BlueNose Edutainment

Your students can earn INTERNATIONAL TRAVEL SCHOLARSHIP CREDITS... and more by simply participating in a nationwide writing initiative.

JANUARY 2012 STUDENT TRAVEL CREDIT ACTIVITY

                            "BEST SPORTS HEADLINE"

                  Entry Deadline:  February 1, 2012

                         PRIZES(one entry per student)

• Every student entry automatically receives a $50 BrightSpark International Student Travel Credit!
• Winning entry wins an Apple iPad!!

“The importance of headlines cannot be understated.”

Merlin R. Mann

The title of a newspaper story is called a headline. Choosing the right headline is an important job. The headline will bring readers to a story and prepare them for it. If you take a look at the pages of the sports section of a newspaper, you’ll see that headlines and photos naturally draw your eye to them. 

A great headline is short, clear, and clever. The best headlines are remembered by readers for years. When the Boston Red Sox won the pennant in 2004, the headline in the Boston Globe was simply “Yes!!!” No one in Boston will ever forget that headline. 

Sometimes journalists and editors make mistakes in headlines. The worst mistakes are spelling or grammar errors. These errors will embarrass the writer, the editor, and other people on the newspaper or magazine. Readers will have less respect for the newspaper and the journalist after seeing a botched headline.

Another kind of error is making a headline unclear or confusing by being too brief or too clever. If the headline does not provide enough information or is confusing, a reader might ignore the story. The reader might also have a misunderstanding of what the story is about, especially if the headline doesn’t match the tone of the story. This misunderstanding might affect how the reader enjoys the story or whether or not the reader even looks at the story.

When creating a headline, it is important to follow the style of the newspaper or other outlet for which you are writing. The Associated Press style book contains guidelines that many newspapers follow. It will help to become familiar with the AP rules. Examples of the AP rules include: use single quotes rather than double quotes for headlines; use periods only for abbreviations in a headline; and capitalize shortened versions of important events like the Derby for the Kentucky Derby. Some writers and editors borrow key words from a story to create a headline. This can be an effective strategy, but you should avoid borrowing phrases from the lead paragraph of the story. Headlines are most effective when they use the active voice: “Crosby leads Penguins within 1 win of Cup finals” 

When you create a headline, think about your typical audience. If you write mostly for a local newspaper or a magazine about a specific sport, you can use words, phrases, and abbreviations that the readers can be expected to understand. Seeing the word ‘Topes means nothing to people in most of the country and around the world. In Albuquerque, New Mexico, almost everyone knows this is the nickname of the minor league baseball team, the Isotopes. If you write for a national audience, then you should stay with names that people know. The headline “World No. 1 Henin quits pro tennis” is written for a national audience. It assumes very little special knowledge on the part of the reader. It tells what the sport is, who the person is, and what the person did. Merlin Mann is an associate professor of journalism at Abilene Christian University. He has proposed some questions that should be asked about every headline.

The TACT Test: Taste-Attractiveness-Clarity-Truth (Ask these questions of each headline): 

1.  Is it in good taste? Anything offensive in any way? Can anything be taken a wrong way?

2.  Does it attract the reader's attention? How can it be improved without sacrificing accuracy?

3.  Does it communicate clearly, quickly? Any confusion? Any odd words, double meanings?

4.  Is it accurate, true? Proper words used? Is the thrust of subject-verb true?

5.  A single "NO" above is a veto. One "No" vote represents thousands of readers. Start over: rethink the headline from the beginning.

Your Assignment

Using a newspaper, magazine, or the Internet, compare some different sports headlines. If possible, have one or more friends join you and evaluate the headlines. Identify the headlines you think are better than others and decide what makes them good or bad. Compare the headlines from different sports, different newspapers, and if possible, different times (headlines today versus those from long ago). 

Knowledge Link

The University of Kansas is known for many things. One of them is the William Allen White School of Journalism & Mass Communication. The Web page below comes from this renowned school of journalism and provides some great tips about writing headlines.

Submitting Your Entry 

Once you have selected your favorite headline and article, simply mail your headline and article to the following address (postmarked no later than February 1, 2012):

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