Newspaper Class: Week 2

Our second class went great! The kids are on fire with ideas and questions. We do not have time in the hour to accomplish everything these bright minds want to talk about and explore, that's for sure!

Here's what was decided:

The newspaper will be named The Norfolk Post. The first editor is Maggie More and her email is written in your child's folder (if you don't have it, please email me). All written material and photographs should be submitted to Maggie this week. Sales will be by individual paper and also by subscription. Subscriptions are $10 for ten issues, and individual papers are $1.50.

We will mail papers if that is desired.

We decided what graphic look the newspaper should have and in what format it will be printed.

Your child has a folder for each job he or she decided to take on.

Subscription sales: These two representatives of the newspaper were selling subscriptions to the paper at lunch on Tuesday. The Subscription Manager is Martina and she will be in charge of the bookkeeping surrounding subscriptions and also individual sales.

Reporters: Reporters should each write one article on an event. It can be an event inside or outside co-op. They should report what happened, who was involved, where it took place, and when it happened. They may or may not have a photo to go along with it.

Columnists: Columnists can write any type of column they choose. They might write an advice column, a how-to column, an interview column, an opinion column -- whatever they like.

Photographer: While the reporters may submit photos connected with their stories, the photographer's job is to take a picture that is its own story. It can have a caption but should speak for itself.

Editor: The editor puts all the material together and compiles it in the template, and also writes an op-ed.

Cartoonist: The cartoonist draws a cartoon, scans it, and emails it to the editor as an image.

DEADLINES: The reporters, cartoonist, columnists, and photographers need to get their materials to the editor by the end of Friday. She then has Saturday and Sunday to work on putting everything together, and will submit her finished work to me by the end of Sunday so I can get it printed.

Now, this next part is important: There are many parameters that were not defined. There were many questions left unasked. Part of letting the children own this project is letting them figure out the questions that need to be asked instead of just helping them figure everything out in advance. If your child feels like they haven't had enough direction, encourage him or her to go in whatever direction is interesting and inspiring.

There may not be a paper this week -- this may be our week to figure things out and come at it with more information next week. And that is totally fine! Our goal is to put out ten issues, so we have some wiggle room in terms of the schedule. Let's be totally unstressed, totally positive, and whatever happens, we will work it out.

The most important thing this week is that the kids start communicating with each other, start learning what's possible in terms of word count and photo size, and have the experience of working for each other.

If they want to keep track of the questions and problems that occur to them as they're working/thinking/planning, that would be great! They can write right on their assignment sheet.