Part One
Understanding News

Chapter 1 - Write From the Start

Resources

• Learning to Tell Stories in Journalism, Roy Peter Clark, The Poynter Institute
• American Journalism Review: a great resource site for journalists
• Newslink.org: another good journalism resource with links to newspapers, magazines, and broadcast stations
• CNN
• How to be your own writing coach - advice from Sacramento Bee columnist Marjie Lundstrom

Chapter 2 - Changing Nature of News

• You be the producer - interactive CNN game to test your news judgment.

Resources

• MrWakeup (iping.com) - a Web-based wake-up telephone service used by the New York Times to send headlines to your computer
• TampaBayOnline (a convergent site of the Tampa Tribune and WFLA-TV Channel 8)
• Philly.com (a convergent site for The Philadelphia Inquirer, The Daily News, WPVI-TV, Channel 6 and Citypaper)
• We're All Nerds Now - article in Columbia Journalism Review
• Newspaper of the future: Integrating print, television and Web - article about convergence at three newspapers from "Making Change," a study by the American Society of Newspaper Editors
• Convergence and the Future of News - How the Tampa Tribune has converged with WFLA-TV, article from the Radio and Television News Directors Association
• The Future of News in the Information Age: Speech by Merrill Brown, editor-in-chief, MSNBC Online
• Pew Center for Civic Journalism - home page
• Online Eyetrac Study - Poynter Institute/Stanford University
• Sunline Sun-Herald interactive pages (write your own obits, post pet pictures and so on).
• You be the Producer - an interactive game from CNN to test your news judgment

• American Journalism Review
• Spokesman Review
• The Oregonian
• CNN
• The Sun-Sentinel (games site)
• The Philadelphia Inquirer
• Tampa Bay Online
• OnWisconsin

Chapter 3 - The Basic News Story

Interactive Exercises

Click into the exercises for this chapter:

Resources

• Newspaper Writing 101: Good tips from the Detroit Free Press on writing the basic news story
• Framing a Story: What's It Really About? - article about covering stories about conflict

Chapter 4 - Grammar and Usage

• Grammar Bytes: a fun, interactive site of grammar exercises. A favorite with students.
• Interactive grammar quizzes - another good site by Charles Darling, English professor at Capital Community College, Hartford, Ct. Try the one on it's/its and their/there/they're.
• Grammar Matters - links to interactive exercises
• 50 common spelling errors: If you think you spell well, take this challenging test by Mindy McAdams, a distinguished Knight professor of online journalism at the University of Florida.
• The John Bremner Editing Test - the toughest editing test you may ever take. Created by the late John Bremner, a former professor at the University of Kansas and nationally respected editing coach. Don't peek but check your answers after you take the test.
• The Tongue Untied: A guide to grammar, punctuation and style for journalists ( an interactive site with exercises developed by Kelle Weingold for pre-journalism majors at the University of Oregon)

• "Prevent punctuation and grammar errors that hurt credibility," good article by Jack Hart, managing editor and writing coach at the Oregonian
• Webgrammar.com - lots of links to good grammar resources; very comprehensive
• American Copy Editors Association, links to resources, internships and more
• The Elements of Style, William Strunk's book considered essential for writers.
• The King's English, William Fowler, another excellent, searchable reference book.
• The American Language, a classic book by H.L. Mencken explaining the differences between British and American language. Online and searchable.
• Roget's II - The New Thesaurus: If you are looking for synonyms, you can search this classic reference book online.
• The American Heritage Book of English Usage - another searchable reference from Bartleby.com
• The Online English Grammar, Anthony Hughes, good, searchable reference - excellent examples for active/passive voice.
• YourDictionary.com: What a great site for translating words into more than 230 languages! Type the word, click the language and you have a translation.
• Common Errors in English - searchable site by Paul Brians, an English professor at Washington State University
• Deadwood Phrases - phrases to avoid in writing
• Bartlett's Familiar Quotations - not grammar, but a good searchable resource for quotes.