This is a project I've been working on where I had to come up with the best way of communicating to youth about the power and dangers of cell phone addiction.
I created a picture book where a young girl, who is addicted to her cell phone, is sucked into another world where cell phones rule the land. She meets some friends who have been stuck there for a long time suffering severe symptoms of cell phone overuse. I chose this particular way to communicate the severity of cell phone addiction as it best suits my audience. They are very visual people and like to understand ideas by having visual support.
The idea of personifying cell phones and exaggerating the symptoms to be almost unbelievable also supports the idea of making serious and sometimes overwhelming information interesting and exciting to read. Even though it comes off as a children’s book (which of course children can read and enjoy it too) it’s the older youth range that will be able to understand what the message really is amongst the fiction story. I’ve displayed true facts such as the overuse of cell phones can cause depression, bad posture and the inability to create new memories, but in a way that isn’t so serious and won’t seem like the information is accusing and being forced upon the reader.
