Journalists need to tell people, as plainly as possible, what is happening in the world. Every story should be fact-based. We must never add our own opinion.
This workshop is presented in two formats, both using the same source material from Media Helping Media. The first is a two-hour workshop designed for those who are already familiar with the topic but who would like to deepen their understanding. The second is a four-hour, half-day workshop for those who are new to the topic.
Trainers are invited to select the format that best meets the needs of those they are training. The source material for this workshop, which focuses on writing style and journalistic discipline, is Editorialising is not for news.
Workshop outline 1: Two-hour session
(For trainees familiar with the topic, focusing on refining practice and deepening understanding.)
09:00–10:00 – Session 1: Defining editorialising and journalistic discipline
- Aims: Define editorialising; establish the core principle of objective news reporting, based on the philosophy that ‘facts are sacred’; understand the critical need for provable accuracy. (Accuracy, in journalism, means ensuring all information is well-sourced, fact-based, and provable, with zero tolerance for inaccuracy.)
- Presentation: Trainer sets out the core function of news reporting: to establish and present facts, free from comment, using fact-based context only. Trainer presents the definition: editorialising is allowing comment, personal opinions, or bias to intrude into a news story. (Bias is a tendency to favour one thing, person, or group over another, often in an unfair way. Journalists must guard against conscious and unconscious biases.)
- Activity: Quick quiz/pair discussion: Trainees receive a short, heavily editorialised news snippet. In pairs, they must identify and mark every word or phrase that introduces opinion or subjective judgement (e.g., ‘shocking’, ‘remarkable’, ‘disgraceful’).
- Discussion: Trainer leads a group discussion on the practical implications of blurring the line between fact and opinion, specifically how it damages the journalist’s and news organisation’s integrity. (Integrity refers to acting honestly and upholding professional standards, resisting outside attempts to manipulate reporting.) The long-term objective is creating trust.
10:00–10:45 – Session 2: Practical steps to uphold impartiality
- Aims: Identify subtle manifestations of editorialising (e.g., emotive language); learn practical techniques to remove subjective judgement from news copy; link ethical standards to writing style.
- Presentation: Trainer explains how editorialising often manifests through adjectives and adverbs that carry emotional or judgemental weight. The key is to avoid language that tells the audience what to think, focusing instead on plain, direct writing.
- Activity: Editorial clean-up exercise: Trainees swap the snippets they marked in Session 1. Each trainee must now rewrite their colleague’s snippet, replacing all subjective words with neutral, factual language, ensuring the resulting copy is strictly fact-based and impartial.
- Discussion: Discuss how this practical avoidance of subjective language relates to upholding impartiality (Impartiality is the requirement to be fair and open-minded, exploring all significant views, rather than taking sides) in reporting and why journalists must learn to respect facts for their own sake, regardless of personal views.
10:45–11:00 – Assignment
Trainees are set the final assignment (see below at the foot of this page). Trainer ensures all necessary materials and context are clear before the workshop concludes.
Workshop outline 2: Four-hour session
(For trainees new to the topic, providing comprehensive foundational knowledge and extended practice.)
09:00–10:00 – Session 1: Foundational principles: Fact, opinion, and journalistic role
- Aims: Clearly distinguish between objective fact and subjective opinion; establish the journalist’s role as an impartial purveyor of facts; understand the zero-tolerance standard for accuracy in news reporting.
- Presentation: Trainer presents the ‘facts are sacred’ principle. Define news reporting as being rooted in accuracy and the clear presentation of facts, versus commentary, which involves opinion. Explain that context can be added, but it must also be fact-based.
- Activity: Fact vs. opinion sorting: Trainees are given a set of statements (derived from recent news stories) and must definitively label each as ‘Fact’, ‘Provable Context’, or ‘Subjective Opinion’. Trainer explains that if one element of a story is inaccurate, the audience cannot believe the rest.
- Discussion: Group discussion on the essential difference between reporting (what happened) and editorialising (what we think about what happened). Trainer stresses that it is not the job of news journalism to tell people what to think.
10:00–11:00 – Session 2: The dangers of editorialising and ethical considerations
- Aims: Explore how editorialising undermines credibility and public trust; identify sources of personal bias (conscious and unconscious); examine the broader ethics violated by editorialising. (Ethics refers to the moral principles that govern journalistic conduct.)
- Presentation: Trainer discusses the dangers: misleading audiences, eroding credibility, and blurring lines. Explain that journalists must leave their opinions ‘at home’ and guard against their own biases. Discuss how violating fairness (Fairness requires being transparent and open in all dealings with sources and interviewees) or disrespecting privacy (Privacy is respecting a person’s private life, only allowing invasion when clearly justified by the public interest) are also ethical issues. Sensitivity regarding causing offence (Offence requires sensitivity when reporting challenging news, considering cultural context) must also be fact-based, not opinion-based.
- Activity: Bias identification: Trainees complete a brief self-reflection exercise (written notes only, not shared) on a subject they feel strongly about and identify potential conscious or unconscious biases they would have to set aside when reporting on that subject.
- Discussion: Trainer leads a discussion on the importance of maintaining a clear separation between news reporting and clearly labelled editorial or opinion pieces to safeguard fairness and public trust.
11:00-11:15 – Break
11:15–12:45 – Session 3: Techniques for impartial writing and copy editing
- Aims: Master practical writing techniques to eliminate all subjective language; learn to incorporate neutral, fact-based context; apply copy-editing discipline to ensure integrity in all output.
- Presentation: Detailed, practical instruction on avoiding judgemental language—specifically focusing on emotive adjectives and adverbs. Emphasise that language must be plain and direct. Discuss the objective: allowing the facts to speak for themselves.
- Activity: Intensive copy editing workshop: Trainees are given two or three news paragraphs that are heavily polluted with editorialising (using loaded language, subjective judgements, and opinion). Working individually, they must meticulously edit the text, removing all contamination and justifying their changes to maintain strict integrity and impartiality.
- Discussion: Group review of edited copy. Trainees read out their rewritten, impartial versions and compare them, focusing on the differences in tone and impact. The trainer summarises the key lesson: everything must be fact-based, strictly accurate, and free from any kind of contamination.
12:45–13:00 – Assignment
Trainees are set the final assignment (see below). Trainer ensures all necessary materials and context are clear before the workshop concludes.
Assignment
Identify and justify the editorial intrusion
Find two examples of recent news reports (one print/online and one from a broadcast/radio script, if possible) that you believe show subtle or overt signs of editorialising.
- Identify and list the specific words (adjectives, adverbs, or framing phrases) that introduce personal opinion, judgement, or emotional weight into the reporting.
- Justify why these specific words or phrases violate the principle of impartial news reporting.
- Rewrite the editorialising sections to be strictly impartial and fact-based, adhering to the core principle that comment is for clearly labelled opinion pieces only.
Materials needed for the workshop
- Handouts summarising core journalistic principles (fact vs. opinion).
- Handouts with clearly marked examples of editorialised copy and impartial rewrites.
- Worksheets for the ‘fact vs. opinion sorting’ and ‘editorial clean-up’ exercises.
- Research resources (internet or printouts) for the assignment.
Assessment
- Participation in discussions and activities, demonstrating an understanding of core principles.
- Quality of copy editing exercises, judged on the ability to identify and eliminate subjective language.
- Quality and justification provided in the final assignment.
Conclusion
This workshop provided a foundational and practical look at journalistic discipline, focusing on how to avoid bias and opinion in news reporting. Maintaining strict separation between fact and comment is fundamental to upholding the integrity and credibility of journalism. We have established that a journalist’s role is not to tell people what to think but to provide them with accurate facts, allowing them to form their own judgements. The source material for this lesson, which explores why accuracy must be paramount, is the MHM article Editorialising is not for news.
