Deconstructing Media

Authors and Audience

This is a magazine cover for the magazine The Blaze for the May 2014 issue.  Specifically, Chris Fields wrote the article attached to this image.

I would say that this image is targeted at the parents of students in school.  The text says "Common Core's threat to our kids".  Our, meaning the person writing must be coming from the standpoint of a parent, speaking to other parents.

Messages and Meanings

The greatest message conveyed is that Common Core is a negative approach to student learning.  The cover calls it a "threat".  It also displays a message that Common Core makes all students the same.  All the students lead up to the thought bubble at the top where it uses the word "Collective".  This is the largest word in the image aside from logo, which draws attention to it.  When looking at this text, it's impossible not to continue reading to see the full message.  At first, it almost seems like the collective idea with the students might be positive, but then you read the subtitle and see that it's not meant to be.  If you don't read the entire text, the image can be seen differently.

Those who are against the use of Common Core would benefit from this image.  The text implies that these standards are a threat to not only the future of everyone's kids, but also to freedom (uh oh).  This is a very inflammatory suggestion.  This image is not good for those schools and educators who implement and believe in Common Core.  If this image draws people into reading the article, as it is intended to do, then some parents might end up believing the claims and cause outrage over it's use within the schools.

Representation and Reality

The perspective of an educator is left out of this.  The message is from the viewpoint of a parent who sees the use of Common Core as negative.  It doesn't speak of educators or the students who may have benefited from these standards.  This is not a credible or accurate representation, in my opinion.  In fact, it's very biased.  It holds one stance:  Common Core is bad.  There's no debate, no indication that it might actually be a good thing (hello, it's a threat to freedom!).

Chris Fields is a conservative Republican, which may be where his bias comes from.  Given this information, it's understandable that he sees Common Core as something negative, especially when discussing collaboration among students.

Language and Persuasion

The technique of emotional appeal is clearly the most obvious one.  Use of the words threat, freedom, and future are meant to cause an emotional reaction.  When discussing this in the context of someone's kids, it's all the more powerful.  Along with that, you can add Glittering Generalities, which has the same effect.  I would also say that there is use of Loaded Language as well because the word "threat" is used.  This word is fairly negative, and creates a strong response with it's use.