FINDING THE THEME

Recall the differences between news stories and feature stories. News reports what happened; timely and public;

straight to the point Features focus more on the personal, less timely;

trends, relationships, entertainment; advice, ideas, emotions. Features delay information to keep the reader curious and engaged.

Hard news versus soft news describes both the topic and treatment of a story. News is typically a serious, somber topic in inverted pyramid format while features are lighter, friendlier and more casual. Features are written to hook the reader into the story.

Themes

Just like a good story has a theme, a good feature should also have a strong theme. Call it a theme or a thread or a spine, but it is what runs throughout the feature to support it. A story can’t be all reporting of facts and information (that’s hard news), but it can’t just be all disconnected anecdotes and observations either.

Narrowed Focus

A reporter must be able to narrow the focus enough that he/she can express the concept in a clear, concise theme or story statement (this later becomes the nut graf).

When considering a feature idea, reporters must ask themselves the following questions:• Is the focus too broad?• Can I realistically do this? (Consider

time to report and write something)• Am I getting to the personal level

and making it real to the reader?

Can I create suspense at the beginning to keep the reader going until the end? Remember this is a story, not hard news in inverted pyramid format. You want to  hook your reader and keep him/her reading by revealing bits of information throughout the story, all the way to the end, which is usually surprising.

• Does the story have conflict and momentum? Does something happen or change?

• Is the story interesting? Your reader will ask, “Why does this matter to me? Why should I care? So what?” Does your story answer the “So what?”

Finding the Theme

Take the assignment from yesterday. You will develop your story idea from

the work in the previous lesson. Write and revise your work until it is

35 words or less and answers the “so what” of the story.

The Work Begins

We are going to be begin a 1000 word feature that will be due in one and half to two weeks.

You will begin your reporting and work on this a bit every day.

Also, it’s a summative. We will work on it over the course of the

next lessons as well, but be working on it in your own time as well.

Cool? Cool.