Who, What, Where, When: Being a News Detective
A school bus got a flat tire this morning and every kid on it was ten minutes late! A news reporter's job is to find out exactly what happened and tell everyone the truth about it. Reporters are like detectives who ask questions until they know the whole story.
What You'll Learn
- The four big questions every reporter asks: Who, What, Where, and When - What a 'headline' is and why it has to be short and true - How to tell the difference between a fact and an opinion - How to write your own two-sentence news report
The Four Questions Every Reporter Asks
Before a reporter writes anything, they answer four questions. WHO was there? WHAT happened? WHERE did it happen? WHEN did it happen? If you leave one out, the reader gets confused. For the bus story: WHO = the kids on Bus 7. WHAT = a flat tire. WHERE = Elm Street. WHEN = 7:45 in the morning.
Headlines: Big Words, Short Sentence
A headline sits at the top of a news story in big letters. It has to tell the most important part in just a few words. 'BUS 7 GETS FLAT TIRE, KIDS LATE' is a good headline because it's short and it's true. A bad headline would be 'Something Happened Today' because nobody learns anything from it.
A fact you can check: 'The tire was flat.' An opinion is what someone feels: 'That was the worst morning ever!' Reporters write facts. They can quote someone's opinion, but they say who said it.
Asking Good Questions
Reporters interview people to get facts. Instead of asking 'Was it bad?' (which only gets a yes or no), a news detective asks 'What did you see?' or 'What happened next?' Questions that start with Who, What, Where, When, or How get the best answers.
Match each question word to what it helps a reporter find out.
Terms
Definitions
Drag terms onto their definitions, or click a term then click a definition to match.
Which sentence is a FACT, not an opinion?
Why does a headline need to be short?
Many newspapers ask reporters to write headlines using only about 6 to 8 words, so it fits in big letters across the top of the page.
Write Your Own News Flash
Pick something true that happened at your house or school today (a pet did something funny, it rained, you lost a tooth). Write down the Who, What, Where, and When on a piece of paper. Then write one headline (under 8 words) and two sentences describing what happened. Read it out loud like a TV reporter.
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