writing news speech

How to write broadcast news stories

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How to Write a News Story: Definition, Structure, Types of the News Story

• by Anastasiya Yakubovska
• 21.06.2022 12.05.2023
• How to write ...

The news story refers to the journalistic writing style that is used in the mass media: television, the Internet, newspapers, magazines, and radio.

Table of Contents

• What Is a News Story 

Features of the News Story

Main functions of news.

• The Inverted Pyramid Structure 
• News Story Structure 

According to the method of writing, news stories are:

• According to the scope, there are the following types of news:
• According to the sequence:

According to the source ofinformation news stories are:

• According to the content:
• Minor forms of news stories:

What Is a News Story

News stories are widely used by the media to inform the audience about current, significant, and interesting events.

A news story is a journalistic presentation of a new event or fact.

Most often this is a short message. 

The news function is to answer the questions: what, where, and when happened.

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The features of the news stories are:

• reliability of information;
• minimal details;
• news stories must be clear and easy to read;
• attractive to all classes;
• widely known terms ( exchange, broker, exchange rate, transaction, market );
• the use of words and figures of speech that are typical for business writing style ( have activities, during the reporting period, take into consideration );
• noun predominance;
• sentences are usually complex. 

Example of News Story

News story “March For Our Lives: Tens of thousands rally for stricter US gun laws” (excerpt) :

Thousands of protesters are gathering across the US to call for stricter gun laws in the wake of last month’s mass shooting in Texas . Gun safety group March For Our Lives – founded by survivors of the 2018 Parkland school shooting – said some 450 rallies were planned for Saturday. It said it would not let politicians “sit back” as people continue to die. US President Joe Biden backed the protests, calling on Congress to “pass common sense gun safety legislation”. Nineteen children and two adults were killed in the 24 May shooting at Robb Elementary in Uvalde, Texas. That attack, and another days earlier in Buffalo, New York, in which 10 people were killed, has led to renewed calls for action on gun control in the US. bbc.com

The major function of the news stories , just like other texts related to journalism, is to provide information about some socially significant event. In addition, the news may contain assumptions, hypotheses, forecasts, recommendations, and regulatory and evaluation information.

The purpose of a news story is not only a detailed analysis of an event. The most important thing is to inform the mass addressee about an event that has happened or will only happen in the future. 

If the news needs to be covered in more detail, then the journalist can indicate the sources of information, add quotes and provide statistics.

How to Write A New Story: The Structure and Method of Writing

The inverted pyramid structure.

To write a news story, journalists use the traditional structure that is typical for the journalistic writing style: information is presented in descending order, that is, its value and importance decrease from the beginning of the text to its end. This way of writing news is called the inverted pyramid .

A news story written using the inverted pyramid structure consists of 4 parts:

• Headline . The headlines of new stories in the media are most often quite informative – within 10 words. The heading itself usually illustrates the main idea of the news. 

For example:

“ Global markets fall after rough week on Wall Street; yen hits two-decade-low” 

2. Lead . The lead is the first or leading paragraph of the news story, the chapeau or abstract of the article, which outlines the main idea of the text, only the most valuable information.

“ Hong Kong/London (CNN Business)Global markets and US stock futures fell early Monday, indicating a downbeat start to the trading week after a broad sell-off on Wall Street following surprisingly strong US inflation data.”

3. The body of the text . It is a description of the event, details, evidence, photographs, quotes, etc.:

“ The Dow (INDU) plunged 880 points, or 2.5%, on Friday. The S&P 500 (SPX) shed 2.7% and the Nasdaq (NDX) dropped about 3%. The US consumer price index rose by 8.6% in May, raising fears that the Federal Reserve will have to act even more aggressively to try to tame price rises. The shockwaves were felt most acutely in Asia on Monday. Japan’s Nikkei (N225) closed down 3%, and the yen weakened to the lowest level in more than 20 years. The Japanese currency has declined rapidly in recent months because of a strong greenback and ultra-loose Japanese monetary policy. The Japanese central bank and government warned in a rare joint statement on Friday that they are concerned about the sharp falls, suggesting a potential intervention by Tokyo to stem the decline. The yen wasn’t the only Asian currency seeing a steep fall. The Indian rupee fell to an all-time low of 78.2 against the US dollar in early trade. Elsewhere in Asia, Hong Kong’s Hang Seng (HSI) fell 3.4% on Monday. Korea’s Kospi fell 3.5%. China’s Shanghai Composite (SHCOMP) was down 0.9%. In Europe, France’s CAC 40 (CAC40) dropped 2.47% in early trade, while Germany’s DAX 30 (DAX) was down 2.3%. The FTSE 100 (UKX) slipped 1.8%, while the pound slipped to $1.22 after new data showed the UK economy contracting for a second consecutive month in April. In the US, Dow futures were down 1.9% at 5.20 am ET. S&P 500 futures were down around 2.3%, while Nasdaq futures were down about 2.9%.

4. Ending . The final part of the news story is additional information, similar, interesting materials, and journalistic assessment. This part is optional. 

“The hangover from Friday’s US CPI data isn’t helped by concern about China walking back some of its economic reopening, or more dire economic data in the UK,” Societe Generale strategist Kit Juckes said in a research note. A number of neighborhoods in Shanghai faced another temporary lockdown at the weekend, as authorities launched mass testing just days after Covid restrictions were eased for most of its 25 million residents. Authorities in Beijing’s largest Chaoyang district announced Thursday the closure of all entertainment venues, just days after allowing their reopening. https://edition.cnn.com/2022/06/12/investing/global-stocks/index.html

News Story Structure

Usually, the journalist tells the reader:

• About the event – what happened?
• About time – when?
• About the place – where?
• About participants – who?
• About the circumstances – how?
• About the source of information – how is it known?
• About the predicted development of the event – what happens next?

Which of these questions the journalist will answer in the text of the news story and the number of these questions will depend on the amount of information that he has and on the purpose of the news. These questions can be arranged in the most varied order, at the author’s discretion.

Another thing to keep in mind regarding whether the new event needs to be related to others that have already happened before and are widely known to the audience. In this case, the structure of the news story will be more complex, because it is necessary not only to talk about the event but also to connect this fact with the information already available.

How to Write a News Story: Types of News

Before you start writing, you need to decide in which genre you need to write, and what type of news story is suitable specifically for this news event.

So that you can quickly navigate and make the right choice, further in the article we will consider the types of news stories. 

There are two general types of news stories according to structure :

• Informative or straight news. The aim is to give the facts of the news. 
• Feature or human interest news story. The aim is to take material of little or no news value and make it interesting for the audience. 
• Descriptive.
• Expository.
• Combination of these types. 

According to the scope , there are the following types of news:

• Local: news story takes place within the immediate locality. 
• National: news takes place within a country. 
• Foreign: the event takes place out of the country. 
• Dateline: news preceded by date and place of origin or the place when it was written. 

According to the sequence :

• Anticipated news or announcement. An announcement is a message about upcoming events (for example, about the construction of new buildings).

Such news stories attract the public to visit various cultural events.

The main purpose of the announcement is to give brief but objective information about the time and aspects of the planned event, about its most important prerequisites and stages.

• Spot news. News that gathered and reported on the spot. The journalist is the eyewitness to the event. Such type of news is reported immediately. 
• Coverage news. News has been written from the given beat. 
• Follow-up news. A sequel to the previous news story.
• Interview story. 
• Speech story. 
• Quote story. Information is presented primarily through quotes. These news stories are based almost entirely on an interview or a speech. 
• Fact story. 
• Action story. A description of an event that involved a lot of motion. For example, war reports, competitions, and sports games reports. 

According to the content :

• Science news. 
• Police reports. 
• Developmental news. 
• Sports stories. 
• Routine stories: celebrations, graduations, election stories reported year in and year out. 

Minor forms of news stories :

• News brief. It is a short news broadcast. News briefs are a good way to describe events that do not need in-depth treatment. 
• News bulletin. It aims to give the gist of the news. 
• Flash news. Flash news is a bulletin that conveys the first word of the event. 
• News-featurette. It is a short news feature usually used as filler. 

Used sources of information:

• Types of News Writing. Willard Grosvenor Bleyer.
• Campus Journalism and School Paper Advising Fourth Edition 1997. Ceciliano J. Cruz.
• Style Palette. Textbook on Russian language style for foreigners. Authors: Nina Afanasyeva, Tatyana Popova .
• Literary editing strategies. Authors: Zueva T. A., Ivanova E. N.
• Russian language and speech culture. Authors: Tatyana Balykhina, Mikhail Rybakov, Marina Lysyakova.
• Image: freepik.com

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Expert Commentary

Basic newswriting: Learn how to originate, research and write breaking-news stories

Syllabus for semester-long course on the fundamentals of covering and writing the news, including how identify a story, gather information efficiently and place it in a meaningful context.

Republish this article

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by The Journalist's Resource, The Journalist's Resource January 22, 2010

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This course introduces tomorrow’s journalists to the fundamentals of covering and writing news. Mastering these skills is no simple task. In an Internet age of instantaneous access, demand for high-quality accounts of fast-breaking news has never been greater. Nor has the temptation to cut corners and deliver something less.

To resist this temptation, reporters must acquire skills to identify a story and its essential elements, gather information efficiently, place it in a meaningful context, and write concise and compelling accounts, sometimes at breathtaking speed. The readings, discussions, exercises and assignments of this course are designed to help students acquire such skills and understand how to exercise them wisely.

Photo: Memorial to four slain Lakewood, Wash., police officers. The Seattle Times earned the 2010 Pulitzer Prize for Breaking News Reporting for their coverage of the crime.

Course objective

To give students the background and skills needed to originate, research, focus and craft clear, compelling and contextual accounts of breaking news in a deadline environment.

Learning objectives

• Build an understanding of the role news plays in American democracy.
• Discuss basic journalistic principles such as accuracy, integrity and fairness.
• Evaluate how practices such as rooting and stereotyping can undermine them.
• Analyze what kinds of information make news and why.
• Evaluate the elements of news by deconstructing award-winning stories.
• Evaluate the sources and resources from which news content is drawn.
• Analyze how information is attributed, quoted and paraphrased in news.
• Gain competence in focusing a story’s dominant theme in a single sentence.
• Introduce the structure, style and language of basic news writing.
• Gain competence in building basic news stories, from lead through their close.
• Gain confidence and competence in writing under deadline pressure.
• Practice how to identify, background and contact appropriate sources.
• Discuss and apply the skills needed to interview effectively.
• Analyze data and how it is used and abused in news coverage.
• Review basic math skills needed to evaluate and use statistics in news.
• Report and write basic stories about news events on deadline.

Suggested reading

• A standard textbook of the instructor’s choosing.
• America ‘s Best Newspaper Writing , Roy Peter Clark and Christopher Scanlan, Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2006
• The Elements of Journalism , Bill Kovach and Tom Rosenstiel, Three Rivers Press, 2001.
• Talk Straight, Listen Carefully: The Art of Interviewing , M.L. Stein and Susan E. Paterno, Iowa State University Press, 2001
• Math Tools for Journalists , Kathleen Woodruff Wickham, Marion Street Press, Inc., 2002
• On Writing Well: 30th Anniversary Edition , William Zinsser, Collins, 2006
• Associated Press Stylebook 2009 , Associated Press, Basic Books, 2009

Weekly schedule and exercises (13-week course)

We encourage faculty to assign students to read on their own Kovach and Rosentiel’s The Elements of Journalism in its entirety during the early phase of the course. Only a few chapters of their book are explicitly assigned for the class sessions listed below.

The assumption for this syllabus is that the class meets twice weekly.

Week 1 | Week 2 | Week 3 | Week 4 | Week 5 | Week 6 | Week 7 Week 8 | Week 9 | Week 10 | Week 11 | Week 12 | Weeks 13/14

Week 1: Why journalism matters

Previous week | Next week | Back to top

Class 1: The role of journalism in society

The word journalism elicits considerable confusion in contemporary American society. Citizens often confuse the role of reporting with that of advocacy. They mistake those who promote opinions or push their personal agendas on cable news or in the blogosphere for those who report. But reporters play a different role: that of gatherer of evidence, unbiased and unvarnished, placed in a context of past events that gives current events weight beyond the ways opinion leaders or propagandists might misinterpret or exploit them.

This session’s discussion will focus on the traditional role of journalism eloquently summarized by Bill Kovach and Tom Rosenstiel in The Elements of Journalism . The class will then examine whether they believe that the journalist’s role has changed or needs to change in today’s news environment. What is the reporter’s role in contemporary society? Is objectivity, sometimes called fairness, an antiquated concept or an essential one, as the authors argue, for maintaining a democratic society? How has the term been subverted? What are the reporter’s fundamental responsibilities? This discussion will touch on such fundamental issues as journalists’ obligation to the truth, their loyalty to the citizens who are their audience and the demands of their discipline to verify information, act independently, provide a forum for public discourse and seek not only competing viewpoints but carefully vetted facts that help establish which viewpoints are grounded in evidence.

Reading: Kovach and Rosenstiel, Chapter 1, and relevant pages of the course text

Assignments:

• Students should compare the news reporting on a breaking political story in The Wall Street Journal , considered editorially conservative, and The New York Times , considered editorially liberal. They should write a two-page memo that considers the following questions: Do the stories emphasize the same information? Does either story appear to slant the news toward a particular perspective? How? Do the stories support the notion of fact-based journalism and unbiased reporting or do they appear to infuse opinion into news? Students should provide specific examples that support their conclusions.
• Students should look for an example of reporting in any medium in which reporters appear have compromised the notion of fairness to intentionally or inadvertently espouse a point of view. What impact did the incorporation of such material have on the story? Did its inclusion have any effect on the reader’s perception of the story?

Class 2: Objectivity, fairness and contemporary confusion about both

In his book Discovering the News , Michael Schudson traced the roots of objectivity to the era following World War I and a desire by journalists to guard against the rapid growth of public relations practitioners intent on spinning the news. Objectivity was, and remains, an ideal, a method for guarding against spin and personal bias by examining all sides of a story and testing claims through a process of evidentiary verification. Practiced well, it attempts to find where something approaching truth lies in a sea of conflicting views. Today, objectivity often is mistaken for tit-for-tat journalism, in which the reporters only responsibility is to give equal weight to the conflicting views of different parties without regard for which, if any, are saying something approximating truth. This definition cedes the journalist’s responsibility to seek and verify evidence that informs the citizenry.

Focusing on the “Journalism of Verification” chapter in The Elements of Journalism , this class will review the evolution and transformation of concepts of objectivity and fairness and, using the homework assignment, consider how objectivity is being practiced and sometimes skewed in the contemporary new media.

Reading: Kovach and Rosenstiel, Chapter 4, and relevant pages of the course text.

Assignment: Students should evaluate stories on the front page and metro front of their daily newspaper. In a two-page memo, they should describe what elements of news judgment made the stories worthy of significant coverage and play. Finally, they should analyze whether, based on what else is in the paper, they believe the editors reached the right decision.

Week 2: Where news comes from

Class 1: News judgment

When editors sit down together to choose the top stories, they use experience and intuition. The beginner journalist, however, can acquire a sense of news judgment by evaluating news decisions through the filter of a variety of factors that influence news play. These factors range from traditional measures such as when the story took place and how close it was to the local readership area to more contemporary ones, such as the story’s educational value.

Using the assignment and the reading, students should evaluate what kinds of information make for interesting news stories and why.

In this session, instructors might consider discussing the layers of news from the simplest breaking news event to the purely enterprise investigative story.

Assignment: Students should read and deconstruct coverage of a major news event. One excellent source for quality examples is the site of the Pulitzer Prizes , which has a category for breaking news reporting. All students should read the same article (assigned by the instructor), and write a two- or three-page memo that describes how the story is organized, what information it contains and what sources of information it uses, both human and digital. Among the questions they should ask are:

• Does the first (or lead) paragraph summarize the dominant point?
• What specific information does the lead include?
• What does it leave out?
• How do the second and third paragraphs relate to the first paragraph and the information it contains? Do they give unrelated information, information that provides further details about what’s established in the lead paragraph or both?
• Does the story at any time place the news into a broader context of similar events or past events? If so, when and how?
• What information in the story is attributed , specifically tied to an individual or to documentary information from which it was taken? What information is not attributed? Where does the information appear in the sentence? Give examples of some of the ways the sources of information are identified? Give examples of the verbs of attribution that are chosen.
• Where and how often in the story are people quoted, their exact words placed in quotation marks? What kind of information tends to be quoted — basic facts or more colorful commentary? What information that’s attributed is paraphrased , summing up what someone said but not in their exact words.
• How is the story organized — by theme, by geography, by chronology (time) or by some other means?
• What human sources are used in the story? Are some authorities? Are some experts? Are some ordinary people affected by the event? Who are some of the people in each category? What do they contribute to the story? Does the reporter (or reporters) rely on a single source or a wide range? Why do you think that’s the case?
• What specific facts and details make the story more vivid to you? How do you think the reporter was able to gather those details?
• What documents (paper or digital) are detailed in the story? Do they lend authority to the story? Why or why not?
• Is any specific data (numbers, statistics) used in the story? What does it lend to the story? Would you be satisfied substituting words such as “many” or “few” for the specific numbers and statistics used? Why or why not?

Class 2: Deconstructing the story

By carefully deconstructing major news stories, students will begin to internalize some of the major principles of this course, from crafting and supporting the lead of a story to spreading a wide and authoritative net for information. This class will focus on the lessons of a Pulitzer Prize winner.

Reading: Clark/Scanlan, Pages 287-294

Assignment: Writers typically draft a focus statement after conceiving an idea and conducting preliminary research or reporting. This focus statement helps to set the direction of reporting and writing. Sometimes reporting dictates a change of direction. But the statement itself keeps the reporter from getting off course. Focus statements typically are 50 words or less and summarize the story’s central point. They work best when driven by a strong, active verb and written after preliminary reporting.

• Students should write a focus statement that encapsulates the news of the Pulitzer Prize winning reporting the class critiqued.

Week 3: Finding the focus, building the lead

Class 1: News writing as a process

Student reporters often conceive of writing as something that begins only after all their reporting is finished. Such an approach often leaves gaps in information and leads the reporter to search broadly instead of with targeted depth. The best reporters begin thinking about story the minute they get an assignment. The approach they envision for telling the story informs their choice of whom they seek interviews with and what information they gather. This class will introduce students to writing as a process that begins with story concept and continues through initial research, focus, reporting, organizing and outlining, drafting and revising.

During this session, the class will review the focus statements written for homework in small breakout groups and then as a class. Professors are encouraged to draft and hand out a mock or real press release or hold a mock press conference from which students can draft a focus statement.

Reading: Zinsser, pages 1-45, Clark/Scanlan, pages 294-302, and relevant pages of the course text

Class 2: The language of news

Newswriting has its own sentence structure and syntax. Most sentences branch rightward, following a pattern of subject/active verb/object. Reporters choose simple, familiar words. They write spare, concise sentences. They try to make a single point in each. But journalistic writing is specific and concrete. While reporters generally avoid formal or fancy word choices and complex sentence structures, they do not write in generalities. They convey information. Each sentence builds on what came before. This class will center on the language of news, evaluating the language in selections from America’s Best Newspaper Writing , local newspapers or the Pulitzers.

Reading: Relevant pages of the course text

Assignment: Students should choose a traditional news lead they like and one they do not like from a local or national newspaper. In a one- or two-page memo, they should print the leads, summarize the stories and evaluate why they believe the leads were effective or not.

Week 4: Crafting the first sentence

Class 1: The lead

No sentence counts more than a story’s first sentence. In most direct news stories, it stands alone as the story’s lead. It must summarize the news, establish the storyline, convey specific information and do all this simply and succinctly. Readers confused or bored by the lead read no further. It takes practice to craft clear, concise and conversational leads. This week will be devoted to that practice.

Students should discuss the assigned leads in groups of three or four, with each group choosing one lead to read to the entire class. The class should then discuss the elements of effective leads (active voice; active verb; single, dominant theme; simple sentences) and write leads in practice exercises.

Assignment: Have students revise the leads they wrote in class and craft a second lead from fact patterns.

Class 2: The lead continued

Some leads snap or entice instead of summarize. When the news is neither urgent nor earnest, these can work well. Though this class will introduce students to other kinds of leads, instructors should continue to emphasize traditional leads, typically found atop breaking news stories.

Class time should largely be devoted to writing traditional news leads under a 15-minute deadline pressure. Students should then be encouraged to read their own leads aloud and critique classmates’ leads. At least one such exercise might focus on students writing a traditional lead and a less traditional lead from the same information.

Assignment: Students should find a political or international story that includes various types (direct and indirect) and levels (on-the-record, not for attribution and deep background) of attribution. They should write a one- or two-page memo describing and evaluating the attribution. Did the reporter make clear the affiliation of those who expressed opinions? Is information attributed to specific people by name? Are anonymous figures given the opportunity to criticize others by name? Is that fair?

Week 5: Establishing the credibility of news

Class 1: Attribution

All news is based on information, painstakingly gathered, verified and checked again. Even so, “truth” is an elusive concept. What reporters cobble together instead are facts and assertions drawn from interviews and documentary evidence.

To lend authority to this information and tell readers from where it comes, reporters attribute all information that is not established fact. It is neither necessary, for example, to attribute that Franklin Delano Roosevelt was first elected president in 1932 nor that he was elected four times. On the other hand, it would be necessary to attribute, at least indirectly, the claim that he was one of America’s best presidents. Why? Because that assertion is a matter of opinion.

In this session, students should learn about different levels of attribution, where attribution is best placed in a sentence, and why it can be crucial for the protection of the accused, the credibility of reporters and the authoritativeness of the story.

Assignment: Working from a fact pattern, students should write a lead that demands attribution.

Class 2: Quoting and paraphrasing

“Great quote,” ranks closely behind “great lead” in the pecking order of journalistic praise. Reporters listen for great quotes as intensely as piano tuners listen for the perfect pitch of middle C. But what makes a great quote? And when should reporters paraphrase instead?

This class should cover a range of issues surrounding the quoted word from what it is used to convey (color and emotion, not basic information) to how frequently quotes should be used and how long they should run on. Other issues include the use and abuse of partial quotes, when a quote is not a quote, and how to deal with rambling and ungrammatical subjects.

As an exercise, students might either interview the instructor or a classmate about an exciting personal experience. After their interviews, they should review their notes choose what they consider the three best quotes to include a story on the subject. They should then discuss why they chose them.

Assignment: After completing the reading, students should analyze a summary news story no more than 15 paragraphs long. In a two- or three-page memo, they should reprint the story and then evaluate whether the lead summarizes the news, whether the subsequent paragraphs elaborate on or “support” the lead, whether the story has a lead quote, whether it attributes effectively, whether it provides any context for the news and whether and how it incorporates secondary themes.

Week 6: The building blocks of basic stories

Class 1: Supporting the lead

Unlike stories told around a campfire or dinner table, news stories front load information. Such a structure delivers the most important information first and the least important last. If a news lead summarizes, the subsequent few paragraphs support or elaborate by providing details the lead may have merely suggested. So, for example, a story might lead with news that a 27-year-old unemployed chef has been arrested on charges of robbing the desk clerk of an upscale hotel near closing time. The second paragraph would “support” this lead with detail. It would name the arrested chef, identify the hotel and its address, elaborate on the charges and, perhaps, say exactly when the robbery took place and how. (It would not immediately name the desk clerk; too many specifics at once clutter the story.)

Wire service stories use a standard structure in building their stories. First comes the lead sentence. Then comes a sentence or two of lead support. Then comes a lead quote — spoken words that reinforce the story’s direction, emphasize the main theme and add color. During this class students should practice writing the lead through the lead quote on deadline. They should then read assignments aloud for critique by classmates and the professor.

Assignment: Using a fact pattern assigned by the instructor or taken from a text, students should write a story from the lead through the lead quote. They should determine whether the story needs context to support the lead and, if so, include it.

Class 2: When context matters

Sometimes a story’s importance rests on what came before. If one fancy restaurant closes its doors in the face of the faltering economy, it may warrant a few paragraphs mention. If it’s the fourth restaurant to close on the same block in the last two weeks, that’s likely front-page news. If two other restaurants closed last year, that might be worth noting in the story’s last sentence. It is far less important. Patterns provide context and, when significant, generally are mentioned either as part of the lead or in the support paragraph that immediately follows. This class will look at the difference between context — information needed near the top of a story to establish its significance as part of a broader pattern, and background — information that gives historical perspective but doesn’t define the news at hand.

Assignment: The course to this point has focused on writing the news. But reporters, of course, usually can’t write until they’ve reported. This typically starts with background research to establish what has come before, what hasn’t been covered well and who speaks with authority on an issue. Using databases such as Lexis/Nexis, students should background or read specific articles about an issue in science or policy that either is highlighted in the Policy Areas section of Journalist’s Resource website or is currently being researched on your campus. They should engage in this assignment knowing that a new development on the topic will be brought to light when they arrive at the next class.

Week 7: The reporter at work

Class 1: Research

Discuss the homework assignment. Where do reporters look to background an issue? How do they find documents, sources and resources that enable them to gather good information or identify key people who can help provide it? After the discussion, students should be given a study from the Policy Areas section of Journalist’s Resource website related to the subject they’ve been asked to explore.

The instructor should use this study to evaluate the nature structure of government/scientific reports. After giving students 15 minutes to scan the report, ask students to identify its most newsworthy point. Discuss what context might be needed to write a story about the study or report. Discuss what concepts or language students are having difficulty understanding.

Reading: Clark, Scanlan, pages 305-313, and relevant pages of the course text

Assignment: Students should (a) write a lead for a story based exclusively on the report (b) do additional background work related to the study in preparation for writing a full story on deadline. (c) translate at least one term used in the study that is not familiar to a lay audience.

Class 2: Writing the basic story on deadline

This class should begin with a discussion of the challenges of translating jargon and the importance of such translation in news reporting. Reporters translate by substituting a simple definition or, generally with the help of experts, comparing the unfamiliar to the familiar through use of analogy.

The remainder of the class should be devoted to writing a 15- to 20-line news report, based on the study, background research and, if one is available, a press release.

Reading: Pages 1-47 of Stein/Paterno, and relevant pages of the course text

Assignment: Prepare a list of questions that you would ask either the lead author of the study you wrote about on deadline or an expert who might offer an outside perspective.

Week 8: Effective interviewing

Class 1: Preparing and getting the interview

Successful interviews build from strong preparation. Reporters need to identify the right interview subjects, know what they’ve said before, interview them in a setting that makes them comfortable and ask questions that elicit interesting answers. Each step requires thought.

The professor should begin this class by critiquing some of the questions students drew up for homework. Are they open-ended or close-ended? Do they push beyond the obvious? Do they seek specific examples that explain the importance of the research or its applications? Do they probe the study’s potential weaknesses? Do they explore what directions the researcher might take next?

Discuss the readings and what steps reporters can take to background for an interview, track down a subject and prepare and rehearse questions in advance.

Reading: Stein/Paterno, pages 47-146, and relevant pages of the course text

Assignment: Students should prepare to interview their professor about his or her approach to and philosophy of teaching. Before crafting their questions, the students should background the instructor’s syllabi, public course evaluations and any pertinent writings.

Class 2: The interview and its aftermath

The interview, says Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Jacqui Banaszynski, is a dance which the reporter leads but does so to music the interview subject chooses. Though reporters prepare and rehearse their interviews, they should never read the questions they’ve considered in advance and always be prepared to change directions. To hear the subject’s music, reporters must be more focused on the answers than their next question. Good listeners make good interviewers — good listeners, that is, who don’t forget that it is also their responsibility to also lead.

Divide the class. As a team, five students should interview the professor about his/her approach to teaching. Each of these five should build on the focus and question of the previous questioner. The rest of the class should critique the questions, their clarity and their focus. Are the questioners listening? Are they maintaining control? Are they following up? The class also should discuss the reading, paying particularly close attention to the dynamics of an interview, the pace of questions, the nature of questions, its close and the reporter’s responsibility once an interview ends.

Assignment: Students should be assigned to small groups and asked to critique the news stories classmates wrote on deadline during the previous class.

Week 9: Building the story

Class 1: Critiquing the story

The instructor should separate students into groups of two or three and tell them to read their news stories to one another aloud. After each reading, the listeners should discuss what they liked and struggled with as the story audience. The reader in each case should reflect on what he or she learned from the process of reading the story aloud.

The instructor then should distribute one or two of the class stories that provide good and bad examples of story structure, information selection, content, organization and writing. These should be critiqued as a class.

Assignment: Students, working in teams, should develop an angle for a news follow to the study or report they covered on deadline. Each team should write a focus statement for the story it is proposing.

Class 2: Following the news

The instructor should lead a discussion about how reporters “enterprise,” or find original angles or approaches, by looking to the corners of news, identifying patterns of news, establishing who is affected by news, investigating the “why” of news, and examining what comes next.

Students should be asked to discuss the ideas they’ve developed to follow the news story. These can be assigned as longer-term team final projects for the semester. As part of this discussion, the instructor can help students map their next steps.

Reading: Wickham, Chapters 1-4 and 7, and relevant pages of the course text

Assignment: Students should find a news report that uses data to support or develop its main point. They should consider what and how much data is used, whether it is clear, whether it’s cluttered and whether it answers their questions. They should bring the article and a brief memo analyzing it to class.

Week 10: Making sense of data and statistics

Class 1: Basic math and the journalist’s job

Many reporters don’t like math. But in their jobs, it is everywhere. Reporters must interpret political polls, calculate percentage change in everything from property taxes to real estate values, make sense of municipal bids and municipal budgets, and divine data in government reports.

First discuss some of the examples of good and bad use of data that students found in their homework. Then, using examples from Journalist’s Resource website, discuss good and poor use of data in news reporting. (Reporters, for example, should not overwhelm readers with paragraphs stuffed with statistics.) Finally lead students through some of the basic skills sets outlined in Wickham’s book, using her exercises to practice everything from calculating percentage change to interpreting polls.

Assignment: Give students a report or study linked to the Journalist’s Resource website that requires some degree of statistical evaluation or interpretation. Have students read the report and compile a list of questions they would ask to help them understand and interpret this data.

Class 2: The use and abuse of statistics

Discuss the students’ questions. Then evaluate one or more articles drawn from the report they’ve analyzed that attempt to make sense of the data in the study. Discuss what these articles do well and what they do poorly.

Reading: Zinsser, Chapter 13, “Macabre Reminder: The Corpse on Union Street,” Dan Barry, The New York Times

Week 11: The reporter as observer

Class 1: Using the senses

Veteran reporters covering an event don’t only return with facts, quotes and documents that support them. They fill their notebooks with details that capture what they’ve witnessed. They use all their senses, listening for telling snippets of conversation and dialogue, watching for images, details and actions that help bring readers to the scene. Details that develop character and place breathe vitality into news. But description for description’s sake merely clutters and obscures the news. Using the senses takes practice.

The class should deconstruct “Macabre Reminder: The Corpse on Union Street,” a remarkable journey around New Orleans a few days after Hurricane Katrina devastated the city in 2005. The story starts with one corpse, left to rot on a once-busy street and then pans the city as a camera might. The dead body serves as a metaphor for the rotting city, largely abandoned and without order.

Assignment: This is an exercise in observation. Students may not ask questions. Their task is to observe, listen and describe a short scene, a serendipitous vignette of day-to-day life. They should take up a perch in a lively location of their choosing — a student dining hall or gym, a street corner, a pool hall or bus stop or beauty salon, to name a few — wait and watch. When a small scene unfolds, one with beginning, middle and end, students should record it. They then should write a brief story describing the scene that unfolded, taking care to leave themselves and their opinions out of the story. This is pure observation, designed to build the tools of observation and description. These stories should be no longer than 200 words.

Class 2: Sharpening the story

Students should read their observation pieces aloud to a classmate. Both students should consider these questions: Do the words describe or characterize? Which words show and which words tell? What words are extraneous? Does the piece convey character through action? Does it have a clear beginning, middle and end? Students then should revise, shortening the original scene to no longer than 150 words. After the revision, the instructor should critique some of the students’ efforts.

Assignment: Using campus, governmental or media calendars, students should identify, background and prepare to cover a speech, press conference or other news event, preferably on a topic related to one of the research-based areas covered in the Policy Areas section of Journalist’s Resource website. Students should write a focus statement (50 words or less) for their story and draw up a list of some of the questions they intend to ask.

Week 12: Reporting on deadline

Class 1: Coaching the story

Meetings, press conferences and speeches serve as a staple for much news reporting. Reporters should arrive at such events knowledgeable about the key players, their past positions or research, and the issues these sources are likely discuss. Reporters can discover this information in various ways. They can research topic and speaker online and in journalistic databases, peruse past correspondence sent to public offices, and review the writings and statements of key speakers with the help of their assistants or secretaries.

In this class, the instructor should discuss the nature of event coverage, review students’ focus statements and questions, and offer suggestions about how they cover the events.

Assignment: Cover the event proposed in the class above and draft a 600-word story, double-spaced, based on its news and any context needed to understand it.

Class 2: Critiquing and revising the story

Students should exchange story drafts and suggest changes. After students revise, the instructor should lead a discussion about the challenges of reporting and writing live on deadline. These likely will include issues of access and understanding and challenges of writing around and through gaps of information.

Weeks 13/14: Coaching the final project

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The final week or two of the class is reserved for drill in areas needing further development and for coaching students through the final reporting, drafting and revision of the enterprise stories off the study or report they covered in class.

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How to Write a News Story

Newspaper article outline, how to write a news story in 15 steps.

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The Purdue Owl : Journalism and Journalistic Writing: Introduction

From Scholastic: Writing a newspaper article

Article outline

I. Lead sentence

Grab and hook your reader right away.

II. Introduction

Which facts and figures will ground your story? You have to tell your readers where and when this story is happening.

III. Opening quotation 

What will give the reader a sense of the people involved and what they are thinking?

IV. Main body

What is at the heart of your story?

V. Closing quotation

Find something that sums the article up in a few words.

VI. Conclusion  (optional—the closing quote may do the job)

The following is an excerpt from The Elements of News Writing by James W. Kershner (Pearson, 2009).  This book is available for checkout at Buley Library (Call number PN 4775 .K37 2009, on the 3rd floor)

1.       Select a newsworthy story. Your goal is to give a timely account of a recent, interesting, and significant event or development.

2.       Think about your goals and objectives in writing the story. What will the readers want and need to know about the subject? How can you best tell the story?

3.       Find out who can provide the most accurate information about the subject and how to contact that person. Find out what other sources you can use to obtain relevant information.

4.       Do your homework. Do research so that you have a basic understanding of the situation before interviewing anyone about it. Check clips of stories already written on the subject.

5.       Prepare a list of questions to ask about the story.

6.       Arrange to get the needed information. This may mean scheduling an interview or locating the appropriate people to interview.

7.       Interview the source and take notes. Ask your prepared questions, plus other questions that come up in the course of the conversation. Ask the source to suggest other sources. Ask if you may call the source back for further questions later.

8.       Interview second and third sources, ask follow-up questions, and do further research until you have a understanding of the story.

9.       Ask yourself, “What’s the story?” and “What’s the point?” Be sure you have a clear focus in your mind before you start writing. Rough out a lead in your head.

10.   Make a written outline or plan of your story.

11.   Write your first draft following your plan, but changing it as necessary.

12.   Read through your first draft looking for content problems, holes, or weak spots, and revise it as necessary. Delete extra words, sentences, and paragraphs. Make every word count.

13.   Read your second draft aloud, listening for problems in logic or syntax.

14.   Copyedit your story, checking carefully for spelling, punctuation, grammar, and style problems.

15.   Deliver your finished story to the editor before deadline.

Kershner, J.W. (2009). The Elements of News Writing. Boston, MA: Pearson Education.

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• Last Updated: Feb 28, 2024 3:16 PM
• URL: https://libguides.southernct.edu/journalism

The Best Way for a Reporter to Cover a Speech

Watch for the Unexpected

Stephanie Klein-Davis  / Getty Images

• Writing Essays
• Writing Research Papers
• English Grammar
• M.S., Journalism, Columbia University
• B.A., Journalism, University of Wisconsin-Madison

Covering speeches, lectures and forums – any live event that basically involves people talking - might seem easy at first. After all, you just have to stand there and take down what the person says, right?

In fact, covering speeches can be tricky for the beginner. Indeed, there are two big mistakes novice reporters make when covering a speech or lecture for the first time.

• They don't get enough direct quotes (in fact, I've seen speech stories with no direct quotes at all.)
• They cover the speech chronologically , writing it out in the order it occurred like a stenographer would. That's the worst thing you can do when covering a speaking event.

So here are some tips on how to cover a speech the right way, the very first time you do it. Follow these, and you'll avoid a tongue-lashing from an angry editor.

Report Before You Go

Get as much information as you can before the speech. This initial reporting should answer such questions as: What’s the topic of the speech? What’s the background of the speaker? What’s the setting or reason for the speech? Who’s likely to be in the audience?

Write Background Copy Ahead of Time

Having done your pre-speech reporting, you can bang out some background copy for your story even before the speech begins. This is especially helpful if you’ll be writing on a tight deadline . Background material, which typically goes at the bottom of your story, includes the kind of information you gathered in your initial reporting – the background of the speaker, the reason for the speech, etc.

Take Great Notes

This goes without saying. The more thorough your notes , the more confident you’ll be when you write your story.

Get The “Good” Quote

Reporters often talk about getting a “good” quote from a speaker, but what do they mean? Generally, a good quote is when someone says something interesting, and says it in an interesting way. So be sure to take down plenty of direct quotes in your notebook so you'll have plenty to choose from when you write your story .

Forget Chronology

Don’t worry about the chronology of the speech. If the most interesting thing the speaker says comes at the end of his speech, make that your lede. Likewise, if the most boring stuff comes at the start of the speech, put that at the bottom of your story – or leave it out entirely .

Get The Audience Reaction

After the speech ends, always interview a few audience members to get their reaction. This can sometimes be the most interesting part of your story.

Watch For The Unexpected

Speeches are generally planned events, but it’s the unexpected turn of events that can make them really interesting. For instance, does the speaker say something especially surprising or provocative? Does the audience have a strong reaction to something the speaker says? Does an argument ensue between the speaker and an audience member? Watch for such unplanned, unscripted moments – they can make an otherwise routine story interesting.

Get a Crowd Estimate

Every speech story should include a general estimate of how many people are in the audience. You don’t need an exact number, but there’s a big difference between an audience of 50 and one of 500. Also, try to describe the general makeup of the audience. Are they college students? Senior citizens? Business people?

• 5 Tips on How to Take Good Notes During a News Interview
• 5 Tips on How to Write a Speech Essay
• 10 Important Steps for Producing a Quality News Story
• How to Avoid Burying the Lede of Your News Story
• Avoid the Common Mistakes That Beginning Reporters Make
• Here's How to Cover a Journalism Beat Effectively
• Memorable Graduation Speech Themes
• Six Tips for Writing News Stories That Will Grab a Reader
• 6 Tips for Writing About Live Events
• Understanding Organization in Composition and Speech
• Reporting on the Courts
• Pragmatics Gives Context to Language
• How to Write a News Article That's Effective
• Figures of Speech: The Apostrophe as a Literary Device
• Give a Speech People Remember
• How to Write and Structure a Persuasive Speech

How to Write a News Story on a Speech

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How to write a speech that your audience remembers

Whether in a work meeting or at an investor panel, you might give a speech at some point. And no matter how excited you are about the opportunity, the experience can be nerve-wracking . 

But feeling butterflies doesn’t mean you can’t give a great speech. With the proper preparation and a clear outline, apprehensive public speakers and natural wordsmiths alike can write and present a compelling message. Here’s how to write a good speech you’ll be proud to deliver.

What is good speech writing?

Good speech writing is the art of crafting words and ideas into a compelling, coherent, and memorable message that resonates with the audience. Here are some key elements of great speech writing:

• It begins with clearly understanding the speech's purpose and the audience it seeks to engage. 
• A well-written speech clearly conveys its central message, ensuring that the audience understands and retains the key points. 
• It is structured thoughtfully, with a captivating opening, a well-organized body, and a conclusion that reinforces the main message. 
• Good speech writing embraces the power of engaging content, weaving in stories, examples, and relatable anecdotes to connect with the audience on both intellectual and emotional levels. 

Ultimately, it is the combination of these elements, along with the authenticity and delivery of the speaker , that transforms words on a page into a powerful and impactful spoken narrative.

What makes a good speech?

A great speech includes several key qualities, but three fundamental elements make a speech truly effective:

Clarity and purpose

Remembering the audience, cohesive structure.

While other important factors make a speech a home run, these three elements are essential for writing an effective speech.

The main elements of a good speech

The main elements of a speech typically include:

• Introduction: The introduction sets the stage for your speech and grabs the audience's attention. It should include a hook or attention-grabbing opening, introduce the topic, and provide an overview of what will be covered.
• Opening/captivating statement: This is a strong statement that immediately engages the audience and creates curiosity about the speech topics.
• Thesis statement/central idea: The thesis statement or central idea is a concise statement that summarizes the main point or argument of your speech. It serves as a roadmap for the audience to understand what your speech is about.
• Body: The body of the speech is where you elaborate on your main points or arguments. Each point is typically supported by evidence, examples, statistics, or anecdotes. The body should be organized logically and coherently, with smooth transitions between the main points.
• Supporting evidence: This includes facts, data, research findings, expert opinions, or personal stories that support and strengthen your main points. Well-chosen and credible evidence enhances the persuasive power of your speech.
• Transitions: Transitions are phrases or statements that connect different parts of your speech, guiding the audience from one idea to the next. Effective transitions signal the shifts in topics or ideas and help maintain a smooth flow throughout the speech.
• Counterarguments and rebuttals (if applicable): If your speech involves addressing opposing viewpoints or counterarguments, you should acknowledge and address them. Presenting counterarguments makes your speech more persuasive and demonstrates critical thinking.
• Conclusion: The conclusion is the final part of your speech and should bring your message to a satisfying close. Summarize your main points, restate your thesis statement, and leave the audience with a memorable closing thought or call to action.
• Closing statement: This is the final statement that leaves a lasting impression and reinforces the main message of your speech. It can be a call to action, a thought-provoking question, a powerful quote, or a memorable anecdote.
• Delivery and presentation: How you deliver your speech is also an essential element to consider. Pay attention to your tone, body language, eye contact , voice modulation, and timing. Practice and rehearse your speech, and try using the 7-38-55 rule to ensure confident and effective delivery.

While the order and emphasis of these elements may vary depending on the type of speech and audience, these elements provide a framework for organizing and delivering a successful speech.

How to structure a good speech

You know what message you want to transmit, who you’re delivering it to, and even how you want to say it. But you need to know how to start, develop, and close a speech before writing it. 

Think of a speech like an essay. It should have an introduction, conclusion, and body sections in between. This places ideas in a logical order that the audience can better understand and follow them. Learning how to make a speech with an outline gives your storytelling the scaffolding it needs to get its point across.

Here’s a general speech structure to guide your writing process:

• Explanation 1
• Explanation 2
• Explanation 3

How to write a compelling speech opener

Some research shows that engaged audiences pay attention for only 15 to 20 minutes at a time. Other estimates are even lower, citing that people stop listening intently in fewer than 10 minutes . If you make a good first impression at the beginning of your speech, you have a better chance of interesting your audience through the middle when attention spans fade. 

Implementing the INTRO model can help grab and keep your audience’s attention as soon as you start speaking. This acronym stands for interest, need, timing, roadmap, and objectives, and it represents the key points you should hit in an opening. 

Here’s what to include for each of these points: 

• Interest : Introduce yourself or your topic concisely and speak with confidence . Write a compelling opening statement using relevant data or an anecdote that the audience can relate to.
• Needs : The audience is listening to you because they have something to learn. If you’re pitching a new app idea to a panel of investors, those potential partners want to discover more about your product and what they can earn from it. Read the room and gently remind them of the purpose of your speech. 
• Timing : When appropriate, let your audience know how long you’ll speak. This lets listeners set expectations and keep tabs on their own attention span. If a weary audience member knows you’ll talk for 40 minutes, they can better manage their energy as that time goes on. 
• Routemap : Give a brief overview of the three main points you’ll cover in your speech. If an audience member’s attention starts to drop off and they miss a few sentences, they can more easily get their bearings if they know the general outline of the presentation.
• Objectives : Tell the audience what you hope to achieve, encouraging them to listen to the end for the payout. 

Writing the middle of a speech

The body of your speech is the most information-dense section. Facts, visual aids, PowerPoints — all this information meets an audience with a waning attention span. Sticking to the speech structure gives your message focus and keeps you from going off track, making everything you say as useful as possible.

Limit the middle of your speech to three points, and support them with no more than three explanations. Following this model organizes your thoughts and prevents you from offering more information than the audience can retain. 

Using this section of the speech to make your presentation interactive can add interest and engage your audience. Try including a video or demonstration to break the monotony. A quick poll or survey also keeps the audience on their toes. 

Wrapping the speech up

To you, restating your points at the end can feel repetitive and dull. You’ve practiced countless times and heard it all before. But repetition aids memory and learning , helping your audience retain what you’ve told them. Use your speech’s conclusion to summarize the main points with a few short sentences.

Try to end on a memorable note, like posing a motivational quote or a thoughtful question the audience can contemplate once they leave. In proposal or pitch-style speeches, consider landing on a call to action (CTA) that invites your audience to take the next step.

How to write a good speech

If public speaking gives you the jitters, you’re not alone. Roughly 80% of the population feels nervous before giving a speech, and another 10% percent experiences intense anxiety and sometimes even panic. 

The fear of failure can cause procrastination and can cause you to put off your speechwriting process until the last minute. Finding the right words takes time and preparation, and if you’re already feeling nervous, starting from a blank page might seem even harder.

But putting in the effort despite your stress is worth it. Presenting a speech you worked hard on fosters authenticity and connects you to the subject matter, which can help your audience understand your points better. Human connection is all about honesty and vulnerability, and if you want to connect to the people you’re speaking to, they should see that in you.

1. Identify your objectives and target audience

Before diving into the writing process, find healthy coping strategies to help you stop worrying . Then you can define your speech’s purpose, think about your target audience, and start identifying your objectives. Here are some questions to ask yourself and ground your thinking : 

• What purpose do I want my speech to achieve? 
• What would it mean to me if I achieved the speech’s purpose?
• What audience am I writing for? 
• What do I know about my audience? 
• What values do I want to transmit? 
• If the audience remembers one take-home message, what should it be? 
• What do I want my audience to feel, think, or do after I finish speaking? 
• What parts of my message could be confusing and require further explanation?

2. Know your audience

Understanding your audience is crucial for tailoring your speech effectively. Consider the demographics of your audience, their interests, and their expectations. For instance, if you're addressing a group of healthcare professionals, you'll want to use medical terminology and data that resonate with them. Conversely, if your audience is a group of young students, you'd adjust your content to be more relatable to their experiences and interests. 

3. Choose a clear message

Your message should be the central idea that you want your audience to take away from your speech. Let's say you're giving a speech on climate change. Your clear message might be something like, "Individual actions can make a significant impact on mitigating climate change." Throughout your speech, all your points and examples should support this central message, reinforcing it for your audience.

4. Structure your speech

Organizing your speech properly keeps your audience engaged and helps them follow your ideas. The introduction should grab your audience's attention and introduce the topic. For example, if you're discussing space exploration, you could start with a fascinating fact about a recent space mission. In the body, you'd present your main points logically, such as the history of space exploration, its scientific significance, and future prospects. Finally, in the conclusion, you'd summarize your key points and reiterate the importance of space exploration in advancing human knowledge.

5. Use engaging content for clarity

Engaging content includes stories, anecdotes, statistics, and examples that illustrate your main points. For instance, if you're giving a speech about the importance of reading, you might share a personal story about how a particular book changed your perspective. You could also include statistics on the benefits of reading, such as improved cognitive abilities and empathy.

6. Maintain clarity and simplicity

It's essential to communicate your ideas clearly. Avoid using overly technical jargon or complex language that might confuse your audience. For example, if you're discussing a medical breakthrough with a non-medical audience, explain complex terms in simple, understandable language.

7. Practice and rehearse

Practice is key to delivering a great speech. Rehearse multiple times to refine your delivery, timing, and tone. Consider using a mirror or recording yourself to observe your body language and gestures. For instance, if you're giving a motivational speech, practice your gestures and expressions to convey enthusiasm and confidence.

8. Consider nonverbal communication

Your body language, tone of voice, and gestures should align with your message . If you're delivering a speech on leadership, maintain strong eye contact to convey authority and connection with your audience. A steady pace and varied tone can also enhance your speech's impact.

9. Engage your audience

Engaging your audience keeps them interested and attentive. Encourage interaction by asking thought-provoking questions or sharing relatable anecdotes. If you're giving a speech on teamwork, ask the audience to recall a time when teamwork led to a successful outcome, fostering engagement and connection.

10. Prepare for Q&A

Anticipate potential questions or objections your audience might have and prepare concise, well-informed responses. If you're delivering a speech on a controversial topic, such as healthcare reform, be ready to address common concerns, like the impact on healthcare costs or access to services, during the Q&A session.

By following these steps and incorporating examples that align with your specific speech topic and purpose, you can craft and deliver a compelling and impactful speech that resonates with your audience.

Tools for writing a great speech

There are several helpful tools available for speechwriting, both technological and communication-related. Here are a few examples:

• Word processing software: Tools like Microsoft Word, Google Docs, or other word processors provide a user-friendly environment for writing and editing speeches. They offer features like spell-checking, grammar correction, formatting options, and easy revision tracking.
• Presentation software: Software such as Microsoft PowerPoint or Google Slides is useful when creating visual aids to accompany your speech. These tools allow you to create engaging slideshows with text, images, charts, and videos to enhance your presentation.
• Speechwriting Templates: Online platforms or software offer pre-designed templates specifically for speechwriting. These templates provide guidance on structuring your speech and may include prompts for different sections like introductions, main points, and conclusions.
• Rhetorical devices and figures of speech: Rhetorical tools such as metaphors, similes, alliteration, and parallelism can add impact and persuasion to your speech. Resources like books, websites, or academic papers detailing various rhetorical devices can help you incorporate them effectively.
• Speechwriting apps: Mobile apps designed specifically for speechwriting can be helpful in organizing your thoughts, creating outlines, and composing a speech. These apps often provide features like voice recording, note-taking, and virtual prompts to keep you on track.
• Grammar and style checkers: Online tools or plugins like Grammarly or Hemingway Editor help improve the clarity and readability of your speech by checking for grammar, spelling, and style errors. They provide suggestions for sentence structure, word choice, and overall tone.
• Thesaurus and dictionary: Online or offline resources such as thesauruses and dictionaries help expand your vocabulary and find alternative words or phrases to express your ideas more effectively. They can also clarify meanings or provide context for unfamiliar terms.
• Online speechwriting communities: Joining online forums or communities focused on speechwriting can be beneficial for getting feedback, sharing ideas, and learning from experienced speechwriters. It's an opportunity to connect with like-minded individuals and improve your public speaking skills through collaboration.

Remember, while these tools can assist in the speechwriting process, it's essential to use them thoughtfully and adapt them to your specific needs and style. The most important aspect of speechwriting remains the creativity, authenticity, and connection with your audience that you bring to your speech.

5 tips for writing a speech

Behind every great speech is an excellent idea and a speaker who refined it. But a successful speech is about more than the initial words on the page, and there are a few more things you can do to help it land.

Here are five more tips for writing and practicing your speech:

1. Structure first, write second

If you start the writing process before organizing your thoughts, you may have to re-order, cut, and scrap the sentences you worked hard on. Save yourself some time by using a speech structure, like the one above, to order your talking points first. This can also help you identify unclear points or moments that disrupt your flow.

2. Do your homework

Data strengthens your argument with a scientific edge. Research your topic with an eye for attention-grabbing statistics, or look for findings you can use to support each point. If you’re pitching a product or service, pull information from company metrics that demonstrate past or potential successes. 

Audience members will likely have questions, so learn all talking points inside and out. If you tell investors that your product will provide 12% returns, for example, come prepared with projections that support that statement.

3. Sound like yourself

Memorable speakers have distinct voices. Think of Martin Luther King Jr’s urgent, inspiring timbre or Oprah’s empathetic, personal tone . Establish your voice — one that aligns with your personality and values — and stick with it. If you’re a motivational speaker, keep your tone upbeat to inspire your audience . If you’re the CEO of a startup, try sounding assured but approachable. 

4. Practice

As you practice a speech, you become more confident , gain a better handle on the material, and learn the outline so well that unexpected questions are less likely to trip you up. Practice in front of a colleague or friend for honest feedback about what you could change, and speak in front of the mirror to tweak your nonverbal communication and body language .

5. Remember to breathe

When you’re stressed, you breathe more rapidly . It can be challenging to talk normally when you can’t regulate your breath. Before your presentation, try some mindful breathing exercises so that when the day comes, you already have strategies that will calm you down and remain present . This can also help you control your voice and avoid speaking too quickly.

How to ghostwrite a great speech for someone else

Ghostwriting a speech requires a unique set of skills, as you're essentially writing a piece that will be delivered by someone else. Here are some tips on how to effectively ghostwrite a speech:

• Understand the speaker's voice and style : Begin by thoroughly understanding the speaker's personality, speaking style, and preferences. This includes their tone, humor, and any personal anecdotes they may want to include.
• Interview the speaker : Have a detailed conversation with the speaker to gather information about their speech's purpose, target audience, key messages, and any specific points they want to emphasize. Ask for personal stories or examples they may want to include.
• Research thoroughly : Research the topic to ensure you have a strong foundation of knowledge. This helps you craft a well-informed and credible speech.
• Create an outline : Develop a clear outline that includes the introduction, main points, supporting evidence, and a conclusion. Share this outline with the speaker for their input and approval.
• Write in the speaker's voice : While crafting the speech, maintain the speaker's voice and style. Use language and phrasing that feel natural to them. If they have a particular way of expressing ideas, incorporate that into the speech.
• Craft a captivating opening : Begin the speech with a compelling opening that grabs the audience's attention. This could be a relevant quote, an interesting fact, a personal anecdote, or a thought-provoking question.
• Organize content logically : Ensure the speech flows logically, with each point building on the previous one. Use transitions to guide the audience from one idea to the next smoothly.
• Incorporate engaging stories and examples : Include anecdotes, stories, and real-life examples that illustrate key points and make the speech relatable and memorable.
• Edit and revise : Edit the speech carefully for clarity, grammar, and coherence. Ensure the speech is the right length and aligns with the speaker's time constraints.
• Seek feedback : Share drafts of the speech with the speaker for their feedback and revisions. They may have specific changes or additions they'd like to make.
• Practice delivery : If possible, work with the speaker on their delivery. Practice the speech together, allowing the speaker to become familiar with the content and your writing style.
• Maintain confidentiality : As a ghostwriter, it's essential to respect the confidentiality and anonymity of the work. Do not disclose that you wrote the speech unless you have the speaker's permission to do so.
• Be flexible : Be open to making changes and revisions as per the speaker's preferences. Your goal is to make them look good and effectively convey their message.
• Meet deadlines : Stick to agreed-upon deadlines for drafts and revisions. Punctuality and reliability are essential in ghostwriting.
• Provide support : Support the speaker during their preparation and rehearsal process. This can include helping with cue cards, speech notes, or any other materials they need.

Remember that successful ghostwriting is about capturing the essence of the speaker while delivering a well-structured and engaging speech. Collaboration, communication, and adaptability are key to achieving this.

Give your best speech yet

Learn how to make a speech that’ll hold an audience’s attention by structuring your thoughts and practicing frequently. Put the effort into writing and preparing your content, and aim to improve your breathing, eye contact , and body language as you practice. The more you work on your speech, the more confident you’ll become.

The energy you invest in writing an effective speech will help your audience remember and connect to every concept. Remember: some life-changing philosophies have come from good speeches, so give your words a chance to resonate with others. You might even change their thinking.

Elevate your communication skills

Unlock the power of clear and persuasive communication. Our coaches can guide you to build strong relationships and succeed in both personal and professional life.

Elizabeth Perry, ACC

Elizabeth Perry is a Coach Community Manager at BetterUp. She uses strategic engagement strategies to cultivate a learning community across a global network of Coaches through in-person and virtual experiences, technology-enabled platforms, and strategic coaching industry partnerships. With over 3 years of coaching experience and a certification in transformative leadership and life coaching from Sofia University, Elizabeth leverages transpersonal psychology expertise to help coaches and clients gain awareness of their behavioral and thought patterns, discover their purpose and passions, and elevate their potential. She is a lifelong student of psychology, personal growth, and human potential as well as an ICF-certified ACC transpersonal life and leadership Coach.

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Before you can be a good journalist, you must first be a good writer. This means you must know how to put words together so that they make sense, flow, and are correctly punctuated. Another important element of news writing is grammar and style. Grammar is the structure of the writing that takes into account the syntax and linguistics, while style is the writing's distinctive appearance and sound . Grammar is decided according to hard and fast rules, but style is more personal and puts your mark on the piece of work. Although very different, they are both essential to quality work and will be discussed together in this section. Please note that this section is meant to refresh your basic grammar skills, and is not comprehensive.

There are few things that will turn a reader away quicker than poor writing. Grammar is the most basic example of this: When words are misspelled, or there is a mismatch between nouns and the proper tense of verbs, or you have used punctuation incorrectly – you are going to lose your audience faster than if you wrote something that offended them on a personal level. Why? Because they'll never get to a point where they will read the content. Poor grammar marks you as an amateur, and you won't be long for the newsroom with that label! So let's conduct a crash course in grammar!

The basic parts of speech are nouns, pronouns, verbs, adjectives and adverbs.

A noun is a person, place or thing.

Examples of a person: doctor, lawyer, man, woman

Examples of a place: hospital, playground, living room, outer space

Examples of a thing: toy, hammer, automobile, microscope

A noun can be singular or "one."

A noun can be plural or "more than one."

Examples of a singular noun: girl, house, pen, motor

Examples of plural nouns: girls, houses, pens, motors

A noun can be proper . That means it names something specific. They begin with capital letters.

Examples of a proper noun: Tom Jones, Mississippi, Washington Monument, Big Mac

Collective nouns are a group.

Examples of a collective noun: government, team.

If the group acts as a single entity you use a single verb. The government is in charge.

If group members act individually you use a plural verb. The team members said they will lose.

Examples of subject pronouns that come before the verb: I, you, he, she, we, they, it

I am going to work. You are going to work. He is going to work. She is going to work. We are going to work. They are going to work. It is going to work.

Examples of object pronouns that come after the verb: me, you, them, us,

Mary followed me to school. Mary followed you to school. Mary followed them to school. Mary followed us to school. Mary followed it to school.

*Know when to use its and it's.

its shows possession.

Example : That is its home.

it's is short for the words it is

Example : It's going to be a great day!

Example of an action verb: ran, jump, think, cry, yell

I ran up the hill. You jump on the chair. They think about their mother.

Example of a state of being verb: is, are, was, were

Examples of an adjective: big, small, fast, slow, yellow,

That is a big balloon. That is a small balloon. That is a fast balloon. That is a slow balloon. That is a yellow balloon.

Examples of an adverb: hardly, barely, sadly, simply

Begin each sentence with a capital letter. T rains are an interesting way to travel.

Use a period at the end of a statement. Trains are an interesting way to travel .

Use a question mark at the end of a question. Are trains an interesting way to travel ?

Use an exclamation mark to indicate excitement. Trains are an interesting way to travel !

A comma ( , ) is used to indicate a pause between parts of a sentence or items in a list.

Joan bought apples , peaches , and bananas at the store.

In the scheme of things , is it more important to reflect , or to forge head on into the future?

Use a colon ( : ) at the beginning of a list or to separate a quote from the speaker.

The losers were: Thomas Paine, Henry James, and Samuel Patterson.

Judge Thompson said: "Don't drink and drive again or you will go to jail."

Use a semi-colon ( ; ) to separate phrases with commas in them.

The DIY instructors are: Micah, knitting; Ralph, decoupage; and Martin, woodworking.

An apostrophe ( ‘) can show possession or indicate missing letters or numbers.

Jim ' s shoe is untied. The ‘49ers are going to go all the way this year!

A hyphen ( - ) ties words together while a dash ( - ) is used for emphasis.

My mother-in-law is always calling – and it drives me crazy.

Quotation marks are used to enclose the actual words of a speaker.

" Let's keep driving till we reach the end of the road, " John said.

Other basic rules of writing include:

Make sure that each sentence has a subject and a verb. That makes it complete. If you are missing either one of these components then you end up with a fragment and not a full sentence. Sometimes writers try to put too many ideas into on sentence making it a run-on. Read through your sentences as you finish them to make sure they make sense.

A paragraph is the basic component of journalistic writing. It is several sentences on the same subject put together. An article is a series of paragraphs on the same subject, but each paragraph offers different specific points. A paragraph begins with an opening sentence, and the following three to five sentences offer supporting details about the opening sentence. These form the body of the paragraph. Finally, there is a concluding sentence.

Here is an example of a paragraph about famous landmarks.

There are several famous landmarks in our area that bring thousands of tourists here every year. Some people come to see the natural, soaring peaks that ring the western border of the state. Others come to enjoy the clear blue waters of Everywhere Lake. They fish, swim, kayak, and boat. Still other visitors bring their camping gear and hiking equipment, so they can enjoy the many parks that are open to the public. Our popular sites are a great source of income for the government and citizens.

Can you pick out the opening statement? Of course, "There are several famous landmarks in our area that bring thousands of tourists here every year."

Do you recognize the body of the paragraph – or the supporting details in the next three sentences? "Some people come to see the natural soaring peaks … Others come to enjoy the blue waters …They fish, swim, and kayak… Still other visitors bring their camping gear…"

The concluding statement is the wrap-up, or indicates that the paragraph is complete. "Our popular sites are a great source of income for the government and citizens."

The journalist should practice writing paragraphs using this structure: opening statement, three to five supporting details, concluding statement.

Paragraphs are the building blocks of articles. When combined with other writing techniques the journalist should become skilled at creating original and informative work.

Writing Style

Writing style is the way writers compose their work. It may be formal or conversational, but over time, as the writer hones his or her craft, it is a reflection of their personality and the way they interact with the audience. A writer's ability and tendency to pen a written piece that sounds uniquely like him or herself is known as voice. Tone is the attitude that shines through the words. For example, the tone of a piece of writing may be funny or serious, emotional or dispassionate. That would depend on the purpose of the writing. Sometimes, tones may be interwoven, such as when giving a speech. The speaker does not want to be too boring, so he or she may break up the oration with bits of humor. At the same time, they may want to be informative, so the writing would be instructive.

Style is one of the most difficult and elusive components of the writing process to understand, yet is the very essence of what makes good – nay, exceptional – writing that touches the reader. Let us consider the elements of style in greater depth in this section.

First, the journalist should write in an active voice, if at all possible. That means there is a subject of the sentence that precipitates action; the action is not done to someone. For example:

The writer won the Pulitzer Prize.

NOT: The Pulitzer Prize was won by the writer.

OR: The doctor operated on the child's liver.

NOT: The child's liver was operated on by the doctor.

Do you see the difference? The sentence jumps into action by saying who did what.

Now, of course, not every sentence can be written this way – and when you are writing in-depth articles or investigative pieces, you will want to pepper the writing with different sentence lengths and structures. But, for the beginning journalist, entering hard hitting news, relying on the active voice in your writing will serve you well.

Next, one of the hardest parts of explaining style is teaching the writer about "voice." Voice is your personal thumb print on the writing. It sounds like you are talking, only the words are not coming from your mouth, they are appearing on the paper. Still, the reader can imagine the person behind the words, The reader feels like you are right there talking to him or her, and that you care very much about the subject on which you are writing.

Teaching a journalist to write with voice – and style - is very challenging. After all, the aim of most articles is to deliver information without bias or opinion; yet when the opportunity presents itself to let the reader see who you are behind the writing – it is a good way to develop an audience and develop the skill. Think about some of your favorite writers. You can probably identify their work, even if you were not told they penned it. That is because their voice shines through. Now, there is no doubt this is easier to do in fiction, but there are also opportunities in journalism. For example, human interest stories, narratives, and investigative work offer the writer opportunity and license to make the work more personal, by letting just a hint of you, the writer, shine through.

It is possible to learn how to become an engaging journalistic writer, whose work is not only functional and effective, but brilliant. There are two things you must do to become masterful in the craft – read. And write. There is no way around it. And we are not talking about reading online news. We are talking about reading lengthy pieces of writing. Books. Textbooks, nonfiction books, fiction books. That is the only way you will develop an ability to string words together – by having those very tracks laid down in your brain, as an example. When you read, you are working the muscles of your mind – and that is essential; it is nothing short of a requirement to becoming a good writer. But, then, so is writing. You are not going to wake up one day and be a good writer, if you have not practiced and practiced. Every professional must practice their craft and the same is true of the journalist. It can be a lonely existence, to be sure. But if you have chosen to write for a living, it is the only way to get there.

The world of writing is filled with average, adequate journalists – brilliant ones are one in a million, and news organizations that are lucky enough to land one will do just about anything to keep them. These are the writers with bylines and popular followings – and that translates into subscription and advertising dollars. It also translates into substantial salaries for exceptional writers, and while we enter the field of journalism with the most altruistic of intentions, everyone has to make a living!

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Recognising news report language

Newswise values.

This lesson focuses on  all  of the NewsWise values; language choices affect the way information is presented to an audience.

Learning objective

To identify and use the language of news reporting.

Learning outcomes

Identify and write an effective 5 W introduction.

Identify the language features of a news report, explaining the purpose of each.

Use formal and concise language to convey information.

Starter/baseline assessment

5 W introductions :   pupils decide which 5 W paragraph they think is the most effective. Discuss pupils’ ideas as a class, considering what the most interesting or important information is within this news story. Which paragraph starts with the most interesting or important information? Which paragraph is the least effective 5 W paragraph and why?

Pupils use the 5 Ws from their own news reports to write an introduction paragraph, making sure that they begin with the most interesting and important information.

Learning activity

Spot the news report : pupils read different accounts of the same story in order to identify which is written in the style of a news report. Which one is the news report? How do you know? How is the news report different to the others? Which words or phrases sound like news report language? Discuss as a class, using pupils’ ideas to add language features to your class’s ‘news report toolkit’. Can you identify all of the language features in the news report?

Challenge : What is the purpose of each language feature? How do the language features help to convey information to the reader?

Pupils read the  Informal report  which contains too much descriptive and informal language. They first identify examples of unnecessary descriptions and inappropriate language, then rewrite the statements using the formal and concise language of news reports. For support, pupils can refer to  News reporting language .

Pupils select a key point from the middle section of their pyramid plan (completed in the previous lesson) and draft a sentence for their own news report. Pupils swap sentence(s) with a partner, reading each other’s aloud and providing feedback on whether it uses formal and concise language.

Challenge:  pupils decide whether their chosen sentence is adding contrasting, additional or chronological information. Pupils attempt to rewrite their sentences using an appropriate sentence starter or a complex sentence, using an appropriate subordinating conjunction (for support, see  News reporting language   for sentence starter ideas).

Questions for assessment

What type of language does a news report use? Why? 

What is the difference between the way a news report sounds compared to a fictional story? 

What makes an effective 5 W paragraph? 

Core knowledge and skills

The language features of news reports include: 

Formal, concise language  with  short sentences, rather than  descriptive narrative writing.

Third person  and  past tense, although note that  the final paragraph may switch to  future tense

Direct speech  using the  reporting verb , such as  ‘said ’, rather than ‘fiction-sounding’ verbs such as ‘whispered’, or ‘cried’

Reported speech  to paraphrase what someone said. Gareth Southgate said that he was excited about the new England squad.

Relative clauses  to explain who the sources are. Gareth Southgate, England manager, said: ‘I believe this is a squad that we can be excited about.’

You may wish to focus on a particular language feature during the main part of this lesson, based on your pupils’ prior knowledge and experience. The suggested focus is on the tone of a news report (formal, concise language), but you may choose to focus on  reported or direct speech  in the context of including quotes. See ‘Extension opportunities’ for further ideas.

Extension opportunities

Pupils   practise the skill of paraphrasing by turning quotes into reported speech (see  Reported speech   resource).

Pupils use their bank of quotes from interviews to practise writing direct speech and reported speech sentences for their news reports. Ask pupils to swap their sentence(s) with a partner and read each other’s aloud before providing feedback.

After looking at the conventions of relative clauses as a class, pupils add relative clauses into direct and reported speech (see   Relative clauses   resource).

Lesson plan pdf

News report toolkit

5 W introductions

Spot the news report

Informal report

News reporting language

Reported and direct speech

Relative clauses

Curriculum links

Grammar, vocabulary and punctuation

Recognising and selecting vocabulary appropriate for formal news reporting; learning grammatical structures 

More lessons

Next lesson

Lesson 13: Writing news reports

Previous lesson

Lesson 11: Structuring news reports

All lessons

All the NewsWise lesson plans

News Broadcast Script Sample for Students | News Casting From Introduction to Conclusion

Writing a news script can be hard for some people because it is not as easy as it may seem. This may seem just to update your audience about what is happening where and when. However, it is not just that. It requires the News scriptwriter to have enough information and structure the script in a formal and informative way. Thus, if you are searching for a news broadcast script sample for students, read the article below.

Recommended to Read: Newscasting Script for The Introduction

News Broadcast Script Sample for Students

Anchor 1: Good evening! It is me ______ (name of the first anchor).

Anchor 2: And it is me _______ (name of the second anchor) and you are watching ______ (name of the news channel). Let us have a glance at the headlines first.

News Headlines

Anchor 1: The capital of Afghanistan is in danger of falling to the Taliban.

Anchor 2: New York the city of light is once again going to be quarantined.

Anchor 1: American computer-animated musical comedy film is releasing soon.

Anchor 2: Australia wins the ICC’S Men T20 World Cup. That is for the headlines. News with details will be shared after a short commercial break. Stay tuned!

Also Read: Step-by-Step Guide to Write a News Script

Anchor 1: Welcome back!

International News

Anchor 1: The capital of Afghanistan is in danger of falling into the hands of the Taliban. For further detail, we have our reporter ______ (name of the reporter) from Kabul. ______ (name of the reporter), kindly update our viewers.

Reporter 1: Kabul is the capital and an important city of Afghanistan for different reasons. After the American forces left the land of Afghanistan, the Taliban took over different cities of Afghanistan. And now it seems that sooner or later the Taliban is going to take over Kabul too.

No matter how hard the Afghan soldiers fight against the Taliban, they seem to be unstoppable and determined. So, they have already taken over the majority of the territory. Let us what the locals have to say about the current situation. I have ____ (name of any local) with me. Sr, can you please tell us about the situation you are facing currently in Afghanistan?

Local: We are just waiting for the Taliban to arrive and we do not expect the government will be able to protect us and our families.

Reporter 1: It is indeed heartbreaking to see how everything is falling apart. This is me _____ (name of the reporter) from Kabul, Afghanistan.

Anchor 2: Thank you, _______ (name of the reporter). Moving onto the national news.

National News

Anchor 2: At yesterday’s meeting between the health minister ____ (name of the health minister) and the Prime Minister ______ (name of the PM), it was decided that New York the city of light should soon be quarantined as the number of cases has increased drastically in the last week.

For further details, we have our reporter _______ (name of the reporter) with us. _____ (name of the reporter), kindly tell us more about the meeting and the decisions that the PM and health minister had to make.

Reporter 2: It was decided a week earlier that New York would start following the normal routine along with precautions. After a week, it will be decided whether or not to impose a lockdown in New York which will depend on the number of covid 19 cases. Since last week, the number of Covid 19 cases has drastically increased, and the PM and the health minister decided to once again quarantine New York.

The decision was taken at the PM House where parliamentary leaders of the political parties were also invited. In conclusion, it was decided that the government offices will be closed from next week while those who have not yet gotten their vaccination done will not get their salaries after 31st November.

Moreover, the government has decided that all the markets and malls in the province shall remain closed until the situation gets better. However, the pharmacies and the export industry shall remain open. It is me ______ (name of the reporter) with cameraman _____ (name of the cameraman), New York.

Anchor 1: Thank you for updating us, _____ (name of the reporter).

Related: How to Write a Summary of a Newspaper

Breaking News

Anchor 1: Viewers, we have got breaking news. Two workers have been killed at the site anonymously in Lahore. For detailed information, we have our reporter ____ (name of the reporter) with us.

_______ (name of the reporter), can you hear me?

Reporter 3: Yes, I can.

Anchor 1: Kindly tell us more about the incident.

Reporter 3: Early morning, when everybody at the site arrived, they found the dead bodies of two workers at a corner in the construction site. Until now nobody knows the whole scene of how they got there and what may have happened. So, the police are investigating at the site.

This is me _____ (name of the reporter) with cameraman _____ (name of the cameraman), Lahore.

Anchor 2: Thank you, ____ (name of the reporter). It is time for a short commercial break. Stay with us!

Anchor 2: Welcome back!

Entertainment News

Anchor 2: Vivo, the computer-animated musical comedy film, has earned all the attention of the public after its first trailer release. For further details, we have our reporter _____ (name of the reporter) with us. _____ (name of the reporter) kindly update our viewer.

Reporter 3: Vivo is a 2022 computer-animated musical comedy film by Sony Pictures Animation. The film is directed by Brandon Jeffords and it is based on the original idea by Peter Jack. The songs are written by Lin Maranda who is also voicing various characters in the film. The Vivo is Sony Pictures Animation’s first musical film.

It will be released on 24 December 2023 in theaters and on Netflix, and it is going to be released on 26 December 2022. After watching the first trailer, the public seemed to be very excited and looked forward to more clips from the film.

It is me _____ (name of the reporter) with cameraman ____ (name of the cameraman).

Sports News

Anchor 1: Australia wins the ICC’s Men T20 World Cup. For further details, we have our reporter _____ (name of the reporter). _____ (name of the reporter), kindly update our viewers.

Reporter 4: The semi-final of the T20 Men’s World Cup was held on November 10 between England and New Zealand in Abu Dhabi. And New Zealand won the semi-final over England. While on November 11, Australia played against Pakistan and made its way to the final.

Next, the final was held on 14 November in Dubai and Australia won the T20 world cup. This is me _____ (name of the reporter) with cameraman ____ (name of the cameraman).

Anchor 1: Thank you _____ (name of the reporter). It is time for a short break. Stay with us!

Comparing Script on Sports Day at School

Weather news.

Anchor 2: It is time for weather news . We have our reporter ______ (name of the reporter) at the studio. _________ (name of the reporter), kindly update our viewers about the weather.

Reporter 4: The weather in different cities of the country seems to be twin these days. Quetta’s weather is 6°C and mostly cloudy. Lahore too is 7°C and cloudy. People in New York are enjoying rain showers today at 12°C. However, New York is sunny at 15°C.

It is me _____ (name of the reporter) for weather news. Now back to the studio.

Anchor 1: That is it for today. For further information, you can check our website at www.xyz.com. Till next time, take care!

Recommended: Weather Forecast Report Sample Script in English

You may want to read more about:

• Best News Casting Script for Reporters
• Newscasting Opening and Closing Script Lines – Newspaper Script – Headline Writing
• English Vocabularies and Phrases Related to Newscasting & Media
• Newscasting Script for The Introduction
• Basic Steps of News Writing | How to Produce Quality News Story

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ASD Space Policy Keynote Address for the 2024 Space Policy Symposium (As prepared)

Good morning.  Thanks to the Space Foundation for this incredible platform to communicate to the world the importance of space to national security.

Intro: The Four C's

I was sworn in as the first Assistant Secretary of Defense for Space Policy in March 2022, shortly after Russia's illegal and unprovoked invasion of Ukraine.  My role as I saw it then and continue to see it now is to ensure the United States and our allies are utilizing space to strengthen integrated deterrence.  

The conflict in Ukraine has demonstrated to the entire world the essential role of space in modern warfare.  Russia and China both know that space is essential to the U.S. way of war, and they have developed a variety of means to attack our satellites. The United States Department of Defense is focused on China as our pacing challenge; space is both essential to deterring a potential conflict with China and prevailing if deterrence fails. 

Meanwhile, the commercial space sector is innovating at a pace and scale that is unmatched in our history.  

We are clearly in a time of rapid change in the space strategic environment, one which does not favor the slow or those resistant to change .  Recognizing this, since my first day in office I have hammered away at three priorities, which I have referred to as my “three Cs”: space control, space cooperation, and space classification.  Over the past year a fourth “C” has emerged: commercial space integration.  There is an urgency to these priorities.  This morning, I will update you on the significant progress we have made on all four.

Space Control

The first C is for space control.  When I first arrived in the Pentagon in spring 2022, the DoD and the IC were just beginning a Space Strategic Review at the behest of the National Security Advisor.  The SSR (“scissor”), as we called it, brought together stakeholders from across the national security space enterprise to assess how we matched up against the growing threats in the space domain.  It was a collaborative but difficult process. 

Our SSR analysis confirmed that China is the Department's pacing challenge in the space domain.  The SSR also confirmed that space is in fact an operational domain, one in which U.S. national security interests need to be defended, and one in which space-enabled adversary threats to U.S. service members need to be countered.

At the end of the process, and after many consultations between the Department and the National Security Council, the White House concurred with our analysis. As a result, last June, the President issued his Space Security Guidance, affirming the takeaways from the SSR, approving the Department's strategic direction on space, and focusing our efforts.

As we implement that guidance, our primary means of deterring conflict in space will be through resilience.  Because space is essential to our way of war, our adversaries may be incentivized to strike us in space.  With resilient architectures, we can withstand strikes against our satellites and degrade gracefully— perhaps not even noticeably— and continue to provide the critical space-based services the Joint Force relies on.  Resilient architectures should reduce the adversary's incentive to strike US satellites in the first place. 

But resilience can only get us so far. Our intelligence community assesses that, today, China's architecture could support tracking and targeting U.S. and allied forces across the Pacific . That capability challenges our ability to conduct joint operations in the Indo-Pacific region. No amount of resilience in our own satellite constellations can protect a carrier strike group from a long-range missile attack enabled by an adversary's satellites.

The United States will protect and defend our men and women in harm's way from space-enabled threats, just as we do for threats from land, sea, or air.  This may require the Department to take action to ensure that our potential adversaries are unable to rely on their space systems to find and strike U.S. and allied forces.  As part of the U.S. Government's integrated deterrence strategy, the United States may leverage counterspace options across all operational domains if necessary. In doing so the Department will continue to be a leader in the responsible use of space to ensure that the domain remains safe, stable, secure, and sustainable.

Space Cooperation

The second C is for space cooperation.  By working together with our allies, we broaden the number of systems collectively available for space operations, both on orbit and on the ground; we strengthen resilience; we expand our options for diplomatic and military responses; and we complicate an adversary's decision making. 

Space cooperation strengthens integrated deterrence, but only to the extent we can successfully work together in the space domain.  Today, combined military operations in space are a relatively new idea.  So for the past two years we have been working hard to fix this.

A leading example is the Combined Space Operations Initiative, or CSpO for short.  CSpO was formed ten years ago around a vision of improving cooperation, coordination, and interoperability to sustain freedom of action in space. Over the last two years, I have worked hard to take CSpO to the next level, expanding membership to Italy, Japan, and Norway, and focusing on the necessary groundwork to one day soon conduct true combined military operations in space. 

For that effort, U.S. Space Command is now leading the way with Operation Olympic Defender, and I am confident our Allied by Design approach will be successful.

The Department is also investing in bilateral space cooperation around the globe. Last year, my team conducted the first bilateral space cooperation dialogue with the Indian Ministry of Defense. We advanced discussions with our Japanese partners on finalizing our unique space domain awareness hosted payload partnership.  U.S.-Norway collaboration enabled the integration of U.S. payloads on two Norwegian satellites to provide 24/7 protected SATCOM for forces operating in the Arctic. And the list goes on.

Not Just Allies and Partners

But space cooperation is not only about working with allies and partners. It is also an important tool we use with our competitors to navigate challenging issues, avoid misunderstandings, and maintain stability. Since President Biden's summit with President Xi last year, my team has been part of several lower level bilateral exchanges with their Chinese counterparts on space security.  Both the United States and China have a vested interest in a safe, secure, stable, and sustainable space domain, and both parties will benefit from continuing to talk. 

As for Russia, the United States and Russia continue to operate the International Space Station together despite Russia's invasion of Ukraine.  That alone is a testament to the value of space cooperation, and to the shared responsibility spacefaring nations have to each other.

The Department also supports the Administration's work to advance space cooperation in the form of verifiable norms at the United Nations, including our commitment not to conduct destructive, direct-ascent anti-satellite (ASAT) missile testing, and we hope that more countries will make that same commitment.

We also strongly support the proposed U.S.-Japan UN Security Council Resolution, which includes reaffirming the Outer Space Treaty obligation not to place in orbit around the Earth any objects carrying nuclear weapons, or any other weapons of mass destruction. We believe all nations should support this UN Security Council Resolution as well.  A nuclear detonation in space would have indiscriminate, devastating effects for all space systems and all space users across the globe. 

Such a weapon is completely unable to discriminate between military, civil, or commercial systems, and it is completely unable to discriminate between nations.  No country should pursue such a capability.  It is in no nation's interest to do so, and puts all space-faring nations' interests at risk.

Space Classification

The third “C” is for space classification.  Our ability to work closely with allies and partners in the space domain, and our ability to use our space capabilities to protect and defend the Joint Force, requires the right information getting to the warfighter at operationally relevant speeds. But that information flow continues to be significantly hampered by the overclassification of space activities.

My office has led the charge on fixing this.  We started by illuminating the problem to the entire national security space enterprise, hosting a summit to identify what issues were limiting our ability to conduct operational cooperation in space with allies.  The number one culprit?  Overclassification of information.  

We then spent more than a year completely rewriting a 20-year-old legacy space classification policy, which reflected priorities of a different time and a different security environment.  That legacy policy limited our ability to share information within the Department, limited our ability to cooperate with our Allies and partners, and limited the ability of our industry partners to provide cost effective and timely solutions to difficult problems.  It limited our ability to adequately plan and train for conflict.  The truth is that over the past 20 years that policy has cost the Department both time and money, two scarce resources we cannot afford to squander. 

After a herculean effort by my team, in close collaboration with DoD and Intelligence Community stakeholders, Deputy Secretary Hicks approved our entirely new space classification policy in December.

Across the Pentagon, there is now a concerted effort to decrease the siloed nature of space activities. Services are reviewing programs to reduce their classification to a level that benefits the warfighter. And we are leaning forward on how much we can share with our Allies and partners, including industry, to allow more meaningful cooperation.

Our goal is to enable better integration of space in joint and combined operations, and to ensure that classified capabilities are accounted for in war plans and exercises.  That does not mean reducing things all the way to the unclassified level— apologies to the reporters in the audience!  But over time, the new policy should dramatically improve information flow and reduce the time and money required to build future systems.

Commercial Space Integration

Our fourth and newest “C” is for commercial space integration.

From launch to space domain awareness to satellite communications and more, over the past several years the commercial space sector's ability to innovate at speed and scale has been nothing short of breathtaking.  The Pentagon is keen to harness that innovation. And we are also keen to harness the speed and cost effectiveness the commercial sector promises, two areas the Pentagon could certainly use help in!

In order to drive the Pentagon to take better advantage of the innovative commercial sector, on April 2nd—just last week!—we released the Department's first ever Commercial Space Integration Strategy, signed by the Secretary of Defense.

The degree to which commercial space capabilities and services can benefit U.S. national security will ultimately be measured by how well the Department can actually integrate commercial solutions into the way we operate, not just in peacetime, but also in conflict.  To accomplish this, as Secretary Austin wrote in the forward to the strategy, the Department needs to eliminate the structural, procedural, and cultural barriers to overcoming legacy practices and preconceived notions of how the commercial sector can support national security.

Over the last year, my team engaged directly with space stakeholders across the Department and the interagency as well with commercial space entities of all sizes. We hosted roundtables, tabletop exercises, and informational sessions to better understand how commercial space solutions could support the Department, while taking into account the commercial sector's interests as well. Informed by that body of work, our new strategy directs the Department to pursue four lines of effort for commercial space integration:

• First, we will work to ensure access to commercial solutions across the spectrum of conflict: not just in peacetime, but also in crisis and in conflict.  
• Second, we will work to achieve integration prior to crisis. By integrating commercial space solutions in our day-to-day operations, we will be ready and able to rely on those solutions during crisis or conflict.  
• Third, we will work to establish the security conditions necessary to integrate commercial space solutions and help commercial providers reduce risk. While the Department will always maintain the option to use military force to protect and defend commercial assets, our primary approaches will be to: (one) create and support norms that enhance safety for all; (two) generate and share actionable threat information with commercial partners; and (three) explore different forms of financial protection, if required. Underpinning all of this is the Department's commitment to be a responsible actor in space.  
• Fourth, we will support the development of new commercial space capabilities that have the potential to support the Joint Force. The Department has a number of tools at our disposal to help commercial companies scale where our interests align.

The strategy is deliberately unclassified to be transparent about what we are trying—and need—to achieve, and to hold ourselves accountable to the strategy we have signed up for.  I am confident it will pay dividends for the Department for years to come.

So there you have it: space control, space cooperation, space classification, and commercial space integration.  Today's security environment demands action and decisions, and each of these four urgent priorities has been met with significant progress in the past two years, made possible by tremendous effort, focus, and teamwork.  And a sense of good humor all along the way.

On a personal note, it is now public news that I will be stepping down from my role in the next few weeks.  It has been the honor of a lifetime to serve as the first Assistant Secretary of Defense for Space Policy.  I will be deeply and forever proud of the work my team and I have done to both lead and push the Department forward at this critical time in history. 

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What to know about Elon Musk’s ‘free speech’ feud with a Brazilian judge

FILE - Elon Musk appears at an event in London, on Nov. 2, 2023. A crusading Brazilian Supreme Court justice included Musk as a target in an ongoing investigation over the dissemination of fake news and opened a separate investigation late Sunday, April 7, 2024, into the executive for alleged obstruction. (AP Photo/Kirsty Wigglesworth, Pool, File)

FILE - President of the Superior Electoral Court, Judge Alexandre de Moraes, speaks during the inauguration of the Center for Combating Disinformation and Defense of Democracy in Brasilia, Brazil, March 12, 2024. The Brazilian Supreme Court justice has included Elon Musk as a target in an ongoing investigation into digital militas, according to a copy of Moraes’ decision issued late Sunday, April 7. (AP Photo/Eraldo Peres, File)

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SAO PAULO (AP) — Headline-grabbing billionaire Elon Musk is clashing with a Supreme Court justice in Brazil over free speech, far-right accounts and misinformation on X, the social media platform Musk bought when it was Twitter.

Since his takeover, Musk has upended many of Twitter’s policies, gutted its staff and transformed what people see on the site. As its owner and perhaps most influential user, he’s also used it to try to sway political discourse around the world. His latest entanglement is inside the nation of 203 million people that has the largest population and economy in South America.

The South Africa-born CEO of Tesla and SpaceX bought Twitter in 2022 and declares himself a “free speech absolutist.” To his critics, it’s absolutism with a political slant. He reinstated previously banned accounts such as the conspiracy theorist Alex Jones and former U.S. President Donald Trump, as well as accounts belonging to neo-Nazis and white supremacists. Advertisers who halted spending on X in response to antisemitic and other hateful material were engaging in “blackmail,” Musk has alleged.

In the United States, free speech is a constitutional right that’s much more permissive than in many countries, including Brazil, where Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes this month ordered an investigation into Musk over the dissemination of defamatory fake news and another probe over possible obstruction, incitement and criminal organization.

WHAT ACCOUNTS HAS BRAZIL BLOCKED?

In Brazil, judges can order any site to remove content. Some decisions are sealed from the public.

Neither Brazilian courts nor X have disclosed the list of accounts that have been ordered to stop publishing, but prominent supporters of former President Jair Bolsonaro and far-right activists no longer appear on the platform.

Some belong to a network known as “digital militias.” They were targeted by a five-year investigation overseen by de Moraes, initially for allegedly spreading defamatory fake news and threats against Supreme Court justices, and then after Bolsonaro’s 2022 loss for inciting demonstrations across the country that were pushing to overturn President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva’s election.

WHO IS JUSTICE DE MORAES?

De Moraes is unmistakeable, with his bald head, athletic build and sweeping black robe. In his escalating attacks on the judge, Musk called him “Brazil’s Darth Vader.”

Whether investigating former President Jair Bolsonaro , banishing his far-right allies from social media, or ordering the arrest of supporters who stormed government buildings on Jan. 8, 2023 , Moraes has aggressively pursued those he views as undermining Brazil’s young democracy .

Days after a mob stormed Brazil’s capital, de Moraes ordered Facebook, Twitter, Telegram, TikTok and Instagram to block the accounts of individuals accused of inciting or supporting attacks on Brazilian democratic order.

FILE - President of the Superior Electoral Court, Judge Alexandre de Moraes, speaks during the inauguration of the Center for Combating Disinformation and Defense of Democracy in Brasilia, Brazil, March 12, 2024. (AP Photo/Eraldo Peres, File)

HOW DID FREE SPEECH BECOME A CAUSE FOR BRAZIL’S FAR RIGHT?

Brazil’s political right has long characterized de Moraes as muzzling free speech and engaging in political persecution. Lawmakers from Bolsonaro’s circle have been imprisoned and his supporters’ homes raided.

Bolsonaro himself became a target of the digital militias investigation in 2021. That was partly because he was casting unfounded doubt on Brazil’s electronic voting system. That year, he also told a massive rally that he would no longer comply with de Moraes’ decisions, pushing Brazil to the brink of institutional crisis .

WHAT’S MUSK’S ROLE?

Far-right X users have been trying to involve Musk in Brazilian politics for years, said Bruna Santos, lawyer and campaign manager at nonprofit Digital Action.

“They often tag him, asking him to take a stand on Moraes,” she said.

On Saturday, he did, republishing a post from X’s Global Government Affairs, tagging de Moraes and writing: “Why are you doing this @alexandre?”

Musk posted Saturday that reinstating the accounts — most of which apparently are blocked only in Brazil — will “probably” lead the social media platform to dry up revenue in Brazil and force the company to shutter its local office.

In his decision to investigate Musk, de Moraes accused him of waging a public “disinformation campaign” about the top court’s actions.

IS MUSK A ‘FREE SPEECH ABSOLUTIST’?

While Musk has railed against what he perceives as the censorship of certain viewpoints by Twitter’s previous administration, he’s also tried to silence critics he doesn’t agree with, including journalists and nonprofits reporting on his companies.

Musk had accused the journalists in late 2022 of sharing private information about his whereabouts that he described as “basically assassination coordinates.” He provided no evidence for that claim, though earlier Musk decided to permanently ban an account that automatically tracked the flights of his private jet using publicly available data.

Last month, a federal judge dismissed a lawsuit by X against the non-profit Center for Countering Digital Hate, which has documented the increase in hate speech on the site since it was acquired by the Tesla owner.

X had argued the center’s researchers violated the site’s terms of service by improperly compiling public tweets, and that its subsequent reports on the rise of hate speech cost X millions of dollars when advertisers fled.

But U.S. District Court Judge Charles Breyer dismissed the suit, writing in his order that it was “unabashedly and vociferously about one thing,” punishing the nonprofit for its speech.

HOW BIG IS X IN BRAZIL?

Brazil is a key market for X and other platforms. About 40 million Brazilians, or about 18% of the population, access X at least once per month, according to the market research group eMarketer.

Twitter closed offices and laid off employees in Brazil in 2022 after Musk bought the company. It is not clear how many employees X has in Brazil.

X’s legal representatives in Brazil, law firm Pinheiro Neto, declined to comment. X did not respond to a message for comment.

WHAT HAPPENS NEXT?

That depends on Musk and X’s actions. If they reinstate the accounts in Brazil, the company will face fines — at least. While fines have generally not phased Musk, experts say they could increase and X could even face suspension.

“The fines could escalate, eventually leading to the platform’s suspension. But this is always the last measure, as it harms other users in Brazil,” said Filipe Medon, a data privacy lawyer and professor at the Getulio Vargas Foundation.

Regarding Musk — a foreign citizen with a company based in the U.S. — any measures from Brazilian authorities would demand legal cooperation with U.S. authorities.

Ortutay reported from San Francisco, California.

This story has been corrected to reflect that free speech is a constitutional right in Brazil.

Watch CBS News

Biden announces new steps to deepen military ties between the U.S. and Japan

By Bo Erickson , Kathryn Watson

Updated on: April 10, 2024 / 3:47 PM EDT / CBS News

Washington — The U.S., Japan and Australia will create a joint air defense network, President Biden announced alongside the Japanese prime minister Wednesday, unveiling several new initiatives aimed at deepening defense and intelligence cooperation between their two countries.

"Together, our countries are taking significant steps to strengthen defense security cooperation," Mr. Biden said during a joint press conference with Prime Minister Fumio Kishida in the White House Rose Garden. "We're modernizing command and control structures. And we're increasing the interoperability and planning of our militaries so they can work together in a seamless and effective way. This is the most significant upgrade in our alliance since it was first established. I'm also pleased to announce that for the first time, Japan and the United States and Australia will create a network of air missile and defense architecture." 

And AUKUS — the Biden-era trilateral defense partnership between the U.S., Australia and the U.K. — "is exploring how Japan can join our work," Mr. Biden said. 

The announcements come amid increasing concerns over China's influence in the Indo-Pacific and globally. Kishida is in Washington this week for his first official state visit as prime minister. 

"Our alliance we have with Japan is purely defensive in nature," Mr. Biden said. "It's a defensive alliance. And the things we discuss today improve our cooperation and are purely about defense and readiness. It's not aimed at any one nation or a threat to the region, and it doesn't have anything to do with conflict." 

Mr. Biden also announced that two Japanese astronauts will join future American space missions, and one of them will become the first non-American to land on the moon's surface.

The president and Kishida met at the White House Wednesday before holding a joint press conference. Mr. Biden and first lady Jill Biden are hosting a state dinner in the Japanese leader's honor Wednesday night, recognizing the decades-long relationship between the two nations. 

"President Eisenhower said his goal was to establish an indestructible partnership between our countries," Mr. Biden said. "Today, the world can see, that goal has been achieved, and that partnership between us is unbreakable." 

Details of an enhanced military partnership will be worked out by Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and his Japanese counterpart in the next several months, senior administration officials told reporters on Tuesday. The U.S., however, expects Japan to step up and play a significant role in producing more military and defense equipment.   

With Philippines President Bongbong Marcos joining the two leaders for a three-way summit on Thursday, one clear goal of this week's meetings between the U.S. and the Asian nations has become clear: underscoring global coordination in the face of increased hostility in the region from China .

China in recent weeks has had some maritime run-ins in the South China Sea with the Philippines, with the Chinese Coast Guard directing water guns at Filipino vessels.

This hostility will not deter the Philippines, U.S. officials said. "The country that is isolated on Thursday is China, not the Philippines," one official said about the three-way Washington summit this week.

Regarding greater intelligence cooperation, U.S. officials noted the Japanese have "taken substantial steps" to protect the most sensitive intelligence information, although the official said there's "still more work to do" before Japan reaches the required level of information security to potentially join the Five Eyes intelligence network. Joining that intelligence sharing agreement — which consists of the U.S., Canada, Australia, New Zealand and the United Kingdom — is viewed by Japanese security experts as a means of adding more protection against China's provocations.

The high-level objectives are part of a 70-point plan that the U.S. and Japan are expected announce this week.

Other promises are more lighthearted. Japan has offered saplings to replace hundreds of popular cherry blossom trees in the Tidal Basin area, and the Japanese prime minister was expected to start some of these plantings at a ceremony on the National Mall on Wednesday.

A "major" lunar agreement, increased university research and a new scholarship for U.S. high school students to enter into exchange study programs with Japanese schools will also be announced, the officials said.

Overall, the U.S. officials also said the U.S.-Japan alliance shows that Mr. Biden's theory of increased engagement with Indo-Pacific nations can foster more cooperation throughout the world. One senior administration official said previously Japan was only worried about its "perimeter," but in recent years, the country has been a vocal supporter of Ukraine, sanctions against Russia, and has engaged more in the Middle East.

"Anywhere American purpose is being put to the test, Japan is by our side," one U.S. official said.

• Fumio Kishida

Bo Erickson is a reporter covering the White House for CBS News Digital.

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