Assignments
EFFORT
Never be satisfied with less than your best. Count
on at least 6 hours of homework outside class per week.
Failure to complete all assignments will result in an E for the
class.
DEADLINES
Deadlines are sacred in this class,
as they are in the real world of journalism. If you can’t make a
deadline, you must let me know before the due date. Otherwise, late
work will be penalized at the rate of 25 percent of your grade per day. There’s
no penalty for turning an assignment in early!
Assignments are due at the beginning of class. Put
digital assignments in the appropriate JMC 460 folder. Print out written
assignments before class (Repeat: Do NOT print
them during class) and put them in the folder on the table in the front
of the classroom. Don’t wait to be asked.
In-class assignments are due at the end of class or at a prescribed
date and time. Check the schedule.
You’ll have a chance to revise projects intended for publication. Assignments
are due on the first deadline, not the revision deadline. That
doesn’t
mean turning in garbage on the first deadline. Work hard to turn in an
excellent project the first time. You can raise your grade a
maximum of one letter on the revision IF you go beyond just
making my suggestions and greatly improve your project.
WORKLOAD
Per ASU guidelines, a student taking a three-credit course should expect
to spend at least an additional six hours a week on coursework
outside the classroom.
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Will Kirkland A sea lion sunbathes on
a mangrove-framed beach.
DESIGN & CSS
PROJECTS (150 points)
These graded exercises will help you improve your skills with CSS, design
and Photoshop.
- Font Poem (25 points)
- Visual Puns / Name Logos (25 points)
- Typography in Photoshop (35 points)
- Text in CSS (15 points)
- Abe Lincoln Web page design (50 points)
ZINE LOGO, HOME PAGE & STORY PAGE (team
= 50 points)
Your team will design a logo, home page and story page for the Cronkite
Zine using Photoshop and CSS. Some of you might not be keen on teamwork,
but online journalism is highly collaborative. Employers look for someone
who can work on a team, handle deadline pressure and complete a task
with grace.
TWO
WAYS OF SEEING
(25 points)
As National Geographic photographer Sam Abell does, take time with the
subjects you photograph. Photograph them in different ways. Turn in your
three best pairs.
SLIDESHOWS
(120 points)
Turn audio and visuals into two dazzling slideshows (40 points for first
slideshow, 80 points for second slideshow).
DATA VISUALIZATION (25
points)
Create a poll, survey or other type of data visualization (but not
a word cloud or map). Easy. No programming required.
MAP
MASHUP (50 points)
Produce a map mashup with
extras, such as text, photos and/or audio.
SEO HEADLINES (25
points)
The headline exercise will give you practice with SEO.
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Cecil Schwalbe Endemic to the islands,
the Galapagos
hawk is one of the few land predators.
SHORT
LIST
Love it or hate it, list journalism drives traffic to your site. According
to a Poynter
article, “Want to be featured
or get the top buzz on Yahoo? Make a list. Want to drive
page views and lower your bounce rate? Make
a list. Want to get tweeted? Make a list. Want to get
stories written about your organization? Make a list.”
Here are sites that have used lists successfully:
• Forbes
• U.S.
News
• Time’s
Best Sites
• Cosmo
• Mashable Lists
• Mashable
Design Lists
FLASH
(75
points)
Create a Flash timeline or another type of Flash interactive.
FROM
SCRIPT TO ONLINE STORY (25
points)
Many news organizations are requiring reporters to write a text
version of their video script.
MEDIASTORM-STYLE
VIDEO
(150 points)
Show us your skills by shooting and editing
a 1:50 to 3:00 personality profile done only in video. Take us as far as
you can! For those of you with video experience,
let us challenge you to produce a MediaStorm-type video with still photos,
words and/or video. Make this production good enough to show prospective
employers.
CRONKITE ZINE (50
points)
As
a class, we’ll
produce the Cronkite
Zine, which will showcase your work and that of other Cronkite
students. The zine has won awards in the online magazine category
of a national student magazine contest for several years in a row.
Let’s
keep up the winning tradition!
BLOG FOR THE ZINE
You’ll contribute to a blog that details
the creation of the zine. Blog posts do not need to be long, but they
do need to say something. Each post will be graded on the following
elements:
- writing style (conversational, interesting to
your audience)
- content (accurate, reflective, insightful, informative,
engaged with the issues raised through readings and/or class activities)
- quality and relevance of links
- mechanics (correct grammar, spelling, punctuation,
AP style)
- multimedia (your own photos, audio and videoblog)
- traffic to your site
- comments on your posts
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QUIZZES (75
points)
We’ll have two so you can show how us much you’re learning.
They’ll
review what we cover in class as well as what you read.
MIDTERMS & FINAL
There won’t be any. Instead, we’ll focus on honing
your skills and producing publishable work, including a fabulous piece
for your multimedia portfolio.
CLASS
PARTICIPATION (50 points)
Class
participation is important too. You’ll
be encouraged to express your thoughts and contribute to every discussion.
Respect for other’s
feelings, beliefs and values is essential to the success of the class,
so please be considerate of your classmates’ different backgrounds
and experiences. Much of what you’ll do in the day-to-day professional
world will involve dealing with people. I welcome honest feedback,
which I try to respond to as best I can.
IF YOU MISS CLASS
Make arrangements with a classmate to show you any new software
skills.
A positive attitude,
extra effort and constructive criticism will help your grade. Whining
won’t.
Participation also means paying attention during class. It means
showing me respect by not talking to your neighbor while I’m
talking or your classmates are talking. It also means putting down
the mouse and not working on other projects while I’m talking
or your classmates are talking.
MASTERY (50 points)
At the end of the semester you’ll receive up to 50 points for your
mastery of the subject matter and skills we’ve covered this semester.
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