Kinds of Articles Hard vs. soft Enterprise vs. spot Features Investigations Explanation/analysis Advancers (curtain-raisers) Second-day stories (folos, running stories) Multiple-elements stories

Models for Journalism Inverted pyramid is oldest “model.” Models give you a mold into which you can pour your reporting. Models become less useful as you become a better writer. Business models are just spin-offs of generic journalism structures. Use the right model for the story at hand.

The Old Inverted Pyramid Source: Newspapers in Education

Another View Source: Poynter Institute

The Adaptive Model What happened? Why? What are the consequences? What is the context? What’s next? Who, what, when, where high in story, but not as inverted pyramid. Elements rearranged as story develops. A strong, useful quote somewhere.

Context: What Is It? Does this fit or break a historical pattern? Does this compare with or to other, similar situations? Can you compare to an external standard? Is this like or dislike other cities, states, nations? Is this unprecedented? Who has supported and opposed? Who wins and loses? What’s at stake politically?

Using the Adaptive Model Lead often includes two elements of the five. Expand details on first five elements in gut of text. Order of elements fits your central point. Order of expanded elements in gut is exact mirror of brief elements at the top. Explain jargon. Cut the emotion in quotes, use substance. Make package no longer than necessary!

Purpose Determines Order One story What happened, why What happened Why Consequences Context What’s next (If necessary, expand in same order.) Another story What will happen, consequences What will happen Consequences Context Why What’s next (If necessary, expand in same order.)

Key Point-of-Entry Terms Main headline or “deck.” Underline or “second deck.” Bullet points. The opening paragraph or lead. Blurb or “pull quote.” Digest or blog entry. Tweet: Twitter entry. Quotes.

Review: Another story What happened and why. Details on what happened. Details on why. Quote. External context. Internal context. Consequences. What’s next. Quote. Expansion on what happened. Expansion of consequences. Quote.

Another Story What happened and consequences. Details on what happened. Details on consequences. External context. Internal context. Quote. What’s next. Expansion of internal context. Expansion of what’s next.