We must interest kids in the news

By Liza Porter

Kids do not seem to have a sense of the importance of news to their daily lives.
Without a free press, democracy is at risk. The importance of this must be instilled in our children. We must have ethical journalism if we want to retain our liberties.

The solution is in the classroom.

Being involved in newsgathering and writing teaches children to love the news and differentiate important news from gossip and entertainment.

Every class from preschool on up should have a newsletter and every school should have a newspaper of its own.

Children should write and/or illustrate articles for their class newsletter on a regular basis. This will instill a sense of the importance of what is going on around them—the news—as well as teach them to write.

These student newsletters/newspapers will also provide a way to communicate with the parents at home and draw them into the news gathering and writing process.

With all of today’s technology available to them, a good newspaper (with online components) can be produced at each school, with everyday news for the younger kids and more in-depth community news for the older.

Every high school should have its own newspaper and/or radio station, with several types of journalism classes so that teenagers can learn how to be “backpackers,” journalists who do it all—the writing, the videotaping and the photography.

An informal telephone survey of 14 area high schools shows that 10 have journalism classes and campus newspapers. One of the schools with no journalism classes this year will offer them again next year, as well as produce a campus newspaper once again.

Imagine that, a newspaper start-up!

Cynics might say it’s too late to recapture younger readers. They’re too addicted to their iPhones and iPods and iPads. They don’t care.

If that is the case, all the more reason to start at the beginning. Teach journalism from Day One. Start educating children from their first day in school that news is important and everyone can share in the gathering and reporting of it.

We must keep journalism alive in our schools.