From a very young age children know traffic rules. However, time runs and people forget even the simplest concepts that may keep them safe in intense city traffic. Our campaign emphasizes the importance of following simple rules in order to increase the level of safety on the roads for both drivers and pedestrians. To attract more attention we decided to use an unusual promotion campaign, specifically by creating a song with a catchy tune and lyrics that are easy to remember. Uncommon way of presenting such information will likely attract more attention and in the end will increase awareness of the matter and encourage more people to listen, remember and follow!
The ideas
We, the students of IB program in Moscow school 1329 under the guidance of our CAS-coordinator Veronika Khrustaleva, decided to investigate the issue of road accidents all over the world. We searched through internet resources, news articles and specific materials related to the causes of car accidents. During the work we noticed that all the causes can be divided into several main groups.
- Safety belt not buckled
- Speeding/ Reckless Driving
- Breaking Traffic Rules
- Drunk Driving
- Distracted Driving
We made a conclusion that most of the road issues occur, because drivers do not follow or break well-known traffic rules. From early childhood kids were told that: “you must cross the road only when the traffic light shows the green colour”. In drivers’ schools people are told that “one must fasten the seatbelt, before starting the engine”. In addition, in general our parents and friends always notice that “attention is the most important aspect on the road” no matter if you are a pedestrian or a driver.
We realized that following these simple rules can decrease the rate of fatal car accidents as a whole. Our purpose was to increase the awareness of people that simple and well-known rules are important and indispensable. Definitely, education is the major instrument to promote safety on the roads. Also, it widely provides specific information and prevents many accidents. However, technological development encourages people to use devises more often. Our team decided to use this fact in order to distribute key principals which we have recognized earlier for audience that is bigger than our school and families. We have chosen a creative method of presenting this type of educational materials.
The initiatives
We decided to use social networks, especially YouTube as a platform to distribute our message. Modern trends motivated us to create a song. It includes 3 steps:
- Writing the lyrics. This stage was complicated because the lyrics should be easily understandable for everyone and at the same time be valuable in terms of providing the idea of following the traffic rules. Our purpose was to write lyrics which would attract people’s attention to obeying the rules. Another aspect that we wanted to use is the ability of a catchy tune and lyrics quickly stick to ones’ memory.
- Making the beat and recording. There was about 10 beats for the song. The main criteria for the beat was its simplicity, positive spirit and high speed, which would be associated with traffic on the road. The recording was made in the room, on the phone. Vocal optimization was made on iPad, in GarageBand.
- Video-making. When we started the project, our plan was to film the video which would have a particular storyline that would visualize the lyric. However, the lockdown and self-isolation period came and destroyed our plans. It was unexpected and we thought about other different ways of visualizing the lyrics. As it often happens, our challenged brought new opportunities that we could not think of before. We decided to use illustration and drew characters which would show the meaning of lyric. It will help us distribute this video and will make it equally understandable by people who understand English lyrics and those who do not. All videos were drawn in Procreate and then edited in IMovie. The most difficult thing was to draw every shot (every movement, every motion). Multiplication took 48 hours with breaks. The color palette was taken from the charming view of the sunsets. The process of creating this video was enjoyable.
Our objective was to highlight the idea that following simple and well-known rules can increase safety on the roads. We planned to involve more people who also cared about this important topic. We achieved our goals, we uploaded the video on May 22nd and after 4 hours we could get 500 views, 125 likes and 30 comments. Analyzing the feedback, we got assured that our purpose was achieved, because a lot of people wrote that lines from the song stayed in their minds and the visual content improved the perception of our message.
In conclusion, we can say that if everyone controls their behavior on the road as a pedestrian or a driver, we can save many lives all over the world and make the roads a safer place.
