In the morning, before school officially starts, we have a breakfast period that lasts 10 minutes. During this time, I have decided to play Channel One News for the students. If you haven’t watched it before, you need to check it out. The broadcasters are really down to earth and the students can connect with them. Channel One News is a CBS News affiliate.
It is a ten minute program that first introduces a basic overview of the news from the previous day. It usually takes the Nightly News and condenses it down for students to understand. The episodes do a great job of providing visuals such as, pictures and graphs, for the students so they can understand better. The remainder of the time is usually spent on news related media that is relavent to the student’s lives (job searching, job outlooks, recycling, teenager student’s personal testimonies…etc.). The students complain that they do not like it, but if you watch them when the news is on, they are hooked! They can’t take their eyes off of the SMART Board.
What I really enjoy the most is how much they actually remember from the episodes. Also, I enjoy how I can use Channel One as a way to enhance my lectures. If something is on Channel One that I’m covering in a unit, I can always show a 2-3 minute clip to make the lesson more personable and real-life.
Jeffrey Fisher 