While students can demonstrate their understanding of a book through the composition of a standard book report, writing a newspaper article book report gives them the opportunity to exercise some creativity. Writing a newspaper article book report may seem like an intimidating task, but by breaking it down into manageable bits, students can effectively and creatively show what they know.
Instructions
- 1
Select an event from the book to feature. Pick an event that was a turning point in your text or one that was just particularly exciting and, as such, would make a good newspaper article.
2Place a dateline at the top of the article, which is the city in which the featured event took place.
3Write an engaging lead, which is the first paragraph. Just like in a newspaper article, your lead should make readers want to continue reading. Write a short, pithy paragraph that catches the reader's attention and makes your event appear important and exciting.
4Answer key journalistic questions. All newspaper articles should answer the questions who, what, where, when, why and how. List them on a separate sheet of paper; cross them off as you address them.
5Include quotations from book characters. If possible, lift dialog from the text, using it as a quote in the article. If no such dialog exists, create your own, imitating the character's voice as depicted in the novel.
6Proofread your article for clarity. Journalists who put out work rife with errors look unprofessional. Check for misspellings and grammatical and factual errors.
7Design a newspaper page on which to place the article. To make your article more engaging, center it on a newspaper page featuring advertisements for products featured in the novel or hand-drawn pictures of the event. Put the date the event takes place at the top of the page. If the exact date is not in the book, consider clues the author gives. Look for references to the season and mentions of important events going on in the world at the time.
