Organizing the Reynolds High School Journalism Institute publication went smoothly during the organizational meeting last night. The white board at the front of the class was filled with the story slugs for the 35 teachers who will write for the online publication which will be the culminating project for our experience here.
The story assignment process went so well because of one primary factor: Submitting story ideas in advance. We were all expected to submit three story ideas prior to our arrival in Phoenix and Steve Elliott certainly spent a significant amount of time reviewing the suggested ideas and encouraging us in what he thought was feasible.
I am observing Steve's instructional strategies and am impressed that he is following his own advice on the guidelines for stories. I'm sure that educators would agree that he is following "best practice."
I have found my new mantra for reviewing story ideas with my students. "Is it relevant to the target audience? Does it have news value? Is it focused? Is it feasible?" Now, I just have to juggle my hands-off approach to content with being too influential in the story assignments for students.
Trampus Willis
South Side High School
Fort Wayne, Ind.
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ReplyDeleteThis year, this same light bulb turned on in my brain. We could spend days, even weeks if they were shortened by holidays or assemblies, on brainstorming and issue planning. I figured there had to be a way to shorten and sharpen this process and I hit on the idea of having students actually pre-compose short, draft versions of stories they wanted to write for the next issue. Come brainstorming day, everything was much smoother, stories got assigned faster and more easily, and we could get down to the business of reporting.
ReplyDeleteI also will be repeating the mantra in my mind. It will certainly help when it comes to approving story ideas.
Kye Haina
Kamehameha Schools Maui
Pukalani, Hawai'i