CREATING YOUR OWN NEWSPAPER

The purpose of this activity is to have students think about the decisions that are made about where ads are placed in a newspaper and why an advertiser would advertise in a particular newspaper or section of a newspaper to reach their target market.
Before this activity, you should have taught print advertising and talked about the set up of a newspaper. Divide students into groups (no more than 3 to a group - 2 is ideal) Have them draw one of the target markets out of a hat. This way you only have one group per class working on that particular target market.  Have all supplies ready the day you start.  Typically they will spend the first two days cutting out ads and articles, the next two - three days they will actually be putting paper together.  Good advice for them is to lay out their paper before they start pasting and taping because they will want to make changes.

(For an MS Word version of this lesson, complete with evaluation sheets, click here.)

Time required: 4- 5 class periods (45 minute periods)

Supplies: Newspapers - we get ours from the Free Lance Star Newspaper in Education department at a discount rate, we also bring in papers from home and get newspapers from library
    Scissors
    Tape
    Glue Sticks
    Staplers
    Markers
    Large sheets of paper - we use bulletin board paper and cut it to the size of the newspaper and pre-fold it for the students

Grading: Each student is given the directions and the grading sheet.  The grading scale is
Excellent  - A
Good - B
Fair - C
Poor - D
By going through each section and circling their grade, it makes it easier to calculate a final test grade for the paper and the quiz grades for the front page and each section.
 
 

Create Your Own Newspaper

Directions: Your newspaper must include the following sections:
Section One: Create a new name for the newspaper. All ads, articles, and filler should interest that target group.  The target market will be assigned randomly and will be one of the following: Males, Females, families, children, teenagers, young adults and business individuals.

Section Two: Design the front page the newspaper.  Be sure to include on the front page the table of contents to gain reader=s interest. Must have an exciting articles and photos for front page. No ads go on front page, just articles. Be sure to include circulation, date, name of newspaper, areas served, etc. Bottom line:   Get me excited to read your newspaper.  

Section Three: Your paper must have at least 10 articles and must be appropriate for target market.  Remember to include hot news whenever possible. Articles included will depend on your target market. 

Section Four: You must create four other areas of interest for the reader.   Be sure to include pictures, title and captions.  You may select from the following list:
a) write up about celebrity interviews/gossip
b) new movie release review
c) new music review
d) travel ideas - places to go, how to travel, etc....
e) Beauty and skin care tips
f) exercise tips 
h) comics
I) weather
j) Food section--- recipes, entertainment tips etc...
k) holiday tips for a certain season.  You are not limited to this time period.
l) editorial page

Section Five: You must include 20 ads for your newspaper.  The ads must be appropriate for the target market.  There must be at least 2 ads from each of the following industries: Food, apparel, gift items, entertainment (for a total of 8).  Other 12 ads can be anything that you like that is appropriate for your target market. 

Section Six: Your layout for the newspaper is just as important as the individual parts.  Think about the order of your articles and ads.  Make the newspaper flow easily for the reader.
All papers will have a Section A that is appropriate for target market, could be such things as national news, regional news, style, sports, food, business, etc.  This section comes out everyday in the paper.  Section B is a special edition, for example: Women - Spring Fashions, Men - Baseball season, Children - Summer Activities, Families - Key Vacation Spots, Teenagers - Prom, Young adults - Weddings, Business individuals - Technology.   This section will be different for each group depending on target market.  Section A will be more general while Section B will be more target group specific

Rating Sheet for the Newspaper
 
 

GRADING POLICY FOR PROJECT:
TEST GRADES: The entire newspaper will count as two test grades.

QUIZ GRADES: The following will count as individual quiz grades:
A) The front page will count as one quiz grade
B) Completion of Section A will count as one quiz grade
C) Completion of Section B will count as one quiz grade
 

Newspaper Summary Sheet

Section One:
Who was your target market?_____________________

What name did you select for your paper? _______________________

Why do you think this name will be appealing to this target market?
 
 

Section Two: 
What articles did you select for your front page (List)
 

Why did you select these articles?
 

Section Three:
What articles did you use in the rest of the paper? (List all)
 

Why this selection of articles?  What were your themes with the articles?  Why would they appeal to this target audience?
 

Section four: I have _____________ articles in my total paper
What were your other four areas of interest (list all)
 

Why these areas?
 

Section five: I have __________ ads in my total paper
List all your food ads:
 

List all your apparel ads:
 

List all your gift item ads:
 

List all your entertainment ads:
 

List other ads:

 

Terri Palmer
Jenee Pins
Courtland High School
Spotsylvania VA