Focusing on just one country

Ask students to pick a country from this list: Canada, Pakistan, Mexico, Iraq, Eritrea, Burma, China, Iran and Russia. Research them on the Freedom House 2013 report website. Then pick one or more levels of activity:

Flashlight: Class discussion with students: Where does the country you picked rank? Why? What could change that would make that country more free? Now look how Freedom House ranked Internet freedom. Is your country on that map? Also check out the World Wide Web foundation Internet rankings. Can a country censor traditional media but allow the Internet to be free?

Spotlight: With further research, ask students to find news organizations in the countries they chose. What is known about the struggles the news organizations face? Have any of their journalists died trying to get the news? (Both UNESCO and the Newseum document journalists who have been killed.)

Searchlight: Amartya Sen, Nobel prize winner in economics, argued that freedom and prosperity are linked in his 1999 book Development as Freedom. Other scholars: S.K. Chowdhury (2004, The effect of democracy and press freedom on corruption); J.C. Merrill (1974, The Imperative of Freedom) and D.A. Belle (1997, Press Freedom and the Democratic Peace). Students can choose any two and compare and contrast their views in a paper.