Newspaper Reporting and Correspondence Part 24

6. Try summarizing a case in one paragraph.

7. Practice getting down testimony verbatim.

8. Practice summarizing testimony in indirect form.

9. Practice writing out the testimony in full in the various ways.

10. Write testimony with action in it for the sake of human interest.

11. Show how all of these may be combined into one good court report.

EXERCISES FOR THE THIRTEENTH CHAPTER

1. Notice how various newspapers treat social news; study the reason in each case; collect examples.

2. List the facts of a wedding story; write short and long wedding stories.

3. Write wedding announcements, beginning in various ways.

4. Write engagement announcements.

5. Write up receptions, banquets, dinners, etc.; report actual functions.

6. Write announcements for the same functions.

7. Write up some unusual social story as a news story.

8. Practice writing obituaries and simple death stories with accompanying obituary. Write sketches of the lives of prominent people.

9. In these exercises use actual events as subjects.

EXERCISES FOR THE FOURTEENTH CHAPTER

1. Study sporting stories for their material and method.

2. Report a football game or some other sporting event.

3. Make a running account of a football or baseball game.

4. Write a brief summary of the game to be sent out as a dispatch, limiting it to 150 words.

5. Write up the same game in 200-300 words; attach a condensed running account of the same length.

6. Write a long story of the same game, following the outline given in the text; attach a detailed running account by periods or innings; compile tables of players and results for the end.

7. The study of sporting news may be taken out of its logical place and studied during the baseball or football season.

EXERCISES FOR THE FIFTEENTH CHAPTER

1. Collect human interest and newspaper feature stories.

2. Watch for material for human interest stories; look at the facts in your other news stories in a sympathetic way and see how they could be made into human interest stories.

3. Write human interest stories on facts given by the instructor and on facts discovered by the students.

4. Write animal stories, and witty comments on the weather.

5. Write up some timely local subject as a 1500-word feature story.

EXERCISES FOR THE SIXTEENTH CHAPTER

1. Gather good theatrical reports and watch for those in which the whole report is written around a single idea.

2. At the theater watch for things to comment on; try to bring away one definite idea about the play--with ill.u.s.trations.

3. Write dramatic criticisms that are the embodiment of a single idea or criticism on the play.

4. Try to point out the bad things in a play without being bitter or personal.

5. Write a half-column of copy on a vaudeville show, supposing that the copy is paid for and must praise, not only the show as a whole, but each individual act.

EXERCISES FOR THE SEVENTEENTH CHAPTER

1. Notice the form and punctuation of the date line: MADISON, Wis., Feb. 29.--

2. Notice the writing of street addresses: 234 Grand avenue, 4167 Twenty-sixth street; 3857 138th street; (without "at").

3. Notice in the use of figures--sums of money, hours of day, ages, figures at the beginning of sentence.

4. Notice use of t.i.tles; use of Mr. before a man's name--always give a man's initials or first name the first time you mention it in any story.

APPENDIX II

NEWS STORIES TO BE CORRECTED

(The following stories have been prepared to ill.u.s.trate some of the most usual mistakes in newspaper writing. They may be rewritten or used as exercises in copy-reading. As a cla.s.s exercise, the student may revise and correct these stories _without recopying_, just as a copy-reader revises poorly written copy.)

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