Reporting and Writing IWhat is news?

Reporting and Writing

• What is news? Where and who does it come from?• Story structure and style• Reporting in the courts and council meetings• Off-diary stories• The public interest

Assessment

40 per cent: Portfolio of 7 stories of publishable standard1,000 word featureTwo page leads of 500 words eachThree other stories with a total of 500

words.Deadline: Week 24

30 per cent: Two in-class timed news writing tests30 per cent: Exam

Essay on issues facing journalistsNews values / ethics questions

Suggested reading

• Essential Reporting by Jon Smith (NCTJ)• Journalism: Principles and Practice by Tony Harcup• Essential English for Journalists by Harold Evans• The Universal Journalist by David Randall• The Great Reporters by David Randall• Flat Earth News by Nick Davies

What makes the headlines?

Why do some stories hit the headlines, while others languish at the back end of the book or are ignored completely?• Every newspaper and

broadcaster has their own set of implied news values.

• They reflect the interests of their audience, and (for newspapers) the politics of their owners.

Who makes the headlines?

Editor

Reporter Photographer

News editor Sub editor

News editor

Guides the development of stories and decides the running order of the paper – but can only work with what reporters supply them.

Who makes the headlines?

Reporter

News editors trust them to have good news sense – not to waste time on bad stories, and not to pass up a good one.

Sub editor

Designs page layouts, cuts stories, writes headlines… but can only make the perfect page if the others have done a good job.

Photographer

Images are crucial to attracting readers – snappers need to be able to identify the pictures that tell the story on the spot.

Click icon to add picture

News values

Newspaper design reflects a hierarchy of stories

Page leads are the strongest, most important stories

The strongest stories tend to go on right hand pages

Pictures can be vital in deciding what stories will be given most space

News values

You’re the news editors…

Group 1 BroadsheetGroup 2 Mid-marketGroup 3 Tabloid

You have 10 storiesYou must choose 5 for a page: A page lead

A downpagerThree fillers

Then explain your choices, and why you rejected the other five stories.

News values

True and Never print anything false or misleading . Check facts. accurate David Miliband is not Labour leader

Fair and Opinion is always attributed and is never confused balanced with fact. Alternative views are sought and assessed.

Does this study really end the climate changeargument? Who says?

Celebrity 19

Novelty 16

Bad News 15

Relevance 19

Pet issues 18

Novelty 5

Power 20

Relevance 19

News values

News values

• There was a huge spider in my flat last night.• There was a huge spider in my flat last night, which turned out to be a

rare and deadly South American tarantula.• I was bitten by a rare and deadly South American tarantula last night,

and am currently in critical condition in hospital.• A rare and deadly South American tarantula killed me and is still on the

loose in Maidstone.• Gary Barlow was bitten by a rare and deadly South American tarantula

last night and is in critical condition in hospital.

News values

Power Stories about America, the EU, or China; big business; Cabinet officials rather than backbench MPs.

Bad news Disasters, deaths and conflicts rank highly...Relevance ...especially if the dead are British or American.

Papers will push subjects relevant to their readers, e.g. Climate change in the Guardian, immigration in The Daily Mail.

Magnitude Two hundred deaths are worth more than one – unless the one is a member of the power elite, or has greater relevance (above).

News values

Novelty Rare or unusual stories. “New” always trumps “old”.Good news Rescues, cures, charity. Often follow a familiar narrative,

e.g. the triumph over adversity, or rags to riches.Celebrity Has its own “power elite”.Entertaining Animals, children, quirky stories, sex.Follow-ups Long-running issues in your paper.Pet issues Newspaper owners will always have their own

media agenda, serving their own fascinations, political beliefs or business interests. E.g. Campaigns.

Good pictures Easy to overlook – a stunning picture can be the story.

Car crash

Has deaths but motorway crashes are common and would need to be very serious to top the news agenda

News values

Drought

Has magnitude, involves deaths, and a major charity…But the story is evolving slowly, and involves obscure countries

Longevity

In theory this is new information, but it’s not surprising or interesting – so it has little news value

Tornado

High rarity and novelty value, and relevance – a serious story even without death. And should have good pics

Katie Perry

Relevance depends on the paper – but she is a tabloid fascination and this lends itself to pictures.

News values

Armenia

Affects a lot of people (magnitude) and has some novelty value (and, cruelly, entertainment) but it is an obscure country

Pandas

Novelty, animal stories are always popular, entertaining and “good news” – makes it news, but of a less urgent variety

Virus

Affects fewer people than the Armenia story, but they are Americans. Computer viruses are a modern bogeyman

News values - suggestions

Lead Downpager Nibs

Broadsheet Tornado Drought Car crash, Armenia, Virus

Mid-market Tornado Pandas Car crash, Armenia, Virus

Tabloid Tornado Katie Perry Car crash, Armenia, Virus

Different papers may choose similar stories, but their treatment will vary (headlines, angles, pictures) – givingthe finished page a very different look

Telling stories

To inform… Journalists belong in a tradition that starts with bards and entertain and poets – we spread information and provide mass

entertainment.Some feature writers use the same techniques as novelists to capture their readers’ imagination.But news reporting is structured to inform above all - complex sentence structures, laboured metaphors and allusions to esoteric works of literature get in the way of telling people what is going on.News reporters writer in clear, direct English , give priority to important facts, and translate jargon intoplain language.

Telling stories

Horrors from Improvement levers real council Holistic approach and govt. Stakeholders publications Place shaping

Gateway reviewCoterminosityPredictors of beaconicity

If you don’t understand a word… there’s a good chanceit will be lost on the reader, too.

Telling stories

Annoying A terrified young woman was taken to hospital after a holes brick was lobbed at her windscreen.

Shattered glass cut her wrist and shards went into her eyes in the attack.

The woman was a passenger in her partner's car when she noticed two men standing on a bridge.As they passed underneath a brick was thrown -shattering the windscreen.The stopped immediately and the two men fled.Is this a satisfying story?We don’t know when it happened or where, or any detail about the victim.

Telling stories

Who What Where

When Why How

Telling stories

• Write in the past tense.• News stories are always structured so that the most important

information comes first.• Don’t waste a word.• Keep the language simple but be careful – readers want your meaning

to be clear, but they don’t want to be patronised.• No contractions (don’t, won’t, shouldn’t, wasn’t etc)• Avoid clichés like the plague• Keep a checklist of the key facts – does your story say who, what,

where and when? Can it say why and how?

Telling stories

PRESS RELEASEAt 8.15am today, police attended the scene of a road traffic accident in Dock Road, Chatham, in which one male from the Rochester area was injured.Officers arrived at the scene to find a black Lexus had collided with a lamp post after swerving to avoid a fox, which was crossing the road.The injured man, a passenger in the car, was taken to Medway Maritime Hospital and treated for mild concussion.

You later discover the man is the Mayor of Medway, Bruce Smyth.

(84 words)

Telling stories

PRESS RELEASEAt 8.15am today, police attended the scene of a road traffic accident in Dock Road, Chatham, in which one male from the Rochester area was injured.Officers arrived at the scene to find a black Lexus had collided with a lamp post after swerving to avoid a fox, which was crossing the road.The injured man, a passenger in the car, was taken to Medway Maritime Hospital and treated for mild concussion.

You later discover the man is the Mayor of Medway, Bruce Smyth.

(84 words)

Jargon Plain language

• “Road traffic accident”

• “From the Rochester area”

• “Male”

• “Collided with”

• Accident, or crash

• From Rochester

• Man

• Hit*

Telling stories

Write it in 50 words.

PRESS RELEASEAt 8.15am today, police attended the scene of a road traffic accident in Dock Road, Chatham, in which one male from the Rochester area was injured.Officers arrived at the scene to find a black Lexus had collided with a lamp post after swerving to avoid a fox, which was crossing the road.The injured man, a passenger in the car, was taken to Medway Maritime Hospital and treated for mild concussion.

You later discover the man is the Mayor of Medway, Bruce Smyth.

(84 words)

Story writing

• THE MAYOR of Medway, Bruce Smyth, was treated for mild concussion after his car hit a lamp post in Dock Road, Chatham, at 8.15am today. His driver had swerved to avoid a fox which was crossing the road.

• A WAYWARD fox left the Mayor of Medway, Bruce Smyth, concussed and his black Lexus wrapped around a lamp post this morning. The Mayor’s car swerved to avoid the animal as it crossed Dock Road, in Chatham, at 8.15am. The Mayor was treated at Medway Maritime Hospital.