Na Jaemin had never felt so nervous before in his life except for the time when he was held at gunpoint. 

 

That same person who had pointed the gun at him as currently sitting next to him in psychology, twirling his pen in his hand with his chin resting on his left hand as he gazed at the board. Jaemin could see that the other wasn’t focusing on the board but rather in a passive state of mind where the other’s mind was roaming a virtual world. He knew that he should look away, he knew but there was something about the way the other bit his lip as his eyebrows furrowed in concentration…

 

…and somehow, Na Jaemin couldn’t tear his eyes away from the sight.

 

Huang Renjun, why are you so- Don’t finish that thought, Na Jaemin. 

 

“Hey, quit looking at me and pay attention.” The words snapped Jaemin out of his reverie and caused his cheeks to colour against his will. Hastily looking away, he saw Renjun smirk at him out of the corner of his eye. 

“No one said I was looking at you. I could have been looking at Seunghee-noona who is behind you,” He retorted, glaring holes into his teacher because the person he was next to was pissing him off. Vaguely, Jaemin could feel his cheeks only get warmer when the other had the audacity to chuckle. 

“Sure you were,” Renjun replied, dragging out the vowel of the first word and laughing when Jaemin threw an eraser him. Thankfully, their professor didn’t notice since they were in the row furthest from the front, Jaemin’s seat next to the window with Renjun on his right. The desks were close enough that they could converse but far away enough for there to be a thin gap of division due to the numerous amount of people in the class. “No one’s behind me, Na Jaemin.”

 

Oh… my life.

 

“I meant from my perspective!” Jaemin shouted, irritation and embarrassment clouding his mind as he stood up. He heard a cough from their professor in the class and as he turned to look at the professor with dread, Jaemin couldn’t stop the sinking feeling of humiliation from occurring.

“Since Na Jaemin and Huang Renjun get along so well, I assume that you two will be each other’s partner for the assignment?” Their professor asked, making Jaemin realise that he had no idea what the assignment was even on. Opening his mouth to protest, he was cut short but Renjun harshly pulling the sleeve of his jumper and forcing him to sit back down. 

“We don’t mind,” Renjun answered for them before the professor clapped their hands and began to explain the task further (making Jaemin more confused since he didn’t really pay attention to the first half).

“Since we are on the topic of society and how that impacts our perspective and opinions, this task is a partner task that focuses on the cognitive psychological aspect of the course. Here is a copy of the assignment,” Their professor explained, hurriedly passing each row a number of sheets for the students to pass down to each other, taking one for themselves along the way. Once Jaemin was passed his own, he stared down at the guidelines of the assignment. 

 

Assessment Task 1: Cognitive Psychology Partner Task

 

TASK RECEIVED DATE: Semester 1, Week 3

 

TASK DUE DATE: Semester 1, Week 15

 

Context:

 

This task is designed to introduce students to the practice of analysing certain issues present within our society. This task will develop students understanding of the aspects that cognitive thought processes as well as the ability of persuasion from others in society and the impact it can have on one’s perspective. Students will investigate and explore one of the themes from the task description and are required to create a documentary on their findings as well as an individual portfolio to record their progress. The documentary must be no longer than two (2) hours and no shorter than half an hour (30 minutes). 

 

TASK WEIGHTING: 30%

 

RAW MARKS: _______ / 45

 

Task Description: 

You are to investigate, research and experiment with any one of the themes available (as shown below) Create a documentary with your chosen partner on your findings Create an individual portfolio that records all research and discoveries gathered through numerous interviews and experiments. Your portfolio must also record all technical and practical information as well as the process of creating your documentary. Your documentary must be appropriate and non-offensive (scenes relating to discoveries and your chosen theme must be clarified with your professor before being used) You must use your own footage for the documentary You must conduct your own social experiments relating to your chosen theme You must interview others for your research and for your documentary

 

You need to include:

Research and investigations on your chosen theme from a range of sources (e.g. internet, numerous interviews with people, social experiments, etc.) Process work detailing the stages your work took to resolve your documentary within your portfolio Evidence of developing an idea, planning and a record of the process involved to create your documentary within your portfolio Written response explaining your discoveries and choices of scenes for your documentary as well as an evaluation on your documentary and group within your portfolio Evidence of editing your documentary within your portfolio

 

There will be progress checks throughout the development of the assessment by your professor.

 

Themes (you are to choose ONE (1) of the following):

Racism ism Classicism Homophobia Nationalism Religious prejudice Ageism Xenophobia

 

Groaning and letting his head fall gently on his desk, Jaemin couldn’t have thought of a better person to be stuck with during the whole 12 weeks that this project would be put into practice. Why did I have to be stuck with Huang Renjun?! 

“Stop making it seem like I’m a bad partner. I do my share and I expect you to not be a deadweight.” He heard Renjun say quietly, the voice of his professor becoming muffled once the older spoke. “Plus, the task doesn’t seem to be that hard. We just have to stick around to each other a lot.” That’s the bad thing.

“I am not looking forward to this,” Jaemin mumbled to himself, sitting up and running a hand through his hair in frustration as his professor signalled for them to use the remaining class time to plan their documentary. 

“I’m not looking forward to it either but you don’t see me complaining,” Renjun retorted as he pulled out a pencil from his pencil case and began to annotate the task notification, plotting down several ideas of social experiments that could be performed. Groaning once more, Jaemin turned to his (now) partner. 

“Which one do you want to do?” Jaemin asked him, looking over and seeing that Renjun had written down more ideas for the ‘homophobia’ theme than he had of any other theme. Does he want to do homophobia?

“I was thinking of ‘homophobia’ since the LGBTQ community will always be an issue that can have so many different answers because of disagreements,” Renjun explained and Jaemin found himself nodding along, agreeing. Being gay himself, Jaemin could relate to that topic better than anyone else. 

“I’m fine with it, I can see us doing it,” He replied, shooting Renjun a soft smile when the other looked at him in disbelief. “Even though I don’t like the idea of making a two hour documentary, I think we’ll be able to do well.”

“What? The documentary is the best bit!” Renjun argued and Jaemin laughed at the adorable expression of disbelief that had settled itself on Renjun’s features. He’s pretty and cute…wait, what?

“More like the experiments that we have to do,” Jaemin fired back, laughing even more at the older male’s pout. 

“Alright so we’ll do homophobia…when do you want to actually do our first experiment?” Renjun asked him, pushing his notification closer to Jaemin do that Jaemin could see his neat handwriting before deciphering the ideas. There were multiple ideas that included someone being bullied for being part of the LGBTQ community in several settings (Jaemin couldn’t help but think back to the bruises on Renjun’s arms that were hidden beneath his jumper), an LGBTQ couple holding hands and filming the treatment staff have towards them in several settings (Jaemin tried to calm his heart down when it sped up at the thought of himself and Renjun executing that experiment), someone being blindfolded with a sign that offered free hugs from someone who was part of the LGBTQ community and seeing how many people would hug them (Jaemin didn’t think he’d be able to see how many people would walk past them if they