VOA Learning English News Lessons

Directions: Visit the official website of the Center for News Literacy by clicking here: About the Center – Center for News Literacy 2. Share in the comments section below what you learned from this website about news literacy.

1. Directions: Read and translate if needed, the following article. Today anyone with a smartphone or a laptop can spread information and video around the world immediately. This new-found power can play a vital role in our understanding of events in places that have been cut off from traditional journalism. As in Syria where the…

1. Directions: Read and translate if needed, the following article. In this lesson, we present seven steps to help you judge the quality of news reporting: Step One: Main Points Be able to recognize and re-state the main points of the story. An intelligent news consumer asks: What are the facts and how are they presented? Step…

1. Directions: Read and translate if needed, the following article. Let’s examine the verification process a little closer. Becoming a literate news consumer requires us to be able to identify legitimate journalism. Legitimate journalism seeks truth. But how do we define that truth? Truthful reporting comes from using facts that can be confirmed. All the details may not be known. But…

1. Directions: Read and translate if needed, the following article. What is legitimate journalism? It is news that has been verified by an independent organization that is accountable for the information. Verification, independence and accountability are the characteristics of quality journalism. Let’s examine Verification. It’s the process of establishing that information is truthful and accurate. Journalists collect information with the goal of…

1. Directions: Read and translate if needed, the following article. Information is an important part of our society. People depend on it to guide them through a complex world. The invention of movable type in 15th century Europe revolutionized the communication of ideas. This invention made it possible to print and publish information to masses of people This free…

Directions: Read and translate if needed, the following article. Today we are at the Newseum in Washington D.C. – where the history of free expression is explained and defended. The first printing presses arrived in the United States in the mid-1600s, marking an important step in the history of America’s free press. A free press…