MATERIAL PRODUCTION FOR CLASSROOM:

USING NEWSPAPER IN THE CLASSROOM.

Teaching materials form an important part of most English teaching programmes.

From textbooks, videotapes and pictures to Internet, teachers rely heavily on a
diverse range of materials to support their teaching and students learning.
Materials development involves the process of providing input to the learners in
various forms and providing opportunities to exploit the materials for language
acquisition and learning.
The material should attract and sustain motivation and internet of learners make
learners use language for a real purpose make learners feel confident and at ease.
The advent of computers, Internet, Technology has brought a lot of change in the
educational system. Today the teaching is turning out to be more & more learner
centered and technology oriented. Internet websites provide innumerable amount
of sources from where one can acquire the material.
Newspapers can provide one of the most comprehensive resources to help a child
become a reader. Once a child learns letter names and sounds, then sight words, he
or she becomes more fluent and can move more quickly through text,
accomplishing more difficult reading tasks such as learning new vocabulary and
understanding what is read.

This paper presents a discussion about the use of newspaper in classroom as a

teaching mate MATERIAL PRODUCTION FOR CLASSROOM: USING NEWSPAPER
IN THE CLASSROOM.

Teaching materials form an important part of most English teaching programmes. From
textbooks, videotapes and picture to Internet, teachers rely heavily on a diverse range of
materials to support their teaching and their students learning.
Material development involves the process of providing input to the learners in various forms
and providing opportunities to exploit the materials for language acquisition and learning.
The material should attract and sustain motivation and interest of learners, make learners use
language for a real purpose , make learners feel confident and at ease.
The advent of Computers and Internet has brought a lot of change in the educational system.
Today the teaching is turning out to be more and more learner centered and technology oriented.
Internet websites provide innumerable amount of material on every topic. There are a number of
sources from where one can acquire the material. One such source is Newspaper.
Newspapers can provide one of the most comprehensive resources to help a child become a
reader. Once a child learns letter names and sounds, then sight words, he or she becomes more
fluent and can move more quickly through text, accomplishing more difficult reading tasks such
as learning new vocabulary and understanding what is read.
Newspapers help keep us informed about what is happening in the world, thereby extending our
knowledge and deepening our understanding. For this reason they are of general educational
value and importance to learners.
Paul Sanderson opines that:

Newspaper are an invaluable source of authentic materials and their use in the language
classrooms is very much in keeping with current thinking and practice in teaching pedagogy.1
Newspapers can be used to teach various skills. A number of activities can be made to teach
these language skills like LSRW ad further to create reading proficiency critical to children to
learn to read like phonemic awareness, phonemics, fluency, vocabulary, speaking etc.
They also provide a constantly changing source of non-fiction reading material, a key need in
many schools and help learners hone critical thinking skills. If used in a more inspiring way,
newspapers can help learners to develop not only reading skills but also writing , grammar,
vocabulary and speaking skills.
As stated by Paul Sanderson:
Newspaper items are conveniently self-contained units which vary in length from a short
paragraph to a complete page or more. This is particularly helpful feature for teachers, in that it
offers them a great deal of flexibility when planning lessons and selecting material to meet
certain criteria, eg: The length of the newspaper items, the complexity of the language, the
diversity of information, the subject-matter and content, the lesson time available and the level of
students.2
This feature of newspaper is also helpful to students, who can measure and increase their reading
tolerance, progressing from very short items, perhaps for detailed study, the students tangible,
on-going targets to aim for in their reading.
The newspaper is used in the classroom with the followings aims:
1. To provide teachers with practical and creative ideas which exploit all the different
sections of newspaper.
2. To enable teachers to meet the diverse needs and interest of their learners, using
newspaper material which engage and challenge them.
3. To provide learners with purposeful and valuable language practice through newspaperbased activities and tasks which develop reading, writing , speaking and writing skills.
4. To instill in learners a positive and comfortable attitude towards working with Englishlanguage newspapers, and towards reading generally in English, both inside and outside
the classroom.

5. To promote extensive reading by giving learners the confidence, the motivation and the
ability to continue their reading outside the classroom.
With the above aims in mind the teacher starts collecting the material which is an on-going
process, but it is worth devoting some time to collect and file specific categories of
newspaper extracts. This will ensure that you have a good supply of materials you need when
you wish to use the activities in the class.
When you are searching for materials, it is helpful to keep several activities in mind that you
wish to try out at a future date.
The key points with material collection are to plan in advance, and to throw nothing away
until you are absolutely sure it is of no use.
It is necessary and helpful to ask a few questions while choosing suitable newspaper
materials to use with the learners. For example:
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.

Will the students find the materials interesting?

Are the materials appropriate for the learners in terms of their existing knowledge?
Are the materials appropriate for the learners in terms of language level?
Should I use only materials from todays newspaper?
Can I use newspaper materials which are not from English-language newspapers?

All these factors are interrelated and most deciding factors in the selection of suitable
newspaper materials.
Once you start collecting the material the next important aspect is organizing the material
you have collected.
Once you start the collection and have amassed a formidable collection, it would be
frustrating to note that you have the article for tomorrows lesson but not sure where uou last
saw it, It is therefore important to devise and implement a system of organizing which suits
you to make sure that materials are handy enough to use. Some possible ways to organize the
material are:
1. Newspaper sections.
2. Themes and topics.
3. Language skills.

4. Language systems.
5. Language level.
After having collected the material and filed in a proper organized manner it is necessary to
prepare the newspaper material for the classroom.
It is important to note that the presentation and appearance of teaching materials play a
significant role in motivating learners to read. Technical details such as the use of
photographs and illustrations, the print size and the layout all combine to help make learners
want to read, and to enjoy what they read. It is therefore essential to take time to produce
materials which are as attractive and inviting as possible.
When you are preparing materials for one class, you should do so with the intention of using
them with other suitable classes in the future. This will enable to build up a bank of highquality, reusable materials, and this will ultimately reduce day-to-day preparation time.
The next stage is to preserve the material that you have prepared carefully for future use. The
problem of mislaying or losing the materials can easily be avoided by following a few guidelines
like:
1.
2.
3.
4.

Making master-copies.
Labeling master-copies.
Storing master-copies.
Protecting original materials.

There are four key ways teachers can successfully use newspaper materials with learners:
1.
2.
3.
4.

Pre-activity preparation.
Careful selection of materials.
Careful design of tasks.
Recycling materials.

Once the material is ready for use the next important aspect the teacher needs to plan is the
activities and classifying the activities into various heads.
The activities using newspapers can be classified into the following heads:
1. Headlines
2. Articles

3. Photographs
4. Advertisements
5. Horoscopes
6. Problem page letters
7. T.v. guides
8. Cartoons and cartoon strips
9. Weather forecasts
10. The whole newspaper.
Now that we have seen so much about material production and using newspaper in the
classroom it is important to see the advantages of using newspaper in the classroom.
There are a number of advantages of using newspapers in the language classroom:
1. General educational value
2. Cultural information
3. Language change
4. Varieties of English
5. Reader interest
6. Reading for pleasure
7. Authentic materials
8. Subject-specific materials
9. Teaching materials
10. Multi-level
11. Lesson planning.
In the end, teachers must weigh up the benefits and costs of designing their own teaching
materials and make their own decision as to whether it is worth the time and effort.
Using the newspaper bridges the gap between classroom learning and real-world living, helps
foster global awareness and understanding of local issues, creates informed citizens, offers
examples of conflict and resolution and foster reading, thinking and writing skills.
Hence, if prepared and used carefully newspaper provide the language teacher with a very good
source of material that can be used to develop efficiency in English language.

rial to teach language.