What’s the news? – Talking about newspapers

Pupils in partner schools read a national newspaper of the same date. They choose the three most important and interesting pieces of news in their opinion. The news and their summaries are published in a shared magazine (MagazineFactory) or in the TwinSpace.

Age Group: 11 years +

Level: Easy

Duration: 1 month

ICT tools: MagazineFactory, TwinSpace, Forum

Pedagogical Objectives

Pupils learn to critically evaluate the content of newspapers and develop from passive consumers to critical readers. They also develop their foreign language communication skills: talking about news and current affairs, translating text and making a summary. They gain an understanding of different types of text: editorial, news, column, title, text, summary, source, etc.

Process

1. Starting Activities

Pupils in partner schools read a national newspaper of their own country of the same date. They choose three most important and interesting pieces of news from the following sections: domestic politics, international politics or foreign affairs, sports, culture, economy + the editorial. They translate the title and the contents in 1-2 sentences into English or whatever language the teacher chooses. (Pupils over the age of 14 can make a summary of the article).

The news and articles are published in a shared magazine (MagazineFactory) or in the TwinSpace.

2. Consolidation

Pupils compare the news. Are any of them the same? What about the sources? Are they the same? Are the photos the same?

Pupils write in the forum about their own reading habits: do they read a newspaper regularly, do they get a morning paper at home, where do they read the newspaper, what news in the newspaper do they read: sports, TV programmes, editorials, cartoons, advertisements, happenings or what? What are they interested in and why? Do they read news or newspapers in the internet?

Outcomes

The pupils can write their own news and create a newspaper/magazine with articles about the pupils’ own life following the sections a real newspaper (if MagazineFactory tool is used).

Links

http://www.edu.fi/magazinefactory/ (Internet newspaper/magazine)