Journalism class is now off and running! The class completed their “Listicle” assignment and showcased their creativity, writing ability, and continued mastery of layout and formatting through SNO Sites. If you want to see what we came up with, all articles are linked in my original article: Assignment 1 – LISTICLE.
The next lesson takes the class to Old School Journalism 101: the “Inverted Pyramid” style of news writing.
With this type of writing, we take fluffy descriptions, catchy hooks, and suspense building and put them to the side in favor of getting right to the point! Here’s what the inverted pyramid looks like:
This style of writing begins with the “Lead” – a brief statement of 1-2 sentences that covers the Who? What? Where? When? Why? and How? of the event being covered. Jasmine Roberts, a professor from the School of Communication at The Ohio State University, shares that after the lead, “information is presented in descending order of importance.” The most important details and quotes come right after the lead, and information that is interesting but not necessarily essential comes at the end of the article.
To practice writing a lead, the class collaborated and made this example based on events from the movie Finding Nemo:
Last week, a young Clownfish named Nemo returned safely and reunited with his father Marlin after being kidnapped and held in a fish tank in Sydney, Australia.
Nemo was captured by a fisherman when he attempted to swim and touch a boat during a school trip. He was too far away for anyone to help him.
“It was the scariest moment of my life,” Nemo said. “I just wanted to touch the boat.”
Even though Nemo had no fear, his father, Marlin, had always been concerned about him because of his deformed right fin. He felt he couldn’t do all the same things as the other kids. Marlin was also overprotective because Nemo was his only living child, and his wife was killed in an accident with a Barracuda.
When Marlin went to search for Nemo, he wasn’t alone. He met a forgetful fish named Dory who accompanied him. On their search, they encountered hungry sharks, cool sea turtles, and a helpful whale.
“The thought of losing Nemo led me to never quit looking, and as my friend Dory says, to ‘just keep swimming,’” Marlin said.
Nemo is now back at school and excited to be home.
Here are the requirements for this assignment:
There are so many amazing things going on at East Islip. Now it’s time for The Broadcaster’s journalists to showcase them!
