Chapter 6 - Writing News Story Leads

What name is given to the beginning of a news story?

• Introduction

• lead

• opener

• summary

Which of the following does not describe an effective lead?

• has impact

• usually one sentence

• comes to the point slowly

• grabs the reader

How are facts arranged in inverted pyramid style?

• less important to more important

• more important to less important

• slowly building to the most interesting facts

• crucial facts equally spaced throughout story

Which of the following is not an advantage of inverted pyramid writing?

• natural way to tell a story

• enables the hurried reader to get important information quickly

• aids the headline writer

• gets unimportant information out of the way first

How do news reporters maintain their objectivity?

• by keeping their opinions out of their stories

• by eliminating unimportant facts

• by presenting their views in the lead

• by using inverted pyramid writing consistently

What type of lead presents the most important information in the first sentence?

• astonisher

• parody

• cartridge

• summary

Why are summary leads and inverted pyramid writing waning in importance?

• they take too long to get to the point

• they are too easy to write

• newspapers are shifting from hard to soft news

• television uses them too frequently

What is wrong with the following lead?

With the cherry trees along the Potomac in full blossom and a soft breeze carrying warm, perfumed air from the south, a tan and vigorous President Roosevelt announce late Friday afternoon that U.S. troops had won another critical sea battle in the South Pacific.

• incorrect grammar

• lack of concrete detail

• insufficient content

• wastes the reader's time

What important error spoils the following lead?

Calling all senior! The senior prom will take place on May 9 at 8:00p.m. in the beautifully renovated Grand Ballroom of the Belden-Stratford Hotel.

• incorrect punctuation

• sentence fragment

• incorrect subject-verb agreement

• incorrect pronoun reference

How might the following lead be improved?

The Parents' Club announced yesterday the formation of a task force to handle the school's most important problems.

• add specific, concrete details

• make the lead briefer

• add general information

• rewrite it as an astonisher lead