For those starting off in a career in journalism, including what makes news, how to write a story, interviewing tips, and fact-checking.
Journalism often involves referring to material produced by others. This module looks at how journalists should provide attribution and avoid plagiarism.
Structure, timing, and letting the interview breathe are all essential elements for ensuring a TV or radio news package explores multiple elements of the story through interviewing different people.
Style differs from sentence construction (syntax) in that it cannot be quantified; it has no precise rules. This is inevitable because style is concerned not so much with the mechanics of English as with the manner in which the writer uses language to play on the sensations of the reader.
In this, the third module in the series about language and style from The News Manual, we look at some of the most important grammatical rules for news writing, at some common mistakes and how to correct them.
Punctuation is designed to make reading easy. It is the written counterpart of those pauses and verbal inflections which make speech understandable.
There is a fine art to interviewing politicians. You need to understand their motivation, realise they will have a script, not allow them to complicate matters, refuse to be sidetracked, and retain an open mind.
Radio journalists writing a script need to be able to select the most newsworthy audio clips and write clear and informative links that highlight the most important elements and help the audience understand the significance of the points made
In this module on language and style from The News Manual, we look at the words you use to tell your story. We see how important spelling is and how to avoid causing confusion with the words you choose.