Editing and Headlines Lesson Plans

ASNE lessons created for use with the Editing and Headlines Training Module

Day 1
Editing lesson
Editing PowerPoint – Day 1
Writing Rules Example
Developing Writing Rules Organizer
Proofreading Marks Guide
Common Grammatical Errors Guide
PROOF IT

Day 2
Headlines lesson
Headline PowerPoint – Day 2
Guided Writing Practice
Headline Challenge Cards 1
Headline Challenge Cards 2
Headline Challenge Cards Blanks

Other ASNE lessons

Resources

• Associated Press Style Basics from Journalist’s Resource
• Style Overview from Journalist’s Resource
• Acronyms from Journalist’s Resource
• The Editor’s Desk Chapter from Reuters’ Handbook of Journalism

AP Style Lessons

• Associated Press Stylebook Game by Harry Katopodis
  Students will gain familiarity with the AP Style Book by looking up answers to questions in the book. The first team to answer the question correctly and show where in the book they found the answer gets a point and a prize.
• AP Stylebook Jeopardy; AP Stylebook Jeopardy – supplemental 1
  This lesson plan is intended to follow more serious study of the AP Stylebook, and would ideally be used as a review before a quiz or test. Categories have been selected from the Quick Reference Guide section of the AP Stylebook, with an eye towards reviewing some of the most common areas of need for student journalists.
• Hello, AP Stylebook. It’s nice to meet you
  This lesson explains the importance of consistent style guidelines and allows students to create a style guide unique to their own school’s publications for instances not covered by AP style.
• Editing for AP (and Your Newspaper’s) Style
  A plan that gets to the heart of the matter of newspaper style. A hands-on lesson (with grading sheet!) that asks students to analyze stories for style errors after an explanation of what it is.

Copy Editing Lessons

• Revision Strategy: Using math to improve writing
  Tracey Burger of Miami shares a short and sweet lesson to eliminate passive voice and “worthless words” from student writing.

Headlines Lessons

• Fitting Ideas to the Space: Writing headlines
  A lesson that assigns students actual layouts and asks them to write heads to fit in that space. Drives home the point that you need to read and understand the story as well as understanding that some layouts make headline-writing impossible.
• Headline Writing is Hard!
  Students will understand that headline writing is a difficult art. Besides space limitations, it is full of pitfalls that can make the newspaper look foolish. In addition, students will learn to write headlines with these pitfalls in mind.