News literacy is an important part of journalism and liberal arts education. Adapting a tool called the Frayer Model, the activity guides students in developing a conceptual understanding of news by creating a definition, listing essential characteristics, and coming up with examples and non-examples. This activity is intended to set the stage for…

The use of an invented criminal justice story can serve as a "soap opera" designed to help teach beginning journalism students a few things about news values, news writing, and reporting. (HOD)

The author explains how she taught third- and fourth-graders the skills needed to produce a class newspaper: note-taking, layout, news writing, and proofreading. She found that learning research skills and disciplined newswriting improved students' writing in general. (SJL)

Presents a variety of techniques and topics that can be used to bring information about ethnic and racial minorities into most of the courses in a journalism program. Provides ideas for student research projects and seminars. (MG)

Activities and methods for teaching newspaper skills to eighth-grade students are presented in this unit from the Greenfield Express Management System (GEMS) program, a California Demonstration Program in Reading. A project overview form from the California Centers for Educational Improvement (CCEI) describes the GEMS program and lists other units…

A learning center-based instructional unit on newspapers for middle school grades is presented. The purpose of the unit, which is designed to take three weeks, is to develop student understanding of the wide variety of topics included in a newspaper. The learning centers may be presented in any order. Teacher instructions include a list of the…