The Journalism Page will include all independent activities you did for class, such as AP Style tests, journalism research, and typing tests. Write a paragraph or two about anything you did for the newspaper that isn't an article or photo-- soliciting advertisements, designing pages, working on distribution, creating a game. At the bottom of the page, write a reflection that explains what you learned about teamwork, journalism, or life from these activities.
Style Study
Associated Press Style v. Modern Language Association Style
When you get to college, you'll use the Chicago Manual of Style or APA Style (American Psychological Association) for writing in Social Studies, Business, or Psychology. For a full list of writing style guides and the different subjects they cover, go to this Citation Style Guide.
The first task on this page is a glossary of Associated Press (AP) style rules compared to Modern Language Association (MLA) style rules. Some of them may be the same-- the goal of this page is to teach you the newspaper writing rules while reinforcing your knowledge of MLA Style for your English class.
For each rule, you need to state the rule and give an example, preferably from your own writing. If the rules are the same, state that and write only one sample sentence.
AP Style: Use quotation marks around the titles of books, songs, television shows, computer games, poems, speeches and works of art.
The movie "Ironman 3" was the summer's biggest blockbuster. My favorite song this summer was "Blurred Lines" by Robin Thicke.
MLA Style: Write titles of books, movies, ships, and "large" things in italics; write titles of songs, television shows, poems, and speeches in quotation marks.
The movie Ironman 3 was the summer's biggest blockbuster. My favorite song this summer was "Blurred Lines" by Robin Thicke.
Here is a list of AP Style rules. Write an example of each of these that could be used in newswriting, and then rewrite the same sentence in MLA Style (you'll have to look this one up!). You can format this information any way you like.
Numbers
Titles of academic courses:
The first task on this page is a glossary of Associated Press (AP) style rules compared to Modern Language Association (MLA) style rules. Some of them may be the same-- the goal of this page is to teach you the newspaper writing rules while reinforcing your knowledge of MLA Style for your English class.
For each rule, you need to state the rule and give an example, preferably from your own writing. If the rules are the same, state that and write only one sample sentence.
AP Style: Use quotation marks around the titles of books, songs, television shows, computer games, poems, speeches and works of art.
The movie "Ironman 3" was the summer's biggest blockbuster. My favorite song this summer was "Blurred Lines" by Robin Thicke.
MLA Style: Write titles of books, movies, ships, and "large" things in italics; write titles of songs, television shows, poems, and speeches in quotation marks.
The movie Ironman 3 was the summer's biggest blockbuster. My favorite song this summer was "Blurred Lines" by Robin Thicke.
Here is a list of AP Style rules. Write an example of each of these that could be used in newswriting, and then rewrite the same sentence in MLA Style (you'll have to look this one up!). You can format this information any way you like.
Numbers
- Spell out the numbers one through nine. Use Arabic numerals for 10 and up.
- Always use Arabic numerals for ages and percentages, even for numbers less than 10.
- Spell out numbers that start a sentence. If the result is awkward, re-work the sentence: "Seventy-five students attended the symposium yesterday." "Yesterday, 635 seniors were awarded degrees." The exception to this rule is a sentence that begins with a calendar year: 2007 was a record-breaking year for fundraising.
- Use Roman numerals for wars, monarchs and Popes: World War II, King George VI, Pope John XXIII
- In the case of proper names, use words or numerals according to the organization’s practice: 3M, Twentieth Century Fund, Big Ten
- Use abbreviations such as B.A., M.A. and Ph.D. only when the need to identify many people by degree on first reference would make the preferred method cumbersome; use the abbreviations only after a full name and set the abbreviations off with commas: Toni Brown, Ed.D., delivered a lecture on dress code.
- Always use Arabic figures, without st, nd, rd or th.
- When a month is used with a specific date, abbreviate only Jan., Feb., Aug., Sept., Oct., Nov. and Dec.: Fall Open House will be held on Oct. 8.
- When a phrase lists only a month and year, do not separate the month and the year with commas: The new Web site will launch in December 2007.
- When a phrase refers to a month, day and year, set off the year with commas: Jan. 15, 2008, was the first day of the semester.
- Use figures except for noon and midnight
- Use a colon to separate hours from minutes: 3:30 p.m.
- 4 o’clock is acceptable, but time listings with a.m. or p.m. (with periods) are preferred
- As a noun, use United States: University of California is one of the premiere universities in the United States.
- As an adjective, use U.S. (no spaces): A U.S. senator will speak at UCLA tomorrow.
- For plural nouns ending in s, add only an apostrophe: the students' grades, states' rights
- For singular common nouns ending in s, add 's: the hostess's invitation, the witness's answer
- For singular proper names ending in s, use only an apostrophe: Thomas’ mission
- For singular proper names ending in s sounds such as x, ce, and z, use 's: Marx's theories
- For plurals of a single letter, add 's: She received all A's this semester.
- Do not use 's for plurals of numbers or multiple letter combinations: the 1960s
- Do not put a comma before the conjunction in a simple series: Boston, Newton, Cambridge and Lexington
- Use a hyphen for compound adjectives before the noun: well-known student, full-time job, 20-year sentence.
- Do not use a hyphen when the compound modifier occurs after the verb: The student was well known. Her job became full time. He was sentenced to 20 years.
- The temptation to use parentheses is a clue that a sentence is becoming contorted. Try to rewrite the sentence, putting the incidental information between commas or dashes, or in a separate sentence.
- Use a single space after the period at the end of a sentence.
- Do not put a space between initials: C.S. Lewis; J.K. Rowling.
- In dialogue, each person’s words are placed in a separate paragraph, with quotation marks at the beginning and end of each person’s speech.
- Periods and commas always go within quotation marks.
Titles of academic courses:
- Do not italicize course titles or put quotation marks around them. Capitalize them when used as a title of a subject, but not when referring to a an area of study. Languages are always capitalized.
- Capitalize the principal words, including prepositions and conjunctions of four or more letters
- Put quotation marks around all such works except the Bible and books that are primarily catalogs of reference material: “The Star-Spangled Banner,” “Gone With the Wind,” NBC’s “Today Show,” Encyclopedia Britannica
- Translate a foreign title into English, unless the American public knows the work by its foreign name: Rousseau’s “War,” not Rousseau’s “La Guerre.” BUT: Leonardo da Vinci’s “Mona Lisa.”
- Do not place these titles in quotation marks.
- Capitalize "the" in the name if that is the way the publication prefers to be known.
- Lowercase "the" before names if listing several publications, some of which use the as part of the name and some of which do not: Time, Newsweek, the Washington Post and the New York Times
- Lowercase north, south, northeast, northern, etc. when they indicate compass direction: The cold front is moving east.
- Capitalize compass points when they designate U.S. regions: A storm system that developed in the Midwest is spreading eastward.
- With names of countries, lowercase compass points unless they are part of a proper name or are used to designate a politically divided nation: northern France, western United States, Northern Ireland
- With states and cities, lowercase compass points when they describe a section of a state or city: northern Manhattan Beach
- Capitalize compass points when used in denoting widely known sections: Southern California, the Lower East Side of Manhattan
- Lowercase spring, summer, fall and winter, as well as derivatives like wintertime unless part of a formal name: the Winter Olympics
9 Elements of Journalism
Look up the 9 elements of journalism. Rewrite them in your own words on your Journalism page. This is practice in paraphrasing.
Landmark Legal Cases that Define School Journalism
There are three important legal cases that journalism students should know. Find at least 3 sources for each one, and take notes on the main ideas of each. Make sure you indicate what the court’s decision was. This is practice in note-taking from a source, and finding multiple sources to support your main idea.
Make sure you cite the three websites you use to take notes. You will find the same information on each cite, but reading the same information in different ways often helps us understand it better as well as shows us different styles of writing and more effective communication. You also want to make sure you are using information sites and not question sites-- no ask.com or ehow.com. Find credible sites whose purpose it is to teach about a specific subject.
Tinker v. Des Moines Independent School District
Hazelwood School District v. Kuhlmeier
Yeo v. Town of Lexington
Make sure you cite the three websites you use to take notes. You will find the same information on each cite, but reading the same information in different ways often helps us understand it better as well as shows us different styles of writing and more effective communication. You also want to make sure you are using information sites and not question sites-- no ask.com or ehow.com. Find credible sites whose purpose it is to teach about a specific subject.
Tinker v. Des Moines Independent School District
Hazelwood School District v. Kuhlmeier
Yeo v. Town of Lexington
Pulitzer Prize
Look up the organization that gives the Pulitzer Prize, and write a 200 word feature story about it. You will need to choose your angle for the story. Will it be the history of the award? Will it be about the man it's named after? Will it be about current award winners? Will it be about past award winners? Will it be about the various categories of the award? Follow the format of a feature story that we learned in class. This is feature writing practice.