Facing Ferguson: News Literacy in a Digital Age

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Activity for this Learning List (6/18/2025 - 7/18/2025)

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Day 5: Verifying Breaking News

Description

What challenges do breaking news scenes—especially ones as fast moving and chaotic as Ferguson—present to journalists and consumers of information? In this lesson, students review news accounts about the killing of Michael Brown from the initial days following the shooting to get a sense of the ways that complex stories unfold over time. The journalists in the featured video help to illuminate the idea that it is not only extremely challenging for consumers to sort fact from fiction during a breaking news story, especially one that elicits such strong emotional reactions, it is also challenging—and at times impossible—for journalists to do so.

Note: As this lesson begins to focus on actual accounts from Ferguson, you may want to acknowledge that this content can be emotional and challenging; consider revisiting the classroom contract and earlier discussions about the DJ Jay Smooth video.


Learning Goals:

  • Students will be able to reflect on how the details about an event may change over time and require patience on the part of both journalists and news consumers to get right.
  • Students will be able to understand the challenges facing journalists as they try to cover complex, fast-moving events while managing the pressures of a 24-hour news cycle.
  • Students will be able to appreciate the importance of—and develop strategies for—verifying news and information.

Summary

Essential Questions: How do news stories, details, and facts unfold and change over time? How can creators and consumers of news and information verify the credibility of information about an event?

Anticipated Timeframe: 2 class periods

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