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Activity 3: The Midsummer Night's News

1. Start collecting newspapers from different editors. Note the different sections of the paper. How is the writing different from the Cover page to the Editorial page? What sections interest you most? What sort of things can you find out by reading the paper? Which paper contains better samples of writing in your opinion (why?)? Right your answer to these questions in your journal, and put together a sample of the 'best' writing from the papers you have gathered to bring to class.

2. In groups of 4 or 5, discuss the samples you brought in. Share why you thought these samples were good, and what sections of the paper you are most interested in. Make a list of the things that made an article good or what made it bad (you will use this later when you start reviewing your work). Make your lists specific and objective - use language like that found in Appendix 12 of the Curriculum guide to help you. Your teacher may help you consolidate these lists in class to form a rubric for scoring your editions. You will be assigned an act from A Midsummer Night's Dream to write an edition of The Midsummer Night's News. At a minimum, your paper will need a cover page and an editorial page, the rest is up to you (at least 3 other 'sections'). Talk about what needs to be done in order to get your paper to publication. Assign roles and responsibilities and discuss the 'deadlines for submission of articles' within your group. Write down your plan and discuss it with your teacher before you proceed. From this plan, your group and the teacher will develop a scoring rubric for assessing your work.

3. Now that you have decided to write, pay close attention to the style of writing. Does your article need to be objective? Are you writing to persuade or inform? What information from the play are you trying to reveal in your article? Have the purpose of your piece clear so that is has the proper focus. Draft your article, then take the time to review, revise and edit it.

4. Once you have a good draft of your piece ready, sit down with your group and review each others work. In a sense, everyone is the 'editor' of the newspaper for this project. Remember to respect each others work, but also to respect and be open to people's opinions as well - they may have ideas you want to incorporate. Use the lists or rubric you created together in step 2 to help you in this stage.

5. After you have reworked your piece from the suggestions you received in step 4, it's time to format your edition. Do you need pitures for certain articles? You can draw your own or use some of the paintings found in Shakespeare Illustrated. Think about the information that is presented in a newspaper: date, name of publication, contents, contributors, etc... You can use Word or another piece of software for a print edition, or you may decide to present your paper as a wall display or a web page - discuss your plan with your teacher.

Take time to read the other editions of the paper from the other groups in your class. What was similar? Different? What did you like about some of the other issues? Record your feelings in your journal. Another idea would be to present your articles as a current affairs or news program instead of a newspaper. Along with sharing your writing with the class, you may want to do some 'mock interviews'. This would take careful preparation and more time, but doing a Barbara Walters Special with Puck or Bottom could be very entertaining for the class. As well, you would need to know these characters inside-out in order to pull this off.