Mrs. Kelly’s Journalism class visited Mrs. Colosa’s fifth grade class at Daniel Street Elementary school on Thursday, February 13th to workshop articles and encourage the young students to continue writing articles on the topics they care about.

The afternoon was filled with games, brainstorming, and conversations about their articles and how to improve them. First, the students listed different components of a ‘good’ article, going over key factors such as good grammar, honesty, and a hook statement or title that grabs the attention of a reader. From there, the journalists from Mrs. Kelly’s class were paired with journalists from Mrs. Colosa’s class based on certain categories; trending, entertainment, sports, animals, and school happenings. The groups played a game about creating catchy headlines called “Man Bites Dog!” to break the ice, putting together goofy headlines together using different cards.

From there, students moved on to workshopping their articles. Articles were written about a range of topics, from screen time to environmental issues, and from recess to Little League. The Jr. Journalists got to ask the high school students about the issues that they faced while writing, and Journalists from the Charles Street Times taught the younger students about the proper way to include quotes in their articles, about the ‘inverted pyramid’ structure of articles, and other helpful information. 

“Collaborating with the Daniel Street 5th graders for our Jr. Journalism project is definitely one of the highlights of the year,” commented  Mrs. Kelly. “Not only was it a fun experience to visit Mrs. Colosa’s classroom, but it was a learning experience as well. In addition to helping the students with their writing and teaching them a lesson, the CST staff got to refine their editing and publishing skills in the process.”  

Mrs. Colosa agreed. “The Jr. Journalism project was such a powerful experience for my fifth graders. To be able to learn from the high school students as an amazing opportunity. My students were so impressed with the feedback they were given and many of them are looking forward to one day being able to join the staff of The Charles Street Times. We all can’t wait to see the finished project!”

The Jr. Journalist’s articles from this collaboration are currently published and linked below.