News Literacy

Comms 351

NEWS LOG #1
What youre doing: Choose three news stories on different subjects, each of which provide examples of different news drivers. You must choose one story from each of the three lists of outlets below (print, broadcast, internet). For each story you choose, explain why you chose it and what makes it newsworthy. Name the news driver (or drivers) for each story. Explain the role of those drivers. Who would or should care about this story? Why? There is no need to summarize the stories. Get right to the point: a clear and compelling argument supported by specific examples. If you write succinctly (and you should), 50 words for each story is sufficient. A template for this assignment follows these directions. Download it, copy and paste it into a new Word document. Use whichever heading is appropriate depending on whether youve chosen a print, broadcast or Internet news outlet. Grades will not necessarily be based on choice, but on your reasoning for the choice and the quality of your argument. You must use quotation marks around any phrase or passage taken verbatim from one of your stories and cite all three stories properly by filling in all the applicable blanks on the template, also posted on the course website. Why youre doing this: This weeks lecture discussed the elements of a story that make it news news drivers. This assignment will not only help us verify that youre following the news, a basic requirement of this course, but also help you to practice identifying news drivers and analyzing their function in real-world stories. What you should aim to get out of it: You should gain a better understanding of what is news and why stories are published or broadcast. You should begin to develop the ability to critically analyze the level of newsworthiness (as in, the usefulness to the consumer) of any piece of journalism.

This weeks list of outlets (choose one print story, one broadcast story, and one internet story): Print: (do not use these outlets companion websites; you must provide section and page numbers in your citations) New York Times Time Magazine Salt Lake Tribune Broadcast (radio / television): KSL 1160AM or 102.7 FM KUTV Salt Lake City (Channel 2) ABC World News Internet www.BBC.com www.espn.com www.digg.com

News Literacy
Comms 351

NEWS LOG #1 TEMPLATE

Cut and paste this template into a Word document. Be sure to double space. Dont forget to save it to your computer! NAME ________________________________SECTION_______DATE ____________

1. Print Outlet: _________________________________ Date:_________________ Headline: _____________________________________________________ Byline (authors name): ______________________________________________ Section and Page number: _____________________

2. Broadcast Outlet: ____________________________ Date: _________________ Time: _________________ Headline: _________________________________________________________

3. Internet Outlet: _____________________________________________________ Date accessed: _____________ URL for story: __________________________ Headline: _________________________________________________________ Byline: ___________________________________________________________