The Newspaper Has a Place in the Classroom

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[Commentary] To better serve students, teachers need to explore a variety of ways to develop their skills and increase their knowledge. One such move would be to bring newspapers back into the classroom and include them in the array of materials used to teach important information and skills. Newspapers could be a strong motivator for students to connect with the world today. Not only could students e-mail friends and family members alerting them to important news stories, but they could also write articles for the school newspaper, or letters to the editor of a commercial newspaper expressing their views about what they’ve read.

With the Common Core State Standards’ strong emphasis on a balance of nonfiction and fiction texts, close reading, analytical and critical writing, and text comparisons, schools have been driven to use many materials that have little appeal to students of any age and few connections to their lives or real-world issues. By bringing newspapers into the mix of classroom materials, schools could move students closer to meeting the language arts standards without the danger of harming their love of reading, writing, critical thinking, and meaningful action.

[Or why not try Benton's Headlines in the Classroom?]

[Joanne Yatvin was teh president of the National Council of Teachers of English from 2006 to 2007]


The Newspaper Has a Place in the Classroom