JOU 4341 - Reporting and Writing for Online Media
Catalog description:
Practice reporting longer stories specifically for presentation on the Web. Topics covered include in-depth interviews, modular story structure, linking strategies, use of online communities to find sources, verification and selection of reliable sources. Students report and write three original online projects.
Credits: 3
Prerequisites: JOU 3101 Reporting
Student goals for the course:
- Plan an online reporting project.
- Find and evaluate online sources (both data and people).
- Make contact with new sources via the Web and e-mail.
- Prepare for and conduct in-person and telephone interviews with unfamiliar people.
- Collect supporting hard data from Web sites for use in journalism.
- Analyze and criticize your own writing.
- Construct multi-linear stories that put the reader in control.
- Consider a real audience and write to capture the audience’s attention quickly.
- Write effective links and effective online headlines.
- Write briefly in chunks of about 300 words, keeping each chunk to one idea or event, and making chunks inter-related but not redundant.
- Practice good “Netiquette” so as not to offend or alienate potential online sources.
- Implement works of online journalism in functional form on the Web in collaboration with other students in the course (and also solo).
Assignments:
- Students complete three major reporting/writing projects in the semester. Each project requires completion of several sub-assignments.
- At least one of the projects requires a cooperative team effort.
- All three projects are self-published online.
- All three projects require students to use the Web as a research tool and verify the accuracy of sources.
Semesters this course is offered: Fall
Online Syllabus:
Melinda McAdams: Reporting and Writing for Online Media
The Campaign for the University of Florida