Objectives

After completing this lesson, students will be able to:

• Discuss strategies for toning muscles and controlling weight.
• Recognize claims for weight-loss and exercise devices that are too good to be true.
• Apply the media literacy skill of recognizing propaganda (loaded language) to a print ad for an abdominal toning device.

Introducing the Lesson

If possible, videotape—or have a student volunteer videotape—a TV commercial for a product that seems too good to be true. Possibilities include a magical stain remover, cleaner, or weight-loss formula that promises results virtually overnight. (Alternatively, you may ask students to clip or downloaded print ads for such products). Have students analyze the claims made in the ad. Ask: What does this product promise to do? Is this a promise you think the product likely delivers on? Why or why not?

Teaching Strategies

On the board, write the acronym FCC. Ask whether students know what these initials stand for (Federal Communications Commission). Reveal that this is a government-funded independent agency responsible for ensuring truth in advertising. Observe that despite the efforts of this watchdog group, advertisers sometimes stretch the truth. Note that one way in which they do this is by using loaded language in their ads. Explain that loaded language is a form of propaganda, the use of false or misleading claims to achieve a specific goal—in this case, the selling of goods.

Note the following features of loaded language:

• Inflated or boastful language. Point out that in print, such language can usually be spotted by the liberal use of exclamation points—sometimes more than one—at the end of sentences and phrases. Words such as amazing and incredible are also examples of loaded language.
• Claims that sound too good to be true. Explain that advertisers in particular will sometimes "stack the deck" in their favor be promising immediate results or other claims that fly in the face of reason. They will be equally enthusiastic in their attack on competing products.

Assign the following to student groups to use in their media analysis. You may either follow up the analysis with a class discussion of group answers, or may assign the analysis to be applied by individual students to another media construction as homework.

Follow up

1. Awareness. What specific group or individual do you think this message is aimed at? Find language in the ad that supports your claim.
2. Analysis. List examples of loaded language you can identify in the ad. Do you think the health information is reliable and trustworthy? What information, if any, has been left out?
3. Evaluation. Do you think this construction is sending a positive health message? Why or why not? What human weaknesses is the message playing on? Explain.
4. Communication. What is your overall reaction to the ad? How would you reinterpret the last two words in the ad if you were giving advice to a friend on whether to buy this product?

Applying Media Skills

The claims used by the advertisers to promote the Ab-Grabber are based on unsupported information. One such claim appears in the final sentence of the first paragraph and is part of an attack on competitors.

Working with a group of classmates and using reliable health resources, compare other claims made in this ad with information from your source about toning up abdominal muscles. In particular, investigate the following:

• Whether all of the groups of abdominal muscles—the upper abs, lower abs, and obliques—can be toned using a single machine or device.
• Whether toning the abdominal muscles alone will give a person who is overweight a lean, "rock-hard" look.
• How long it takes to tone out-of-shape abdominal muscles.

Concert your findings into a "counter-ad" for the Ab-Grabber. Add illustrations to your ad to demonstrate the facts you iclude.

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