUD’s overview summary aloud
- Spanish vocabulary: aviso, inquilino, administrador, ajuste razonable
- Offer a fill-in message template
- Reduce to the rewrite-the-notice task only
Stretch
- Research what local tenant organizations exist in your area and what they offer
- Compare federal fair-housing protections with your state’s list of protected characteristics
Challenge: Analyze how absence works as a choice: what does leaving out the issuer, date and contact do to the reader’s position?
| Rubric | Beginning | Developing | Proficient | Advanced |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Evidence | No specifics from the notice. | Mentions the notice generally. | Quotes the notice and older rule. | Quotes both and names what is still unknown. |
| Reasoning | Declares a legal violation. | Complains without a clear need. | Connects the rule to a concrete effect. | Separates the communication problem from the legal question. |
| Audience & purpose | Hostile or vague. | Polite but no request. | Specific request the manager can act on. | Specific request plus questions that clarify authority. |
| Revision | No change. | Tone edits only. | Replaces the conclusion with a question and request. | Explains how each change makes a yes more likely. |
Standards this can show
Global Politics — key concepts: power, equality and justiceIB DPLanguage A: language and literature — Readers, writers and textsIB DP
Case 20
Looks real. What proves it?
A realistic image says the courtyard flooded today. What would it take to post that as true?
Generated and recycled images now move through group chats as fast as real ones, and organizations that repost them lose trust quickly. Students who can write an honest verification note, including “we can’t confirm this yet,” protect their audience and their own credibility.
In the real world
- NPR, 2023Fake viral images of an explosion at the Pentagon were probably created by AI
- CNN, 2023‘Verified’ Twitter accounts share fake image of ‘explosion’ near Pentagon, causing confusion
- You’ll make
- Guided analysis, 600–800 words, written in 75 minutes
- Time
- About 75 minutes
- Level
- IB DP Language and Literature
JordyI wanted a clean yes or no for the recap. “We can’t verify it yet” is less fun. It’s also what’s true.
The case file
Look at what’s actually here before deciding what it means.
- 1Fictional case material
Courtyard flood image with caption, shared Wednesday 2:48 p.m.
Image, described: a photo-like view of the campus courtyard with water over the paving and benches; a person in the foreground holds up a phone.
Caption: “Courtyard flooded today, stay away.” No link, no date on the image and no original poster named.
- 2Fictional case material
Sami’s zoom-in of the hand, crew chat, Wednesday 3:02 p.m.
Zoomed screenshot of the foreground hand: the fingers seem to merge at the knuckles.
Sami: “The hand is weird. But who posted this first? That’s what I want to know.”
- 3Fictional case material
Reply in the crew chat, Wednesday 3:05 p.m.
“My roommate’s friend said she saw water near the library earlier.”
- 4Fictional case material
Result from a free online image detector (illustrative)
“12% likely AI-generated.”
- 5Fictional case material
Campus facilities alerts page, checked Wednesday 3:10 p.m.
“No active alerts. Last update: Monday, 9:15 a.m. Scheduled elevator maintenance in Science Hall, completed.”
Outside the story
The case is fictional. The questions in it are not. Here is where they show up in the real world.
Still missing
Who first posted the image and when, whether it shows this courtyard on this day, whether anyone with a dated photo saw water, and how quickly the facilities page would report a same-day flood.
Real-world evidence
Real sourceNational Institute of Standards and Technology, Reducing Risks Posed by Synthetic Content: An Overview of Technical Approaches to Digital Content TransparencySummary, not a quotation: NIST describes approaches such as provenance data, labeling, watermarking and detection for synthetic content, and explains that each has technical limitations, so no single approach settles on its own whether content is synthetic.
articleFake viral images of an explosion at the Pentagon were probably created by AINPR, 2023-05-22A realistic fake image spread fast and briefly moved markets before officials confirmed nothing happened.
article‘Verified’ Twitter accounts share fake image of ‘explosion’ near Pentagon, causing confusionCNN, 2023-05-22A blue check was not proof: accounts that looked trustworthy still shared an image with no real source.
Discuss before deciding
- Which item did you trust first, and why?
- What would you need to see before repeating the strongest claim?
- Who is missing from these documents?
What the evidence can hold up
Two claims are in play: the flood and the image. Sort each piece of evidence under the claim it actually bears on. What would settle either one?
| Evidence | Claim 1The courtyard flooded today. | Claim 2The image was generated by AI. |
|---|---|---|
| 1The image shows water in a courtyard, with no date or source | Supports | — |
| 2Facilities alerts page at 3:10 p.m.: no active alerts | Challenges | — |
| 3Secondhand report of water near the library | Supports | — |
| 4An odd hand and a 12% detector score | — | Leaves open |
Still open
- The image’s earliest source and date
One student’s draft
Write the verification note Jordy posts instead of the image, plus a short explanation of your choices.
Verification note: We’ve seen the courtyard flood picture going around. We checked the campus facilities alerts page at 3:10 and it shows no flooding today1, and we couldn’t find who posted the image first2. The picture is fake, so please ignore it.3 Check the official alerts page before you change plans. Why I wrote it this way: I didn’t repost the image because people would share it without reading the note. I listed what we checked so followers can check it too. The hand in the picture also looks weird, which shows it was made with AI4.
- 1Strong: a named source and a time, so followers can check it themselves.
- 2Honest about a gap in provenance, which is part of what was checked.
- 3Revise: the evidence shows the flood is unconfirmed, not that the image is fake. It could be a real photo from another day or place.
- 4Revise: an odd detail is a reason to look closer, not proof. Visual clues and detectors both have error rates.
Works wellUses evidenceGap to fixThink about the reader
One revision
BeforeThe picture is fake, so please ignore it.
AfterWe can’t confirm the flood, so we’re not sharing the image as news, and we’ll update here by 6 p.m.
The revision reports exactly what the evidence supports and gives followers a time to check back, instead of a verdict the crew can’t defend.
Teacher commentary
The note does the hard part well: it names a source, a time and a provenance gap, and it keeps the image out of the feed. It then overclaims twice, calling the image fake and treating an odd hand as proof of AI. Replacing both verdicts with calibrated language moves the response from Developing to Proficient on Reasoning.
Teach it in one period
IB DP Language and Literature
Write a guided textual analysis of a teacher-selected, clearly labeled AI-generated image post and its caption, answering the guiding question, then test your analysis against the case’s courtyard post and its reposts.
- Sources
- One teacher-selected image post that is clearly labeled as generated, plus the case’s courtyard caption and two reposts with added comments.
- Product
- Guided analysis, 600–800 words, written in 75 minutes
- Objective
- Students practice analyzing how image and caption combine in a multimodal non-literary text to prompt a reader to act before checking.
- Assessed by
- The teacher gives practice feedback on understanding and interpretation, analysis of the writer’s choices, focus and organization, and language; no IB marks are predicted.
| 45 minutes | You | Students | Check for |
|---|---|---|---|
| 5 minThe image | Describe the courtyard image and caption: “Courtyard flooded today, stay away.” No link. | Rate belief 1–5 and write what makes it convincing. | Reasons are about appearance, not source. |
| 8 minZoom-in trap | Show the class zooming into a hand. Ask: what does an odd hand prove? | Sort clues into “reason to look closer” and “proof.” | Students put the hand under “reason to look closer.” |
| 12 minTrace it | Hand out the earliest post found, the campus facilities page and a weather note. | Build a chain: claim, earliest source, date, corroboration. | Chains show no independent record of a flood today. |
| 10 minRead the limits | Summarize NIST: provenance, labels, watermarks and detection each have gaps. | Write what a detector score can and can’t tell you. | Answer mentions error rates or missing provenance. |
| 7 minWrite the note | Model: checked / found / still open. | Draft a 50–80 word verification note for the recap. | Note states uncertainty without calling anyone a liar. |
| 3 minExit | Ask: what would change your confidence? | Name one piece of evidence. | Answer names independent, dated evidence. |
Before class
Prepare the case documents, one set per pair:
- Courtyard flood image with caption, shared Wednesday 2:48 p.m.
- Sami’s zoom-in of the hand, crew chat, Wednesday 3:02 p.m.
- Reply in the crew chat, Wednesday 3:05 p.m.
- Result from a free online image detector (illustrative)
Every document is fictional case material, printable from the online field guide.
Questions to keep asking
LupaNo link, no date, no original poster. The image arrived without its backstory.
DudaWhat would you expect to find if the courtyard really flooded today?
PautaA detector score is a clue with error rates. It isn’t a finding.
Support every student, then assess
Success looks like
- Responds directly to the guiding question
- Analyzes image and caption together with precise references
- Explains how the text positions its reader to act
- Sustains an organized line of analysis in clear academic language
Supports at this level
- Guiding question printed above the text
- Annotation layers: composition, realism cues, caption syntax, imperatives
- Glossary of visual terms: framing, foreground, focal point
Access
- Use a printed image-check card with icons
- Describe the image aloud for students with low vision
- Spanish vocabulary: imagen, fuente, verificado, sin confirmar
- Offer an oral verification note
- Reduce to two checks: who posted first, is there another record
Stretch
- Compare how two news organizations describe their image-verification process
- Research what content credentials record and what they cannot show
Challenge: Analyze how each repost’s added comment shifts the meaning of the same image for its readers.
| Rubric | Beginning | Developing | Proficient | Advanced |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Evidence | Treats the image as proof. | Cites a detector or a detail as a verdict. | Checks the earliest source and an independent record. | Checks several sources and names what each can’t show. |
| Reasoning | Declares real or fake with no basis. | Hedges without explaining why. | Matches confidence to evidence. | Separates authenticity of the file from truth of the event. |
| Audience & purpose | Urges spreading. | Warns without guidance. | Gives followers a safe next step. | Gives a next step, a follow-up time and a way to contribute evidence. |
| Revision | No change. | Softens words only. | Replaces the verdict with a verification note. | Explains how each change protects followers and credibility. |
Standards this can show
Theory of Knowledge — Knowledge and technology (optional theme)IB DPLanguage A: language and literature — Readers, writers and textsIB DP
Track the work across the year
Each case has its own four-level rubric on its support page. The criteria repeat, so growth is visible: mark the level each student or group reached, case by case.
| Case | Evidence | Reasoning | Audience | Revision | Took a civic step |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1Before you repost | |||||
| 2The apology is not the repair | |||||
| 3Who gets to see your school records? | |||||
| 4Who decides what stays on the shelf? | |||||
| 5Is it a recommendation or an ad? | |||||
| 6Your ballot is more local than your feed. | |||||
| 7A protest is not one legal question | |||||
| 8Internship, or someone’s unpaid job? | |||||
| 9“It’s our policy” is not the end | |||||
| 10Looks real. What proves it? |
Feedback that moves the work
- Name the evidence the student used, then ask what it can’t show.
- Point to one line a reader might misread.
- Ask for one revision, and have the student say why it’s better.
Use it in your tools
Take it into class.
Share it, schedule it or edit it in the apps your school already uses.