BASIC REPORTING PROGRAM 12

Writing news stories

There are different ways of structuring a story. Here in our Basic Reporting Program we will show you two simple approaches – the news story and the feature story – that are worth mastering before you move on to the slightly more complicated methods that we will demonstrate in a set of Good Storytelling modules.

In this module, we look at writing a simple news story using the well-known Inverted Pyramid structure.

This is the type of story you will commonly see in newspapers. It begins with the most important information and tapers off to the least important – hence the upside-down pyramid shape. This type of story structure has been the mainstay of newspapers for over 100 years. In the new media of the Internet, the Inverted Pyramid still plays an important role. It offers readers the most important information at the top and if the reader is in a hurry or is not

This type of story has its uses. It can work well for fairly simple pieces of news – a wedding, a funeral, an accident. Although there are better storytelling methods, this type of story is worth mastering.

Draft a plan

If you have followed the advice in the Preparing to write module, you will have organized your interview notes, research and background material. You will also have a fairly clear idea of What’s the story – the main theme and thrust of the story. Now is the point at which you draft a plan for how you are going to lay out the story.

The plan is an outline of the story. Resist the temptation to begin writing until you have sketched this outline. You would not build a house without putting in the foundations and supporting pillars.

When writing a news story there is a template you can use.

BASIC OUTLINE

Try to make this list clear and simple. This is the list or template you can use to write the story.

For example:

LEAD – Protest march over poor wages for women workers

SUPPORTING QUOTE – Woman activist speaks out

CONTEXT – NGO rallies women workers to improve their conditions. Poor pay. Women lose their jobs if they have to take off time to have baby. Harassment in the workplace.

FURTHER QUOTES – Protestors speak, government official speaks

EXPLANATION OR BACKGROUND – number of women in work force, problems about women’s status in the past. Comparison of wages of women and men

Write the story

Use the template to write the story. What you will be doing is filling in the information, step by step. If you have drafted your template correctly, the story will flow. But don’t worry if you have to move some material around. Most reporters find their template is never 100 percent correct.

One draft or several?

There are different ideas on whether you should aim to write one main draft of your story or several drafts. Some reporters methodically write the story from beginning to end, referring to their notes and adding in the right quotes and statistics as they go. Others write a quick draft and then come back and add in the quotes and materials in the second draft. Some write draft after draft after draft.

The answer is to aim to write one draft, or at least try to avoid endlessly rewriting. Many reporters get caught up in spending too much time rewriting.

Attribution

When you put a piece of information in your story, you have to convey to the reader where the information came from. If you talked to somebody and they gave you some information, then you can put, “told UCA News.” If the person you are quoting spoke to a press conference, then you put, “told the press conference.” If the information came from the media, such as a the Daily News newspaper, then you put, “according to a report in the Daily News.” Always state the sources of your information. Reporting should be based on information you have gained from talking to people, e-mailing them, people speaking in public, published material and so on.

Facts, figures, names, dateline

Make sure to check your basic facts, figures, spelling of names and designations, and that the dateline (where you reported it from) are correct. If you make mistakes in the spelling of names and people’s positions it can upset people and lead to mistrust of the story.

Is your story too long?

Writing to length, as it is called, is one of the hardest parts of writing news and feature stories. So often a reporter who is asked to write 60 lines ends up writing a 100 lines. One of the skills of learning to write well is learning to write to length and to encapsulate your story in a short, tight story.

Edit the story

After you have written or drafted your story, you should aim to approach it again with the eye of an editor or somebody reading the story for the first time. Make sure the story is clear and logical, that the questions that arise in the story are answered and that it includes the answers to the 5 Ws and one H – who, what, where, when, why and how. After you have made sure it includes all the information necessary for the telling of the story, try to edit out unnecessary words, phrases and sentences. Try to avoid repetition. Make sure sentences are not too long. Print out the story and give it a final check and polish.