Lecture 5: Writing Ledes with Twitter

Outline:

Overview of Ledes
Review Chapter 4
Practise Writing Ledes

 

What are the six basic questions that every story must answer?
Who
What
When
Where
Why
How
How long should a lead be?
Leads should be short, usually fewer than 25 words


Inverted Pyramid

The organization of a news story in which

information is arranged in

descending order of

importance.

Review Chapter 4:

Numbers 1,2,3,4,5
Group 1: Page 67- middle 71
Group 2: “Accuracy in Word” – middle 77
Group 3: “Handling Quotations”- middle 83
Group 4: “Editing News-Service Copy” – top 89
Group 5: “The First Edition” – end 94

Create a ppt of your section of Chapter 4
Upload it to Slideshare.net (you will need to create a login)
Create a summary blog post (1 paragraph) highlighting key terms/ideas and embed your slideshare presentation
Teach class the key points from your section using your ppt (4 minutes)

Practise Writing Ledes:

Create a Twitter account
Log in
Begin all leads with: “@JessL” so that I can track them
You may chose from any of the types of leads you know 5W & H, question or quotation.


Choose five current news articles and rewrite the ledes
Compare similar stories across three newspapers, note the differences/similarities
(your first tweet will identify the three stories, then one tweet for differences and another for similarities)

Send all to @JessL


Homework:

For next class (after Reading Week!):
Blog Report 1 Due!
Read Chapter 5 in CE

Image from UB Fundamentals of Journalism.