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Morning Edition is public radio's most listened-to news magazine program. MPR's Cathy Wurzer and a team of NPR hosts and reporters bring you the latest international, national, and local news.

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News Reports

Student Exercises

  1. Students select daily news clips to listen to and then summarize. Students then can read more about the story in a local or national paper, in print, or online. This can be a great activity to begin the day, advisory, or class period, particularly with a class of struggling readers who would benefit from the contextual and auditory overview of news stories before they read them. Whenever possible, pair audio and text versions of the stories for learners.
  2. Students compare and contrast the MPR audio and text news reports with similar stories in print, online, and television sources, looking for different perspectives and critiquing the benefits of each media type.
  3. After listening to and analyzing the structure of radio news stories, students create their own radio/audio reports. Selecting a story from a local print source, students summarize the key points, create a short script, rehearse their delivery, record their audio report (either digitally or with a tape recorder), and play the report back to the class. Create a collection of these stories to make an audio portfolio.

Tips and Techniques

  • Some different ways to use the news sites: 1.) Students browse the main MPR News site or the various program pages for the current week's news; 2.) Students read and listen to stories selected and previewed by the teacher; 3.) Students conduct searches for stories on research topics.
  • Go to the main MPR News site as a starting point for all the news program sites.
  • When there are both audio and text versions of a report, provide students with a print copy to read and take notes on as they listen to the audio.
  • Remember to have students cite sources for information or quotations they use in reports, multimedia documents, or other educational projects, including photos and audio clips. Students should include the following information in their citation: document title or description, date of publication or when they found it on the Web, an address (URL), and, if possible, the author, photographer, or artist.


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