LET'S WRITE A NEWSPAPER STORY - REPORT WRITING ACTIVITY!!!  

 Goal:
To make Students learn how to write reportes and to build newspaper stories.
Objectives:
Students will:
Identify the purposes of a newspaper
Apply the Who -What -When -Where -Why -How writing technique
Write an effective lead
Use basic editing principles
Apply basic layout principles
Produce a class newspaper (optional)
Students will demonstrate the ability to write a newspaper story.
Lesson Overview:
After learning about writers and what they do, each student wrote a newspaper story. Students choose their own stories and edited their own stories, wrote a headline, lay out the newspaper.
Below is the Activity Layout and few Quick Notes:

Key Learning Points : News Report
The key elements of a News Report are:
1. Headline

 Catches your attention.
  Sums up the story.

2. Byline
 Writer’s name
 Writer’s Specialty, e.g. sports, food, crime,
current events

3. Placeline
 Where the story begins

4. Lead
 The opening section
 Gives most important information
 Should answer most of the 5W'

5. Body
 Supplies detail
 Most important details come first
Simple true statements

6. Quotation
 What someone actually said
Adds accuracy
Adds “at the scene” feeling.

News Report – An example 

News Report Practice

Read the article below. Fill in the Elements of a News Report chart on the next page.
                                           Students Grow Flying Sauce
                                          Jim Wilkes, Science Reporter
TORONTO - In the cult movie classic Attack of the Killer Tomatoes, mutant
vegetables cut a deadly swath through the community, consuming everyone in their
path.
 But Canadian astronaut Bob Thirsk says Toronto students cultivating tomato
seeds from space shouldn’t worry about like imitating art.

 “There should be no fear on the part of teachers or parents about any toxic fruit
growing from these tomato plants,” said Thirsk, who flew aboard the shuttle
Columbia on a 17-day mission in 1996.

 He said he’ll eat tomatoes produced from the high-flying seeds or use them to
make salsa or ketchup.

 Thirsk visited students at St. Cecillia Catholic School on Annette St. yesterday to
check up on their experiments with tomato seeds taken into space by astronaut
Mark Garneau.

 The Tomatosphere project involves 2,500 secondary school classrooms across
Canada growing 400,000 seeds, half of which made the trip to space. Space plants
are said to grow faster and taller.

 “The space-flown seeds made 170 orbits of the Earth, travelled more than 7
million kilometers and spent 12 days weightless,” Thirsk said.

 At the end of June, schools will send results of their experiment to the Canadian
Space Agency which will compile the date and make conclusions.

 Thirsk said the program is designed to introduce space science to young
Canadians. “I can see that in these classrooms we have potential future Canadian
scientists and astronauts,” he said. “I find that incredibly exciting.”

Fill in all the elements of the news report based on the previous article:
Element                                      Definition                                   From the Article
Headline                                • Catches your attention        Students Grow Flying Sauce
                                                • Sums up the story

Byline                                     • Writer’s name                             ....................................
                                               • Writer’s Specialty, e.g.
                                                 sports, food, crime,
                                                  current events

Placeline                                 • Where the story begins               ....................................

Lead                                        • The opening section                  .....................................
                                               • Gives most important               
                                                 information
                                               • Should answer most of
                                               the 5W’s

Body                                  • Supplies detail                               Circle the Paragraphs in the body 

Facts                            • Simple true statements                        Underline 4 Facts in the                          Article


Quotation                      • What someone actually
                                       said
                                     • Adds accuracy
                                     • Adds “at the scene”
                                        feeling

Writing a News Report is as easy as 1-2-3!

Step 1: Start planning
•     Look at the picture – What is happening in this picture?
•     How can you connect the picture to the headline?
•     In your rough notes, answer some or all of the following questions:
•     Then add:
•     Think of a catchy lead paragraph

Step 2: Create a story!
•     Write a byline
•     Create a placeline
•    Create a catchy lead paragraph
•     Write in the 3rd person
•     Write the body (1-3 paragraphs)
•     Be ensure to include a quotation
•     Print neatly and legibly

Step 3: Review
•     Who?
•     What?
•     Where?
•     When?
•    Why?
•     How?
•     Quotes
•     More information