October 24 -- Lead Story / Ammenheuser class

I was surprised by how well my young 3rd graders responded to our discussion today. At first I was worried because they have a hard time understanding all the ideas and concepts in the articles -- vocabulary is WAY above their level. But they are learning to get the big idea of the story from the title and we are kind of going with that.

We decided that a lead story should have the following criteria:

* Important to America
* Needs to have information that we need to be aware of, or that will help us (being safe, our health, etc.)
* Needs to be something that isn't an everyday occurrence
* Needs to catch people's attention and be interesting -- has action
* The title needs to be interesting and BOLD so people will read it

We had 3 stories that came from our small group discussion that we thought should be the lead story:

School/Grade: 3rd grade / Mills Elementary
Headline: McCain turns to other "Joes" to criticize Obama's tax plan
Byline/Author: Elisabeth Bumiller and Jeff Zeleny
Date Story Published: 10/24/08
Section of Newspaper: Front section
Page Number Story Begins On: page 1
Criteria for Selection: This matters to the country and everyone needs to know about it because of the upcoming election. People might not read it because it is at the bottom.

School/Grade: 3rd grade / Mills Elementary
Headline: Frat Must Pay Millions
Byline/Author: Tony Plohetski and Claire Osborn
Date Story Published: 10/24/08
Section of Newspaper: Front section
Page Number Story Begins On: Page 1
Criteria for Selection: This does not happen often so it is big news. It talks about law issues and people need to know about it so they don't get involved with this fraternity and they learn to be safer

School/Grade: 3rd grade / Mills Elementary
Headline: Man Gets Probation in Killing
Byline/Author: Steven Kreytak
Date Story Published: 10/24/08
Section of Newspaper: Metro/State
Page Number Story Begins On: page 1
Criteria for Selection: Everyone needs to be aware of this man and how dangerous he is. It should be the lead story on the front page, not in the Metro/State section