2 Million Minutes

1) Who is sending this message and what is the author’s purpose?
This video was created by Bob Compton. I believe the purpose of this video was to inform people of the differences of high school students in different countries. They followed two students from the U.S. and two students from India, and two students from China. The students discussed their academic ambitions and their studying.

2) What techniques are used to attract and hold attention?
The techniques I saw used were experts, fear, and plain people. The video showed many experts talking about the different countries studies. The video also used fear in a sense for parents and maybe students in the United States. The video definitely showed how much more dedicated the Indian and Chinese students were towards their schooling. This might spark some fear in parents to get their sons and daughters to study more. It might also spark fear in other high school students. The video also used the technique of plain people. These were everyday students that the camera was following around.

3) What lifestyles, values, and points of view are represented in this message?
There are three different lifestyles and points of view in this video. India and China were very similar in my option. Those students seemed more pressured to succeed and get ahead in their study. They put their studies and education before other things like sports. Though the Indian students didn’t seem to have a choice in their future career. The Chinese students enjoyed their studies and seemed to have more of a choice of a future career.
The United States students were very different. They valued other things more like sports and spending time with their friends. The boy said that he didn’t even really study for class. The parents also didn’t seem to put too much pressure on them.

4) How might different people interpret this message differently?
I think that different people will interpret this message differently. I think that American students would relate to the two students on the video and also not see a huge need to study more. I also think that high school parents will also view this and think that their children already do a lot. They might agree with the one mom on the video and just be happy that their sons and daughters aren’t getting into trouble.

I think that other people who have very young kids or don’t have kids at all might view this video and think that American students are lazy and need to study more in order to compete better with other countries.

5) What is omitted from this message?
This video is only showing two students as a representative as a whole country. It’s not fair to say that all or even most of the students in that country feel the same way that these students do.