News structure

Formula for a Well-Written News Article

1. First paragraph
   In your first one or two sentences tell who, what, when, where, and why. Try to hook the reader by beginning with a funny, clever, or surprising statement. Go for variety: try beginning your article with a question or a provocative statement.
2. Second/Third/Fourth paragraphs
   Give the reader the details. Include one or two quotes from people you interviewed. Write in the third person (he, she, it, they). Be objective — never state your opinion. Use quotes to express others’ opinions!
3. Last paragraph
   Wrap it up somehow ( don’t leave the reader hanging. Please don’t say….”In conclusion” or “To finish…” (yawn!) Try ending with a quote or a catchy phrase.
   Use active words (verbs that show what’s really happening.)
   Take notes when you interview. Write down quotes!
   Tell the really interesting info first!

These are tips for beginners on writing newspaper articles.
Writing the story
A story is much like a conversation. It begins with the most interesting piece of information or a summary of the highlights and works its way down to the least interesting facts. There are words or phrases that take you from one topic of conversation to another. Before you know it, you’re finished.

Inverted pyramid
You should be very familiar with the inverted pyramid style of writing. You’ll likely use it every day. For example, when you call a friend to tell him or her about a big date, you begin by telling the most interesting and important things first. The least important information is saved for the end of the conversation, and depending on how much time you have to talk, that information may not get into the conversation.
That concept also applies to news stories. The lead is the first paragraph of a news story. Usually, the lead is one sentence long and summarizes the facts of the news story in order of most newsworthy to least news-worthy. The reader should know at first glance what the story is about and what its emphasis is.
Here is an example:
Bargainers from General Motors and UAW Local 160 will resume talks in Warren this morning seeking to end a day-old strike over the transfer of jobs from unionized employees to less costly contract workers.
Who, What, Where, When, Why and How … The five Ws and an H
Depending on the elements of news value, the summary news lead emphasizes and includes some or all of the five Ws and H.
Who names the subject(s) of the story. The who, a noun, can refer to a person, a group, a building, an institution, a concept — anything about which a story can be written.
The who in the lead above are the bargainers from General Motors and the UAW.
The what is the action taking place. It is a verb that tells what the who is doing. Reporters should always use active voice and action verbs for the what because they make the wording direct and lively.
What are the bargainers doing? The lead says they will resume talks.
When tells the time the action is happening. It is an adverb or an adverb phrase.
When will the bargainers resume talks? This morning.
Where is the place the action is happening. Again, it is an adverb or adverb or adverb phrase. In our story, the where is Warren.

Why, another adverb, explains the action in the lead. The bargainers are meeting to discuss the transfer of jobs.
How usually describes the manner in which action occurs.
The lead
The lead sets the structure for the rest of the story. If the lead is good, the rest of the story comes together easily. Many reporters spend half their writing time on the lead alone. One guiding principle behind story organization is: The structure of the story can help the reader understand what you are writing about. The structure should lead the reader from idea to idea simply and clearly. The object is to give readers information, and wow them with convoluted style.
News lead
In one of their bloodiest raids into Lebanon in years, Israeli warplanes killed dozens of Muslim guerrillas with rockets and machine-gun fire Thursday as they pounded a training camp of the pro-Aranian party of God.
Quote lead
I have the worst job in the Army.'' This is an example of a good quote lead because the reader asks,What could that possibly be?”
Description lead
Penciled sketches of an air strike, complete with renderings of F14s and Patriot missiles. And on the ground, tiny people run for cover. That’s how 8-year-old Jimmy Zayas pictures war in the Middle East…
Like a beauty pageant entrant, Donald Hofeditz struts his vital statistics. He curls his thumb in his waistband to show he’s a size 36, down from 40. He pats his stomach where 50 pounds used to rest. And he rubs his chest about his now healthy cholesterol level of 177.
Hofeditz even relishes showing his before'' pictures. The pot-bellied 70-year-old in the early 1980s was unable to cut his backyard grass because of the cumbersome weight. Bad lead A reminder to those who enjoy good new records. The library has 22 new records which it is willing to loan out! The students are invited to come and look them over! In the first place, the opening sentence isn't even a sentence. There are times when sentence fragments are acceptable, if you use them effectively, but that first sentence isn't one of them. Is it news that the library is willing toloan out” materials? That’s what libraries are for. The word out'' is unnecessary. Andloan” is an adjective or noun, not a verb. Make it lend.'' A better way to express the thoughts in this lead would be: Twenty-two new records have been placed in the school's lending library, the head librarian announced. Transitions With one-sentence paragraphs consisting of only one idea -- block paragraphs -- it would be easy for a story to appear as a series of statements without any smooth flow from one idea to the next. Block paragraphing makes the use of effective transitions important. Transitions are words or phrases that link two ideas, making the movement from one to the other clear and easy. Obvious transitional phrases are: thus, therefore, on the other hand, next, then, and so on. Transitions in news stories are generally done by repeating a word or phrase or using a synonym for a key word in the preceding paragraph. Think of block graphs as islands tied together with transition bridges of repeated words or phrases. Direct quotes You should use direct quotes: · if a source's language is particularly colorful or picturesque · when it is important for written information -- especially official information -- to come from an obviously authoritative voice · to answer the questionswhy, how, who, or what?”
Use a direct quote after a summary statement that needs amplification, verification or example.
Remember, a direct quote repeats exactly what the interviewee said. If you don’t have a person’s exact words, you can paraphrase, but you cannot change the meaning of a person’s words. And when you paraphrase, you must never use quotation marks.
Putting it all together: News story
By RICHARD A. KNOX

Colleagues of polio vaccine pioneer Jonas Salk said Wednesday that they are ready to mount large-scale trials of his AIDS vaccine in thousands of people infected with the AIDS virus. The Salk group, which had been criticized for promoting the vaccine without sufficient documentation, this week published the first scientific report of its results. The group’s research showed that growth of the human immuno-deficiency virus slowed substantially in infected volunteers given three injections of the vaccine.
The report, in the Journal of Infectious Diseases, comes at a time when researchers are discouraged about efforts to make an effective AIDS vaccine — either to treat HIV-infected people, such as Salk’s subjects, or to prevent infection, such as classic vaccines against polio or smallpox.

Both approaches have their problems with this virus,'' said Dr. Thomas Merigan of Stanford University, a prominent AIDS researcher. The virus' ability to elude immune defensesis the most powerful tool this virus is using against us now.”

News Writing Fundamentals
https://writingcenter.gmu.edu/guides/news-writing-fundamentals#:~:text=News%20articles%20are%20written%20in,information%20goes%20at%20the%20end.
Reporting
One of the most fundamental differences between journalism and other forms of writing is the way journalists obtain the information they write about. Journalists obtain information through a variety of reporting techniques, which can include interviewing sources, looking through government documents, researching old articles, and observing events firsthand.
Good news writing begins with good, accurate reporting. Journalists perform a public service for citizens by presenting truthful facts in honest, straight-forward articles.
News Values
Journalists commonly use six values to determine how newsworthy a story or elements of a story are. Knowing the news values can help a journalist make many decisions, including:
What information to give first in a news article, and in the lede
Which articles to display on a newspaper’s front page
What questions to ask in an interview
The six news values are:
Timeliness- Recent events have a higher news value than less recent ones.
Proximity- Stories taking place in one’s hometown or community are more newsworthy than those taking place far away.
Prominence- Famous people and those in the public eye have a higher news value than ordinary citizens.
Uniqueness/oddity- A story with a bizarre twist or strange occurrences. “Man bites dog” instead of “dog bites man.”
Impact- Stories that impact a large number of people may be more newsworthy than those impacting a smaller number of people.
Conflict- “If it bleeds, it leads.” Stories with strife, whether it’s actual violence or not, are more interesting.
The newsworthiness of a story is determined by a balance of these six values. There is no set formula to decide how newsworthy a story is, but in general, the more of these six values a story meets, the more newsworthy it is.
Libel
Libel is defined as the published defamation of a person’s character based on misleading or inaccurate facts. Newspaper reporters can often run into issues of libel because it is their job to write truthful articles about people that might not always be flattering.
Even though we live in a country with a free press, journalists cannot write anything they want. Reporters do not have the right to state something about a person that could damage their reputation and that is untruthful.
One of the easiest ways to protect oneself from libel is to make sure to always do accurate reporting and to attribute all information in an article. If you write something about someone that you’re unsure about, just ask yourself if it’s true, and how you know it’s true. Rumors, gossip, and information you received from an anonymous or unreliable source are all dangerous to report, and they could run you the risk of a libel case.
Lede
The lede (or lead) of a news article is the first sentence, usually written as one paragraph, that tells the most important information of the story. When writing a lede, it is helpful to use the “tell a friend” strategy. Imagine you had to sum up to a friend, in one sentence, what your story is about. How would you sum up quickly what happened? A story’s lede answers the “Five W’s” in a specific order: Who? What? When? Where? Why?
For example:
The Atlanta Police Department will hold a memorial service Wednesday at Holy Christ Church in Buckhead for fallen officer Lt. James Montgomery.
WHO: The Atlanta Police Department
WHAT: will hold a memorial service
WHEN: Wednesday
WHERE: Holy Christ Church in Buckhead
WHY: for fallen officer Lt. James Montgomery
Other Examples:
Gwinnett County Public Schools was awarded $250,000 early Wednesday as a finalist for what’s considered the Nobel Prize of public education.
A man beat an Army reservist in front of a Morrow Cracker Barrel, yelling racial slurs at her as he kicked her in the head, Morrow police said.
Examples courtesy of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Inverted Pyramid
News articles are written in a structure known as the “inverted pyramid.” In the inverted pyramid format, the most newsworthy information goes at the beginning of the story and the least newsworthy information goes at the end.

After you have written your story’s lede, order the information that follows in terms of most important to least important. There is NO formal conclusion in a journalism article the way there is in an essay or analysis paper.
Attributing information
ALL information in a news article MUST be attributed to the source where the reporter got his/her information. The reporter must indicate in his/her article where material was obtained from – from an interview, court documents, the Census, a Web site, etc. Direct quotes and paraphrasing can be used to attribute information obtained in an interview with a source.
For example:
According to a police report, the suspect threatened the cashier with a gun before running away with the money.
In a 500-page government report, investigators reported evidence that the army had committed crimes against humanity.
Integrating quotes
The first time a source is introduced in an article, you should use that source’s full name and title. After this initial reference, use the last name only.
For example:
“The swine flu vaccine is an incredible advance in modern medicine,” said Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius.
When attributing a direct quote, always use the verb “said” and never any other verbs such as “explained,” “whispered,” etc. It is also more common to use the format “XXX said” instead of “said XXX.”
For example:
“The housing crisis is growing out of control,” Bernanke said.
Even when information from a source is not used in a direct quote and is paraphrased instead, it still must be attributed to that source.
For example:
Bernanke said the recession is probably over.
The recession will most likely begin to recede in six to eight months, Bernanke said.

Blogger-Akash Shinde😍 (Assistant Director)😍

Student of Journalism and Mass communication..