Citizen Journalism Lesson PDF

**CITIZEN JOURNALISM** **Lesson Overview:** This lesson is focus on n this lesson, we are going to look more closely at the two main types of citizen journalists and talk about the ways that ordinary citizens can get involved. **Learning Objective:** At the end of the lesson, the student will be...

**CITIZEN JOURNALISM** **Lesson Overview:** This lesson is focus on n this lesson, we are going to look more closely at the two main types of citizen journalists and talk about the ways that ordinary citizens can get involved. **Learning Objective:** At the end of the lesson, the student will be able to know about the rights and responsibilities of citizen journalists and talk about the advantages and disadvantages of having more voices in the media. **Main Lesson:** **Citizen journalism** refers to the way that ordinary members of the public, not professional journalists, collect and distribute information via the Internet. By doing this, citizen journalists can give ordinary people a voice. There are two main ways that the general public can become citizen journalists: by working on their own and by working with news organizations The first type of citizen journalism is where citizen journalists work on their own, not affected by traditional media. Citizen journalists are not adding to articles that already exist. They are creating something by themselves. There are two main ways that people can do this: through social media or by creating a blog or website. Many people have a social media account such as Facebook or Twitter. By publishing photographs and opinions and sharing stories, the public can help to report what is going on in the world. During the Arab Spring in Egypt in 2011, protesters used social media to coordinate their demonstrations against the government. When a person feels strongly about an issue, they might create their own blog or website, to share their opinions with other people. This is an opportunity for someone to write more or to continue with the same topic over a period of time. With a website, a citizen journalist can use different types of media to communicate their news - Commenting on articles - Crowdsourcing - live blogging **Commenting on articles** Commenting on articles refers to the comment that readers make on an online news article. You can give your opinion on the topic or comment on the article itself. Other readers can reply to your comment as well as the original article. **Crowdsourcing** **Crowdsourcing** means using a crowd, a lot of people to work on a project. In journalism, it means asking the general public to provide additional information to complete a story. Journalists usually do this when a task is very big and needs many people. For example, if a very long document, too long for one person to read is made public, a newspaper might ask its readers to each read a part, to check the facts or look for details. **Live blogging** Live blogging occurs when something happening live such as a concert, a political meeting, a sports match or a severe weather event like a snowstorm. If we take the example of a snowstorm, online newspapers will ask the readers to send in stories of how the snow is affecting them, along with photographs of the snow. Readers might also talk about travel delays or places being closed. **ETHICS IN THE DIGITAL AGE** **The Responsibilities of Citizen Journalists** Citizen journalists also have responsibilities. They should think about some of the same principles of journalism as professional journalists when they write. When they write an article or post on a blog, they should think about originality (not copying someone else\'s work) and fairness. They should also be concerned about impacting people. They should consider humanity, respect for others and empowerment, giving power to those who do not have it. Having more voices in the media means the **democratization** of journalism. **Democratization** means ordinary people have more power. In journalism, it means that more people have an opportunity to tell the world what they think. This is certainly true in the digital age. People can use blogs and social media to share their ideas with the world much more easily than before the internet existed. However, this has both advantages and disadvantages, meaning both good things and bad things. **THE ADVANTAGES OF THE DEMOCRATIZATION OF JOURNALISM** The main advantage is we can see more events happen in more places. Because of technology like smartphones, anyone can record what they see and broadcast it to the world. This means that when people see powerful people causing problems. At a rally or a demonstration for example, they are in a good position to record and share it. A lot of the video and images that professional journalists use are filmed by citizen journalists, who are at the scene. Citizen journalists can help professional journalists in this way. Another advantage is that citizen journalists do not have to worry about how many readers or viewers they get. Global professional news organizations have to think about the size of their audience, how many clicks each article or video gets. A citizen journalist can cover any story, even those that might not be very popular. In this way stories that normally do not get any attention will be told. **THE DISADVANTAGES OF THE DEMOCRATIZATION OF JOURNALISM** The disadvantage of democratization of the news media is that nobody\'s checking what is written. Citizen journalists have to check themselves. And this is not always successful. Their articles can be badly written, much too long, or simply not true sometimes. A good example happened in 2008 when a citizen journalist reported that Steve Jobs, the founder of Apple suffered a heart attack. Apple stock fell 10% in 10 minutes, until people realized that the report was false. A report from a professional journalist would have been edited and checked before it was published, avoiding this problem. **Enrichment Activity:** Create a short video via Tiktok video hosting reporting a significant incident in your community **References:** Ceciliano-Jose (2010). *Campus Journalism and School Paper Advising.* Manila, Philippines: Rex Book Store Saleh, Naveed (2013).The *Complete Guide to Article Writing: How to Write Successful Articles for Online and Print Markets.* Ohio, USA: Writer's Digest Books Keeble, Richard (2006). *The Newspapers Handbook.* New York, USA: Routledge Rich, Carole (2010). Writing and Reporting News: A Coaching Method. Boston, MA: Wadsworth Soriano, Marcelo Jr.F. , Velina, Lieza B. Undergraduate thesis,*" The Newspaper Reading Habits of Sophomore AB Engliah Students.* Pangasinan State University, Lingayen Campus. 2018 Bravante, Errol C. , et al. Undergraduate Thesis," *Student Publications of Pangasinan State University-PSU-Lingayen Campus.*2018. [[www.cyberjournalism.net]](http://www.cyberjournalism.net) [[www.freedomforum.org]](http://www.freedomforum.org) [[www.writerswrite.com]](http://www.writerswrite.com) [[www.journalism.net.com]](http://www.journalism.net.com) [[www.npc.press.org/about/ethics.cfm]](http://www.npc.press.org/about/ethics.cfm) [[www.cyberjournalist.net]](http://www.cyberjournalist.net) [[www.journalistoolbox.com]](http://www.journalistoolbox.com) [[www.powerreporting.com]](http://www.powerreporting.com) [[www.newspaperlinks.com]](http://www.newspaperlinks.com) [[www.natpress.org]](http://www.natpress.org) [MOOC English Journalism]