Journalism Studies 20 Header

Six O'Clock News
Module 2, Activity 3.10 - Making the Local News
Student Page
(teacher lesson for this lesson)

Introduction: A news broadcast is created with a very limited amount of time in an environment of extreme pressure. In this lesson, you will put all of your skills to the test in a real-life situation. As a class, you will create a live news broadcast of your own.
Activities: Task One - Chain Links To begin, your class must decide on a local event on which to focus the newscast. Then you will be given approximately 5 days to prepare for the broadcast, 1 day for the actual broadcast and an additional day for evaluation. Need Ideas? Home Tournament Municipal Election Grand Opening of a Business Children's Festival Big Bike Ride for Heart and Stroke Elementary School Field Day Once the class has decided on a focal event, you must begin to get organized. The first order of business will be to assign/choose jobs. View the handout on possible jobs. The jobs are listed in groups of 2-4. These small groups will be the links within the chain of the larger newscast. The most important jobs will be those of the home base group. These people will essentially be team leaders for the entire project. This project is meant to prepare you for your independent project. The class will be expected to solve as many problems as possible on their own. This is why it will be important to have strong team leaders. The broadcast will need all the elements of a regular newscast, but it will use the major community event as its focus.
Necessary elements 1. Top news stories: 3-4 beginning with the headlining event 2. Human interest/feature stories with interviews - each of these will give a different view of the focal event 3. Sportscast - possibly in relation to event 4. Weathercast - how this might be affecting the major event 5. Commercials - possibly focusing on businesses sponsoring the event in the news
Once all members of the class have chosen or been assigned jobs, review with your teacher how you will be marked individually and as a group, and begin to prepare for the day of the news cast.
Knowing in advance how you will be marked gives you the opportunity to continually check your progress throughout the assignment.
Task Two - Working on the Chain Gang In the days preceding the event, there will be many tasks to complete. View this sample timeline and use it as a basis from which to start. Your teacher will be available to confer with, but the majority of the work must be completed by you and your classmates. This requires a great deal of teamwork. Keep people's suggestions and feelings in mind as you work. Part of you mark will depend specifically on how well you work together to solve problems.
The key to successful team work is listening to and respecting others.

Objectives: You will be able to - recognize what is news - understand how a radio or television production is created - recognize the elements of a news story - understand effective news gathering and editing techniques - recognize the differences between a news story and sports writing - understand the role of a news bureau - understand the requirements for reporting news using radio, television, and the Internet - understand and demonstrate copy editing for the electronic media - determine and plan a project in one area of journalism - complete and present a project - prepare a simulated television or radio broadcast - understand the limitations that may be imposed on student journalists, depending on school policy - demonstrate responsible journalism - recognize the importance for journalists of interviewing, researching, and reporting - demonstrate fact-gathering, research, and writing skills necessary for in-depth reporting - conduct an interview skillfully - demonstrate effective writing, design, and production techniques - recognize the value of teamwork and co-operation
Resources: - access to a number of video cameras - permission to film - sample timeline - local news jobs - individual/peer assessment - news broadcast group evaluation
Task Three - The Weak Link On the last day before the broadcast, you may want to prepare for problems. Try to create a list of all things that could possibly go wrong and list of possible solutions to the problems.
This will exercise should help you to see how smoothly the day could go and prepare for the issues you will definitely face.
Task Four - Chain Reaction On the day of the community event, you will work togetherto create a 56 minute newscast including commercials. You should work within your small groups, but continually check in with the home base group. Just like a real newscast, your newscast must be handed in by the end of the day. Your director will prepare a specific timeline for this day long before it happens, and you will have to meet your deadlines.
This will require a great deal of organization and coordination that cannot be achieved unless you work together as a team.
Task Five - Lock it Up After the newscast is finished, you will have the chance to watch the completed newscast in class. After you have watched the product of your work, you must take some time to do peer evaluation. You will be responsible for evaluating the other members of your small group. Once the peer evaluation is complete, spend a few moments discussing the good, the bad, and the ugly of newscasting. What was the most difficult part? What was the best part? What would you change if you had time? What are you most proud of? What was challenging about working almost entirely on your own? What things must you consider for your independent project?

Last Updated
May 25, 2005

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