There are many ways a newspaper can help the young people in its community learn about the right of both the newspaper and its readers to express an opinion, and to engage in that right.
A WORLD OF IDEAS
Various activities are taking place all over the world that you can join and recreate in the classroom. For example, the international press freedom foundation, Loesje is hosting freedom of expression workshops around the world and so can you. Two French students are raising awareness about human rights and freedom of speech abuses in China ahead of this summer's Olympic Games and so can students in your area. And everwhere, students can send a postcard of protest in support of Shi Tao, the jailed Chinese journalist who was awarded WAN's Golden Pen of Freedom. We've included below a few suggestions of what else young people can do to observe the day. If you have other ideas, please let us know so we can spread the word. Just write us at youngreader@wan.asso.fr
INITIATE A PRESS FREEDOM POSTER CONTEST In Mongolia, hundreds of children from around the country sent in entries for a Press Freedom Poster contest organized by the national association of private newspapers. Here's an idea for how to organize a poster contest in your country to link with this year's WAN China campaign.
1. Students can choose one journalist jailed Chinese journalist and create a poster calling for that person's release. Read the profiles here.
2. Host a press freedom poster design contest. Send PDFs of the winning posters to WAN at nie@wan.asso.fr and we'll share them with the world.
3. Students can use or adapt any of the cartoons and images at www.worldpressfreedomday.org or to create their own. Click on the picture at right to see examples of posters WAN designed to protest China's treatment of journalists.
LEARNING WHY PRESS FREEDOM MATTERS Each year, WAN publishes thoughtful texts on the theme of Press Freedom, including those by the rock singer and activist Bono, the Dali Lama and Marianne Pearl, widow of the murdered journalist Daniel Pearl (from 2004). To see these and other texts, click here.
ON THE DAY: WHAT TO DO WITH NEWSPAPERS ON 3 MAY
Check the paper on Press Freedom Day
1. Students can read the newspaper on 3 May to see if and how it observes Press Freedom Day.
2. Write a letter to the editor commenting on the May 3 stories and editorials.
3. Send WAN copies of May 3 stories you find and of your letters via e-mail to nie@wan.asso.fr or post to WAN, 7 rue Geoffroy St. Hilaire, 75005 Paris, France
Some quick explorations with the newspaper
o Students can create an instant press freedom poster using only words and images they cut out from the day's paper. Send the best one to the local paper and explain what you did and why.
o Students can find three items in today's paper that they think a government would like to suppress. Talk about why it's important for the public to learn about such things.
OTHER WAYS OF GIVING A VOICE TO CHILDREN
Even without a massive public campaign, a paper can encourage students to learn about the importance of expressing their opinions.
One way of doing this is to organize activities around political cartoons and writing letters to editors for primary and secondary schools in the community. The key, though, is that it cannot be a boring civics project but rather something a bit audacious and passionately pertinent to the young.
Here are some ideas and steps for such a project:
1. As soon as possible, the paper should start announcing the project with short descriptions of Press Freedom Day, why it is cool and the details of how a the school class should prepare letters to the editor or editorial cartoons, including the deadline and that the best will be published on 3 May.
2. The WAN 3-May site has good text and graphics for such announcements.
3. It would be useful to create a slogan to encourage the schools to participate and to repeat this slogan in each announcement. Again, WAN's 3 May site should give you some ideas.
4. The newspaper needs to tell the schools that the letters to the editor and political cartoons should focus on Press Freedom and reflect what students think about this right and about its importance to them (or perhaps its seeming irrelevance).
5. On the publication day just before World Press Freedom Day, the newspaper can announce that the students' letters and graphics on Press Freedom will be published on 3 May.
6. On 3 May, the students' letters and cartoons are published next to the newspaper's own editorial or materials about this day.
7. Publishers might consider other actions, such as sending a certificate to each school that sent a letter or cartoon, recognizing its contribution to the World Press Freedom Day. This is especially appropriate for primary schools.
8. Let us know how it went by writing us at nie@wan.asso.fr. If you like, you can send tearsheets by post to WAN, 7 rue Geoffroy St. Hilaire, 75005 Paris, France
As an extension to this activity, the newspaper can suggest that young people take their advocacy even further by sending a protest letter in support of a jailed or officially harrassed Africa journalist or news oreganization via RAP21, WAN's bi-lingual site for the Africa press (in English and French):
http://www.rap21.org
BACKGROUND ON PRESS FREEDOM
http://www.worldpressfreedomday.org
This site has political cartoons, essays, statistics, public service advertisements and more on the topic of press freedom successes and challenges from the World Association of Newspapers. This year's campaign focuses on China to highlight the severe impediments to speaking out.
http://freedomhouse.org/template.cfm?page=251&year=2007
This site has a global map that shows levels of Press Freedom around the world.
http://www.rsf.org/
This site, in French, English and Spanish, also has a Press Freedom world map.
http://www.article19.org/
This site, in French, English, Spanish, Portuguese, Russian, and Arabic, has two maps that show where and what kinds of criminal defamation laws exist in countries around the world and how many reporters have received prison sentences or fines as a result of them.
http://www.ifex.org/es/content/view/full/438/
A listing of links to several dozen media organizations that support freedom of expression.
PRESS FREEDOM IN INTERNATIONAL TEXTS ON HUMAN RIGHTS
Universal Declaration of Human Rights
European Convention on Human Rights
American Convention on Human Rights
African Charter on Human and People's Rights
OPINION IN THE PRESS - some activities and explanations
http://www.media-awareness.ca
The Canadian Media Awareness Network includes writing letters to the editor in its extensive programme of exercises (also in French).
http://www.bangkokpost.com/education/opinion.htm
This Bangkok newspaper has an educational website that includes tips on how to better understand opinion pieces in the newspaper.
http://lfpress.ca/nie/
This Canadian newspaper's exercise examines the role of opinion in the newspaper, and ends with a letter to the editor exercise.
WRITING A LETTER TO THE EDITOR - some activities and explanations
In Argentina, the newspapers of Buenos Aires and the post office joined forces in a campaign to encourage writing letters to the editor. The schools taught pupils how to do it and the post office provided the stamps.
In a small town in the United States, letters to the editor played an important role in an effort to fight an unreasonable curfew. "I'm very much in favor of teachers having students write letters when something has them upset," wrote one NIE coordinator, "and that might be an individual student who got particularly excited one way or the other about a topic, or it might be a chance for a group of students to write a letter together, which would involve collaboration and consensus." The same coordinator argues strongly against having a class write letters if there is no urgent matter at hand.
In the United Kingdom, students began a public campaign to get a skate board ramp that included a letters to the editor campaign.
In Brazil, O Dia newspaper published letters it had encouraged students to write to President Luiz Lula da Silva, that described their lives and problems and offered some possible solutions.Below are some helpful websites that can assist you in teaching young people how they too can write to newspaper editors and even government officials.
http://www.bangkokpost.com/education/postbag.htm
This newspaper also includes a guide on how to convey your thoughts to a newspaper editor.
http://action.aclu.org/site/PageServer?pagename=AP_writing_letters_to_editor
This section of The American Civil Liberties Union illustrates how letters to editors can serve as advocacy tools.
http://www.webenglishteacher.com/drseuss.html
This ESL guide uses the cleverness of "Dr. Seuss" children's stories as a basis for NIE exercises, including writing letters to the editor.
http://www.expats.cz/prague/article/czech-education/prague-efl/
This site provides tips on how to write letters to the editor among other activities as a basis for teaching English as a Second language.
http://www.texnews.com/arn/letter.html
Shows an e-mail format for sending letters to the editor online.
