Every week across the Island, hundreds of school children open their copies of The Royal Gazette and listen as their teachers ask them questions about a particular article. This is Newspapers in Education (NIE) in action and The Royal Gazette's Tricia Walters recently caught up with NIE Education Services Coordinator, Jennifer Hind to talk about the programme and its benefits.

NIE has been active in Bermuda's schools for almost a decade. Funded wholly by The Royal Gazette, the programme involves sending (during term time class) sets of newspapers on Tuesdays and Thursdays to all schools - that request them.

"This amounts to between seven and eight thousand newspapers a week. And they are sent free of charge," explains Mrs. Hind.

"Every Tuesday and Thursday I go into work at 7 a.m. and select one or two articles that I think would be of interest to students, or would directly relate to a topic of study and create a worksheet of ten comprehension questions based on the article or articles."

Mrs. Hind elaborates that she may also include maps or additional information that teachers might find useful. These are sent by e-mail before 8 a.m. so that when teachers come to school, they have waiting for them a class set of newspapers and classroom-ready materials to use with the newspapers.

In addition, sets of work sheets that are not time-sensitive have also been created on particular topics.

"These are made available to teachers to create enrichment lessons in a variety of subjects including Mathematics, Social Studies, Science, Business Studies and Language Arts," she explains. "My 18 years as a classroom teacher was a decided advantage at this point. In creating the worksheets, I refer to the Ministry of Education's written curriculum goals and to keep abreast of developments in Education, I attend teacher workshops wherever possible, and confer with Education Officers regularly."

Throughout the school year a variety of materials are created for inclusion in the newspaper itself. This last academic year these included a series of short stories involving Keisha the Mermaid, a series on the Constitution, in celebration of its 40th anniversary, and 16-page supplements on topics like 40 Assets for Youth Development and the History of Hamilton.

Mrs. Hind adds that this year NIE also completed a highly successful Young Observer project, in which once a fortnight throughout the school year, the articles were written by students of a particular school. And for several years now The Royal Gazette has been celebrating the academic success of our young people through its graduates pages.

Teachers are able to bring their students for a tour of the premises to get a better understanding of how a newspaper is actually produced, and Mrs. Hind also visits classrooms to talk about journalism. "Workshops for teachers are held regularly, and this summer I also conducted a teenager journalism course in conjunction with the Bermuda Youth Library," she says.

Why newspapers?

Mrs. Hind explains that newspapers are a high-interest resource, and are accessible to almost all readers — even struggling readers will be able to read the comics or the captions under the photographs — and there's something for everyone, from Annie's Mailbox and the horoscopes to sports and news relating to young people. Even emerging readers can scan the front page to pick out the letters in their name or words they recognise. While many adults may not be familiar with the texts their children are reading in school, they will have read the newspaper and will be able to discuss something they both will have read. The newspaper also opens a window to the world not available in text books.

"The NIE programme is not meant to be a separate, extra programme, but a way of supplementing the textbook and providing real life applications for the academic content," she surmises. "My role is not to tell teachers what to teach, but to provide them with inspiration and suggestions for creating their own lessons to meet the specific needs of their students."

But why teach newspapers? "Well, we teach children how to navigate and interpret poetry, how to enjoy plays, how to write stories. And while most of what is taught in English class is fiction, what the vast majority of people read as part of their everyday lives is non-fiction. Think about it. It's important to teach children how to navigate a newspaper and to read critically. And if the occasion demands, to respond thoughtfully through a letter to the editor."

She adds: "In fact, the NIE programme helps teachers meet specific Ministry of Education goals and is written into the Language Arts Performance Standards. Reading and discussing articles in a newspaper will help children develop skills in comprehending informational texts (news articles), expository writing (features articles), persuasive texts (editorials, reviews, letters to the editor) and documentary and procedural texts (recipes, lists of things to do in case of)."

Does it work?

Mrs. Hind smiles broadly. "In fact, it does!"

She elaborates that an independent study sponsored by the Newspaper Association of America was conducted in 2001 and the findings showed that across the board, students who participated regularly in a Newspaper in Education programme improved their performance on standardised tests.

"These findings, I believe, have implications for Bermuda. The study included 22 newspapers in nine states across the United States whose coverage area included 2,900 schools. The findings included the observation that in schools with few low-income and minority students at the elementary level students scored three percent better on standardised tests if they were involved in NIE, at the middle level students scored ten percent better with NIE and at high school level the students scored seven percent better."

The results were even better for "at risk students". Mrs. Hind says in schools with a high level of low-income and minority students, at the elementary level students scored four percent better on standardised tests with NIE, at the middle school level students scored 13 percent better and at the high school level students scored 9 percent better.

But the ultimate reason The Royal Gazette continues to provide this programme despite the current economic climate is that teachers see a place for NIE in their classroom and students enjoy reading the newspaper.

"Almost all schools participate in the NIE programme in some form," Mrs. Hind concludes.