Inspired by the writers of the Bernards High School publication, The Crimson, the fourth grade students of Bedwell Elementary School created a newspaper of their own. Mr. Thurlow, teacher of technology and design at Bedwell, guided the young aspiring journalists.
While all of the fourth grade classes crafted a newspaper, The Crimson staff looked specifically at the articles from Mr. Reed’s students, with the paper cleverly named 4-Reed Report: You gotta Reed it! The featured articles catered to their peers at Bedwell, covering a variety of topics such as LEGO, sports, and school-related news. The students also conducted a series of interviews with other students, teachers, and new vice principal Mr. Keri.
Fourth graders Margot and Gwen described their process of interviewing Mr. Keri: they formulated questions about his life, kids, and new position at Bedwell before meeting with him in his office to record his responses.
The 4-Reed Report further included an extensive sports section that analyzed the accumulative successes of New York sports teams, from the New York Yankees to the Harlem Globetrotters. Once the students’ articles were fully written, Mr. Thurlow guided them to organize a layout on google slides. On a google slideshow, the students organized their articles in columns and added graphics and/or pictures.
In late October, the staff of The Crimson met with Mr. Thurlow and his writers over Zoom to discuss their different approaches to producing the newspapers. Advanced students of The Crimson shared information and advice on all that goes into the publication: one Editor-in-Chief, Meghan Shelley ‘23, shared the process of composing articles, Entertainment Editor, Ava Highland, discusses the details of layout for the print issues, and another Editor-in-Chief, Matt Lesnik, taught them about the online site and The Crimson Podcast.
The fourth grade students were also given the opportunity to pose any questions, whether simply out of curiosity or in the interest of improving the 4-Reed Report. Writers of The Crimson responded to queries ranging from the cost of each publication, what qualifies as a strong and timely article idea, to the amount of time it takes for papers to fall into the hands of the high school students.
This virtual meeting exposed a younger generation of writers to the complexities of an established, small-scale newspaper. It served as an educational opportunity for the students of Bedwell to learn about ways to better enhance their writing style as well as their overall paper.
Many of the fourth graders expressed their enthusiasm over this new journalistic endeavor. “I hope it’s something we can keep on doing, I really enjoyed it,” said Noah, a new Bedwell student and contributor to the 4-Reed Report. Fulfilling popular demand, Mr. Thurlow intends to continue the program every few months over the course of the school year. The staff of The Crimson looks forward to seeing what lies ahead for these fourth grade newspapers and their young writers!
