The order a summary is built in
Six lines of a news summary, out of order. Put them into the order a report is built in.
- The authors did not claim that, and said attainment data was not yet available.
- A university team published a study on Monday on school start times.
- A department spokesperson said timetabling decisions were for individual schools.
- Several headlines said the study showed that later starts improve exam results.
- The head teachers’ association welcomed the finding and called for a national trial.
- It reported that pupils in later-starting schools slept twenty-three minutes longer.
Somebody presenting a story properly
The school start times study
There is a story this week about school start times, and it is a good example of how a study becomes a headline.
A university team published a study on Monday. They followed about four thousand pupils in fourteen schools over two years, and found that pupils in schools starting an hour later slept, on average, twenty-three minutes longer.
The headlines said the study showed that later starts improve exam results. The study does not say that. The authors were careful: they reported the sleep finding, said that attainment data was not yet available, and suggested that any effect on results would need a longer study.
The head teachers’ association welcomed the finding and called for a national trial. A department spokesperson said that decisions on timetabling were for individual schools, which is true and is also a way of not answering.
What I would want to know is who chose the fourteen schools. The paper says they volunteered. Schools that volunteer for a sleep study are not a random sample of schools, and the authors say so on page nine — which is nine pages further than any headline got.
Three questions about how the presentation is built.
1. What does the third paragraph do?
2. Why is the department’s answer described as "a way of not answering"?
3. What is the critical move in the last paragraph?
Four moves of a critical summary
The presentation made four moves: what was published, and by whom · what it actually found, in its own terms · what was said about it, attributed · the question you would want answered, aimed at method rather than conclusion.
The fourth move is what separates engagement from agreement or complaint.
Eight phrases. Match each to the move it makes.
Two minutes of assembly
Seven gaps. Choose the verb or form the sentence around it requires.
A university team a study on Monday. They that pupils in later-starting schools slept longer. Several newspapers that this improved exam results; the authors making that claim. They that attainment data not yet available, and that a longer study would be needed.
Five sentences of the kind that appear when somebody is summarising at speed.
1. The study revealed that later starts might improve results. — nothing was established
2. The authors denied to have claimed it.
3. The newspapers accused the authors to exaggerate.
4. A spokesperson said me that it was a matter for schools.
5. The association welcomed the finding and asked for a national trial to be happened.
Present it to the desk
How the twenty-six minutes run. Four minutes alone, twelve in threes, eight for the swap, two to move.
Stage 1 · Alone · 4 minutes
Prepare a story you have actually read this week. If you have not read one, read one now — four minutes is enough for a news piece.
Five claims on paper, each with a source attached.
- What happened, and who published or announced it.
- Three claims, each attributed to a named person or organisation.
- One thing that is disputed, with both sides attributed.
- One question you would want answered, aimed at how something was measured, chosen or counted.
Stage 2 · Threes · 4 minutes each
Present your story. The other two are the desk, and may ask two questions only.
Four minutes each, with interruptions. Repair on the spot.
- Desk question one: "who says that?" — any time a claim arrives unattributed.
- Desk question two: "how do they know?" — any time a source is named but the evidence is not.
- Presenter: answer and carry on. Do not restart.
- Desk: keep a count of question one. That number is the useful one.
Stage 3 · The swap · 8 minutes
Four minutes each. Present somebody else’s story — one you heard for the first time twenty minutes ago.
Report a story you do not own, with every attribution intact.
- You will not remember every source. Where you cannot attribute, say so rather than filling the gap.
- Use at least four different reporting verbs, and be ready to justify each.
- The person whose story it is listens and afterwards corrects your attributions — not your facts.
- Note which claims you accidentally promoted from "somebody said" to "it is the case".
What got promoted
Two questions.
1. In stage 3, what happened to claims you had heard once?
2. What does that tell you about how you stored them?
The source travels with the claim
Two questions. Twenty seconds.
1. What is the strongest kind of critical question?
2. Why do claims lose their sources?
Next. The errors this area produces — and why the expensive ones are invisible to the person making them.