Lesson video

Hello, I'm Mrs. Smart.

Welcome to this English unit.

In this unit, we're going to be focusing on journalistic writing, and we're going to start today's lesson by identifying some of the features of a newspaper report.

This is going to be really helpful later in the unit, when we come to write our own newspaper reports.

Okay, let's get started.

In this lesson, you will need an exercise book or some lined paper, a pen or pencil to write with, and a ruler or some sort of straight edge that you can draw straight lines with.

If you don't have any of those things with you right now, just pause the recording and get yourself ready for today's lesson.

In today's lesson, we're going to start by discussing the purpose, audience, language, and layout of journalistic writing.

We're then going to look at an example of this text type, and identify the features in an opening paragraph, and then the chronological recount paragraph.

And lastly, we'll finish with your independent task.

So before we start, what is journalistic writing? Have you ever heard of that type of text before? Maybe you can hear or see a word in a word.

I can see the word 'journalist' in 'journalistic'.

Maybe that could give you a clue as to the text type that we are going to be looking at today.

What does a journalist do? What do they write? Pause the recording and write down anything you know about journalistic writing.

Off you go.

Okay, I'm sure you've got lots of really good ideas.

I'm going to go through some of the notes that I have made.

Journalistic writing is a text written by a journalist.

So a piece of writing that's been written by a journalist.

Journalists, and that's the type of job, so someone works as a journalist, they collect, write, present, edit or comment on news and current affairs.

Current affairs means things that are currently happening right now in the world.

News is a recount of current, significant events, so it retells what's happened.

And written news reports can be found in newspapers, magazines, and often online.

But also we can have news reports in different ways.

We could have them presented on television, for example.

You might've seen this if you have ever watched a programme such as Newsround.

Here you can see three different types of written news.

So we can see news written on paper, a newspaper.

And then we can also see news can be written and displayed on a mobile phone or on a tablet or computer.

And these days, lots of people choose to read their news in electronic forms, such as on their phone or on their computer, rather than on paper in a newspaper.

We're now going to think about the purpose, audience, language, and layout of journalistic writing or a newspaper report.

But before we do that, let's just think about what these four keywords mean.

Can you write down on your piece of paper a definition for purpose, audience, language, and layout? It doesn't have to be in reference to the newspaper report.

Just what do these terms actually mean? Pause the recording and write yourself some notes now.

Okay, let's go through my definitions and you can check and see if you've got something similar.

Purpose.

Purpose is the reason a text is written.

The reason the author or the writer, or the journalist in this instance, has written the text.

The audience is the type of people that read a text.

So different texts will attract and be appropriate for different groups of people.

For example, a picture book might be, the audience of a picture book might be young children, whereas a very formal scientific report might be more appropriate for adults or people who are interested in science.

Language.

Language is the vocabulary or the words that have been chosen as part of that piece of writing.

And layout.

Layout is how a text is organised or structured, often what it looks like on the page.

Now let's think about those four different aspects in relation to a newspaper report.

So can you write down what do you think the purpose, who do you think the audiences, what sort of language and what sort of layout would you expect of a newspaper report? Pause the recording and write yourself some notes now.

Okay.

Let's go through and you can see if you've got similar answers.

So the purpose of a newspaper report is to provide information about current events.

Like we mentioned already, a newspaper report contains news, which is all about things that are happening currently in the world, that are significant, that are important for people to know about.

The audience.

The audience for a newspaper report could be anyone interested in the subject.

And sometimes news reports might be more appropriate for children, if you've ever read a newspaper such as First News, or we can have newspapers that are more appropriate for adults.

Language.

In a newspaper report, normally the language that's chosen can be quite formal, and it might include some journalistic phrases, and we'll have a look at what that means in a bit more detail later on.

And lastly, layout, the structure of the report.

Now, this will vary for each newspaper report, but we're going to follow a particular structure when we write our own, and in the example that we have a look at.

So the layout we're going to be using is a headline at the start, followed by an opening paragraph, a chronological recount paragraph, a quotes paragraph, and lastly, a closing paragraph.

But there're lots of different structures you can use, but most newspaper reports will start with a headline and some form of opening paragraph.

We're now going to have a look at an example of an opening paragraph of a newspaper report.

I've written this example about Goldilocks and the three bears.

So you might recognise the story.

I'm going to read this opening paragraph out loud and you can follow along on the screen, or you might want to pause the recording and read it through yourself.

Goldilocks Raids Bear Residence.

Yesterday afternoon, police were called to an incident at 3 Honeypot Lane in the Big Bad Forest.

A young female known as Goldilocks was arrested at the scene after a violent disturbance raised concerns with neighbours.

We're going to identify some of the key features in this opening paragraph.

The features are listed on the right-hand side of the screen.

We're going to try and find the headline, and then we are going to identify the four Ws: who, what, when, and where.

Okay, let's start with the headline.

Can you pause the recording and point to the headline on the screen? Well done.

Of course, the headline is a little bit like a title.

It's right at the beginning of the newspaper report, and it tells the reader what the newspaper report is going to be about.

It's also a really useful way of hooking your reader in or engaging them and making them read the rest of your report.

Now I want you to try and find the who, who is this newspaper report about? Can you pause the recording and point to the who in this paragraph? Well done.

The main person that this report is going to be about is the young female known as Goldilocks, but you might have also pointed to the police because they were called as a result of the incident.

Now I want you to find the what, what is this newspaper report about? And you might identify few different whats in this paragraph.

Have a go.

Okay, so a few different things happened as part of this incident.

The police were called to the incident.

A young female known as Goldilocks was arrested.

And there was a violent disturbance.

And each of these events leads to the next one.

So for example, the violent disturbance happened, and then as a result, the police were called.

And then as a result, the young female known as Goldilocks was arrested.

So each event leads to the next one.

Well done if you found all three of those.

Now I want you to find the when, when did this incident occur or happen? Pause the recording and point to the when.

Well done.

The when is yesterday afternoon, that's when the event happened.

And often news is reported either on the day that something happens or sometimes the day after.

So often the word 'yesterday' would be used in a report to describe when something happened.

Lastly, I want you to try and find the where, where did this incident happen or occur? Pause the recording and point to the where.

Well done.

The where is 3 Honeypot Lane in the Big Bad Forest.

Excellent job! Well done if you found all of those different features.

Now you've looked at an example of an opening paragraph I want you to have a think about this question.

What is the purpose of the opening paragraph? Remember, purpose means why has it been written or why do we need an opening paragraph as part of our newspaper report? Pause the recording and either have a think or write yourself some notes now.

I think the opening paragraph is really, really important to the newspaper report.

It summarises the key information.

So it doesn't go into lots and lots of detail, but it gives a brief overview of what happened as part of the event or the incident.

It also helps the reader to decide whether to read the rest of the text, a little bit like a blurb on the back of a book might help you to decide whether you want to read the whole book.

You might as a reader read the opening paragraph of the newspaper report, and based on that decide if you're going to read the rest of the report.

It might interest you and you might read on, or you might think, "Oh, that's not really relevant to me.

"I don't want to read on." So we need to make sure when we write our own openings, that it's really engaging and it makes the reader want to read the rest of the report.

We're now going to have a look at the second paragraph of a newspaper report.

This is the chronological recount paragraph.

Chronological means in time order.

So this paragraph is retelling the event in time order or in the order that it happened.

And it goes into a lot more detail than the opening paragraph.

I'm going to read it through out loud and you can follow on the screen, or if you would prefer, you can pause the recording and read it through yourself.

Yesterday afternoon, the Bear family, Mr Bear, Mrs Bear and Baby Bear, left their residence at 4:00pm for approximately an hour.

This is supported by an eyewitness, the postman, who knocked on their door at 4:20pm, but got no response.

Therefore, the evidence suggests that Goldilocks unlawfully entered the Bear premises between 4:30pm and 4:45pm.

When the police arrived at the scene, they found two smashed bowls and two broken chairs.

In addition, a substance thought to be porridge was spilled all over the kitchen floor.

Reports indicate that Goldilocks' vandalism was interrupted by the Bear family returning home and subsequently a fight ensued.

However, it is thought that neither parties obtained any serious injuries.

We're now going to look at this paragraph in a little bit more detail and identify some of the key features that you can see listed on the right-hand side of the screen.

So we're going to identify any timings, formal conjunctions, journalistic phrases, and brackets for extra information.

Don't worry if you don't know what some of those things mean right now, because I'll go over those in more detail as we come to them.

So firstly, let's try and find any timings, any references to when these different events happened.

Pause the recording, read the paragraph through, and see if you can identify any reference to time or timings.

Off you go.

Let's see if you found all of these.

So we should have yesterday afternoon, at 4:00pm, for approximately an hour, at 4:20pm, and between 4:30pm and 4:45pm.

Well done if you found all of those examples.

Now we're going to see if we can find any formal conjunctions.

What is a formal conjunction? Formal conjunctions are used at the beginning of a sentence, followed by a comma.

For example, furthermore comma, and then your sentence would continue.

They link sentences together, and they create cohesion.

That means they help your writing to flow.

They also provide a formal tone.

These types of conjunctions are often found in formal pieces of writing.

Let's look at the three different types.

We've got 'and' conjunctions.

These add more information.

'But' conjunctions.

These show a contrast or two sentences being in contrast or opposite to each other.

And then we have causal conjunctions, which show one sentence causing something else to happen or one event causing another event.

Now, can you pause the recording and write down any examples you can think of that would come under those three different types of conjunction: 'and' conjunctions, 'but' conjunctions or causal conjunctions.

Have a go now.

Okay, I'm going to show you my examples.

'And' conjunctions.

We've got in addition, furthermore, moreover, and also, and you can see each one is followed by a comma and then the rest of the sentence would continue.

'But' conjunctions: however, nevertheless, despite this, and although.

'Although', you'll notice, is a little bit different because it's also a subordinating conjunction.

So it needs to be followed by a subordinate clause and then the comma.

And lastly, we have causal conjunctions: as a result, consequently, and therefore.

You'll notice 'in order to' is a little bit different because in order to goes in the middle of a sentence, rather than at the beginning.

Well done if you thought of any of those.

Keep those in your head because they're going to be useful when we look back at the paragraph now.

Okay.

Can you now find some formal conjunctions in this chronological recount paragraph? Off you go.

Did you find all three? Hopefully, you found therefore, in addition, and however.

Next we're going to have a look for journalistic phrases.

What is a journalistic phrase? This is a phrase or a sentence starter, which are often used in newspaper reports, and show where the information has come from.

So as journalists, we have to investigate and find out information and these phrases show where that information comes from.

So for example, 'reports suggest that' would tell us that you found the information from some sort of report.

And 'police reports indicate' would suggest you've got the information from a police report or something that the police have told you.

They also show the information has not been confirmed.

So sometimes journalists aren't completely sure about whether something is true or not.

So they might use a journalistic phrase to show that.

'It is thought that' would show that people have said this, but that journalist isn't completely sure if that's actually true.

And also 'allegedly' means some people are saying this or some people think this, but we're not completely sure yet.

Now, can you find any journalistic phrases in this paragraph? Pause the recording, scan through, and see if you can find any.

Off you go.

Well done if you managed to find some.

That was quite tricky.

I've got: this is supported by, the evidence suggests, reports indicate that, and it is thought that.

Well done if you found any of those.

Lastly, we're going to see if we can find any brackets, and brackets are an opportunity to add extra information to a sentence, and they're often used in newspaper reports.

Can you scan through the paragraph and see if you can find any examples? Off you go.

Excellent.

There're two examples and hopefully you found both of them.

The postman and thought to be porridge.

So the postman adds information to an eye witness, and then thought to be porridge adds information to a substance.

Now that you've read a chronological recount paragraph, hopefully you can answer this question.

What is the purpose of the chronological recount paragraph? Why has it been written or why is it important that it's included in a newspaper report? Pause the recording and have a think or write down some notes for yourself now.

Okay.

So a chronological recount paragraph provides detailed information about the event.

It goes into a lot more detail than the opening paragraph that just gives a summary.

It recounts the events in chronological order so the reader knows exactly what happened and when, and it just helps the reader to understand what happened during the event.

Now it is time for your independent task.

Can you write down the features of journalistic writing? We've looked at lots of features today.

This is your opportunity to retrieve all of that learning and see what you can remember.

Can you include an example of each feature? Think carefully about the layout or the structure of a report.

Can you remember what those different paragraphs were referred to as? What sort of language do we need to include, and what punctuation might we see in a newspaper report? And you can do this in a mind map, or you might just want to write yourself some headings and list your features underneath.

Here's an example that I started.

I haven't got everything.

I've just made a start where I've done it as a mind map.

So you can see I've got features of journalistic writing in the middle, and then I've got my ideas and then I might have expanded on my ideas.

So I've written structure and then I've written the different aspects of structure, formal conjunctions, and I've written the three different types of formal conjunction that we learned about today.

So that's an example.

If you want to lay it out like that, you can, or you can do it in any way you want.

So the agenda today was to look at the purpose, audience, language, and layout of a newspaper report.

We identified the features of the opening paragraph and the chronological recount paragraph.

And now it's time for you to complete your independent task, retrieve all of that learning from today, and see what you can remember.

If you can't remember anything, you can just rewind through the recording and remind yourself.

Congratulations! You've completed your first lesson in this new unit.

Well done for all of your hard work.

If you would like to, please share your work with your parents or carer, and I will see you in our next lesson, when we are going to learn more about journalistic writing and newspaper reports.

Goodbye!.