As part of a media literacy unit, class members establish criteria for good video reporting, and practice giving both positive (warm) and constructive (cool) criticism.

What actually happens at a press conference? Make sense of the mayhem with a mock press conference activity designed to promote media literacy. Individuals participate as either members of the press or the governor's office to examine...

Events in recent years have underscored the importance of a free and independent press in a democracy. Young journalists engage in lessons about the function of journalism in a democratic society, practice the steps of Bok's Ethical...

Young historians turn into detectives in a thought-provoking activity on the Challenger Explosion. The activity uses an image of President Reagan watching the Challenger explode on live TV to help academics practice historical analysis....

Uncle Sam wants you! During World War II, the US government and military created a propaganda campaign to gain public support. The activity uses primary documents such as photos to explain how and why the propaganda campaign was...

Given all the recent criticism of the news media and coverage, it's crucial that young people are given the tools they need to evaluate what they see, hear, and read about current events. A video interview from "News Goggles" introduces...

The case of the 1928 execution of Ruth Snyder takes center stage in a instructional activity that asks young journalists to consider the ethics involved in publishing an image of an execution. A series of discussion questions ask...

Mistakes happen. When they happen in news reporting, be it in print or on the internet, journalism ethics requires that the errors be corrected. Young journalists use an Accuracy Checklist to track how news organizations post corrections...

Scholars investigate events in the civil rights era in their community and develop a multimedia presentation of their findings. They compare local events with national events discussed on a NewseumED timeline.

Not all southern newspapers covered the civil rights movement of the 1950s and 1960s. Young journalists investigate how The Lexington (Ky. Herald-Leader and The Jackson (Tenn.) Sun re-examined their coverage of the movement. After...

Alternative facts? After watching the We The Voters film, "MediOcracy," viewers compare how cable news outlets CNN, Fox News, and MSNBC report the same story about politics or public policy. After a whole-class discussion of their...

To quote or paraphrase? That is the question examined by a 29-slide presentation on the importance of including direct quotes in news reporting.

Here's a lesson designed to help learners develop their digital verification skills. First, expert groups study specific digital verification skills, and in a jigsaw activity, share what they have learned with classmates. The jigsaw...

The debate over the integrity of stories in media is not new. Young journalists analyze historical sources that reveal freedom of the press controversies and draw parallels to challenges freedom of the press faces today. 

Young journalists have an opportunity to experience the challenges of covering a catastrophe by staging a mock press conference. Half the class acts as reporters while the others act as officials from the mayor's office.

Breaking news reports can be short of facts. Young journalists select a pair of news articles about a disaster; one published within hours of the event and the second published the following day. They examine whether facts in the report...

After researching statistics about their community in local census reports, young journalists interview a resident about their interests and then analyze a local newspaper or homepage to see how similar the stories are to the residents'...

Young journalists learn that how we get our news and information matters in a collaborative social studies activity. The class is divided into three groups with the first analyzing a transcript of FDR's "Day of Infamy" speech, the second...

Verification of provenance and the original source of an image or video can be a long and winding process. Young journalists learn about the difficulty of finding the original source of a scrape, a copy of an original news story, and...

In this power transmittance activity, students read about sources that transmit power and are given a chart with the distance and the power transmitted by each device. Students determine the intensity in watts of the power for each...

Students evaluate a radio broadcast by correspondent Edward R. Murrow as a primary historic source. The broadcast, popularly known as "Orchestrated Hell" recounts Murrow's experiences with a Royal Air Force bomber crew on a raid over...

Sixth graders examine the use of rhetorical devices in oral presentations. In this rhetorical device lesson plan, 6th graders watch a newscast of a major TV news personality to observe how speech patterns and rhythms are used...

Students watch a video about wild stallions and conduct research about wild horses and wildlife photography. Students explore the relationships between animals and humans and conduct Internet research about the treatment of wild horses...

Students research glaciers, how they are formed and what kind of landforms they carve out of the rock they pass over. They organize their findings into a mock newscast in a presentation for the class.