Transcript Writing Crime Stories

Chapter 8
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When writing a news story, you need a plan
 Conceive
 Collect
 Construct
 Correct
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Conceive the idea
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What struck you as most interesting or important
What is most newsworthy
What is the main point of the story
What do readers/viewers need or want to know
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Collect the information
 Get the basics…the 5 W’s
 Take good notes
▪ Jot down details from observations
▪ Get quotes, facts, comments from sources
 Tape interviews for sound bites
▪ Don’t rely solely on recording
 Note down additional info you will need
▪ Background, more details, etc
 Highlight important points in notes
 Gather anecdotes
▪ Brief stories from sources
 Consider the your focus as you report
 Think ahead
▪ What do you need to do next
 Collect documents
 Verify facts, names & spelling
▪ Some of the worst errors to make
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Construct the story
 Find the focus
▪ Write a focus sentence on top of your story before you begin
 Plan an order
▪ Topics
▪ Main points/highlights you want to cover
▪ Highlights
▪ If creating a highlights box…what would they be?
▪ Time sequence
▪ Are there distinct time elements or chronological events?
▪ Block Sources
▪ Cover all comments from one source
 Before moving to the next source
▪ Q&A
▪ If one paragraph raises questions
▪ Answer them in the next
▪ Free-writing
▪ If you can’t find an order, write what you remember w/out notes
 Then look for logical arrangement
▪ Ending
▪ Create a lasting impression
▪ Strong quote, future action
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Correct the story
▪ Read your story aloud
▪ One of the best self editing techniques for print publication
▪ Basics
▪ Are the 5 W’s there
▪ Context
▪ Background or details to help readers understand story
▪ Check Accuracy
▪ Double check names, titles and facts
▪ Avoid opinion based adjectives
▪ Let details and sources describe actions and feelings
▪ Purge and parroting
▪ If quotes/sound bites repeat your transitions or story content
▪ Rewrite or cut them
▪ Cut useless or excess words
▪ Edit the pace
▪ Check grammar
▪ (subject verb agreement)
▪ Cut jargon
▪ Read aloud again
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Tips for tightening stories
▪ Squeeze a fact on every line
▪ (one idea per sentence)
▪ Focus tightly
▪ Think about the REAL story and share what’s important
▪ Use impact leads
▪ Avoid rehashing known info, apply Spin/Angle on lead
▪ Make the story move
▪ Make your point early & use info that supports it
▪ Keep it tight
▪ Use specific details over adjectives
▪ “ancient windmill” vs “100-year-old windmill
▪ Don’t over attribute
▪ No need for he/she said after every sentence
▪ But make sure source of info is clear
▪ Use strong, lively verbs
▪ Hundred of people in the streets vs
 “lined, jammed, crowded, etc
▪ Avoid weak transitions
▪ With well organized articles, transitions will be minimal
▪ Use quotes that advance story
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Leads
 Tips to finding a good lead
▪ What will hook reader’s attention
▪ What does reader need to know first/most
▪ In order to understand the story?
▪ What is the story about
 Remember the 5 W’s
 Write a few leads then choose the best one later
 Vary the pace
▪ Follow long sentences with short ones
▪ This helps readers to follow the story
 Parallelism
▪ Wording sentences in the same grammatical order
▪ Even repeating some words
 BBI- Boring but important info
▪ Break it up throughout the story, not in one long block
 Simple sentence for complex info
▪ Use simple sentences for difficult info
 Lists
▪ Help the flow through middle of story
▪ Itemize group of statistics or cumbersome info
▪ Highlight key points in a story
▪ Use Active Voice when possible
▪ She will always remember her first story
▪ VS. Her first story will always be remembered by her
▪ Write short, simple sentences
▪ Keep the subject and verb close together
▪ Write the way you speak
▪ To improve reading flow through story
▪ Quote kickers
▪ Quote that sums up the main idea of story
▪ Circle kicker
▪ Tying together your lead and ending
▪ Future-Action
▪ Giving the next step in the development of an issue
▪ Factual
▪ Short simple sentence that states a fact
▪ Could possibly work as a lead
 Cliffhangers
▪ Also a suspense ending
▪ Used if story will continue on another day
 Out of gas endings
▪ Used when there is nothing more to say
▪ Appropriate for hard news stories
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Due next Monday (9/17)
 A news article written by you
▪ 400-600 words (Include word count on paper)
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Headline
Lead
Body/middle
Ending
▪ 2 or more primary sources
 Meaning people you talked to/interviewed
 Story should relate to school, community or students