American Press Institute
Newspapers in Your Life: What’s News Where?
Big news isn't necessarily newsworthy everywhere! How do journalists decide what to cover with so much happening around them? A instructional activity on media literacy examines the factors that affect the media's choice of stories to...
Curated OER
Reporting Live from the Twentieth Century
Students create a news story on one of the top 100 news stories of the 20th century.choose one past news event. They write a news story about that event, and provide a continuation of the story based on their research.
Curated OER
Don't Lose Your Way in the News
Students explore language arts by participating in a newspaper analysis activity. In this journalism instructional activity, students identify how newspapers present stories, who is writing them and how they can obtain information from...
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Identify the Parts of a Newspaper features of informational text, newspaper format
Young readers make sense out of the wealth of information in newspapers with this helpful reference document. Pointing out basic features like headings, articles, bylines, and captions this resource is a great tool for introducing...
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Where Do I Begin: Writing an Effective Feature Story
High schoolers write an effective feature story. In this journalism lesson plan, young scholars learn through 6 activities to ask open-ended questions, write effective leads, and handle quotes, and write headlines for news stories.
Online Publications
Become a Journalist
Explore the newspaper as a unique entity with a detailed and extended unit. The unit requires learners to consider the newspaper's role in democracy, think about ethics, practice writing and interviewing, and examine advertising and news...
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Two Sources of Story Ideas for Our Paper
Students research and identify story ideas for the school newspaper. In this story ideas lesson, students pitch story ideas to their teacher on a weekly basis using a specific format. Students find the majority of their ideas from print...
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Hurricane Katrina: You Be the Reporter
Students work in a small group to create news stories, feature stories and editorials/letters to the editor and organize them in a podcast, video-based program, or newspaper/magazine focused on Hurricane Katrina.
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Understanding the News
Students work in small groups to identify the following categories of news articles: hard news, features, announcements, and opinion/personal reflection.
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News Magazine: Special Issue on Iran. (It's about Perspective)
Students take on the role of journalists. In this Iran lesson, students explore the condition of the country at this point in history and collaborate to create a news magazine that features current events and cultural issues pertaining...
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Nellie Bly's Newspaper Club: Introducing the Art of Writing
Students use video and the Internet to research the life of Nellie Bly, a famous female reporter from the 19th century. They research a writer and present their information to the class in the style of a news reporter.
Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
Alexander Graham Bell
Study the features of nonfiction text with a set of comprehension and analysis materials. Readers learn about Alexander Graham Bell with questions about the text, writing prompts, and proofreading activities.
Curated OER
Tuning Out Telemarketers
Students research laws for telemarketers in their state, examine whether there are effective laws in other states, explore concept of national telemarketing legislation, and write news features about telemarketers and impact they have in...
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What Makes a Novel a Novel?
As your authors prepare to write a hypothetical novel, they need all the inspiration they can find! Using a book they have already read (and enjoyed), learners complete a literary analysis by filling in eight short-answer questions....
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Creating a Newspaper
Get the scoop with a fun, engaging newspaper project. After analyzing the parts of a newspaper, including the headline, subtitles, and pictures or images, young journalists get to work by writing their own stories in a newspaper article...
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Newspapers
Have your class learn about the features of a newspaper. Learners identify the parts of a newspaper and an article. They discuss the elements of good writing and describe how to add photos and captions to a story. Informative and useful!
Roald Dahl
Matilda - The Third Miracle
Magnus takes a visit to the classroom in the 20th chapter of Matilda. Or does he? After reading, learners interview the person in the hot seat to get a detailed account of what happened during this chapter. Then, they write individual...
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Beneath the News: Who's Doing What to Whom, and Who Cares?
Students investigate the differences between various forms of media (print, radio, TV, Internet). They determine the target audience for each and compare exposure around the world. They write a short story and share it with the class.
Curated OER
Law: Requiring HPV Vaccine
Learners research the HPV vaccine and estimate its cost. They interview doctors and local health officials about it. Students write feature stories based on their research focusing on the timelines for implementation in their states or...
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What Weather When and Where?
Students learn the difference between hard news and feature writing. They choose one of these news styles to write a compelling weather-related article based on interviews with local sources.
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Informal Writing 1
Students examine characteristics of informal writing. Students read through a class story. They rewrite the story so that it sounds if they were explaining the story to a friend. Students discover the use of apostrophes and...
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Newspaper Unit: Reading Lesson Plan
Work on identifying the different parts of a newspaper with your English learners. After reviewing newspaper terminology, pupils pair up and complete a scavenger hunt, looking for specific things in the newspaper and recording their...
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Let the Pictures Tell the Story: Presenting a Point of View
Ninth graders examine the process of writing a newspaper article that presents a point of view. They read various newspaper articles, analyze methods of persuasive writing, interpret and create editorial cartoons, and write an editorial.
Curated OER
Pet Food Safety A Con
Learners use the internet to research pet food safety laws. In groups, they examine what happened during the pet food recall earlier this year and what is being done to improve the situation. They write a news feature story including...