Naomi Meredith [00:00:00]:

Thinking about hosting a school-wide news club, but not sure if it will be successful. Are there even benefits of hosting this type of club, or is it just one more thing to do? Honestly, having a school-wide news club is something that I wish I had started sooner when I was a K-5 STEM teacher. In this episode, I'm going to be sharing with you what you're missing out on by not having a school-wide video news. Maybe you already know before listening to this episode that hosting a school-wide news club is definitely something that you want to do. And if you're still unsure, I'm gonna get into that in this episode, but either way, I am going to be hosting a live 2-hour workshop where I'm going to be sharing all the secrets of starting your school-wide video news club, and the students never have to go live.

Naomi Meredith [00:01:33]:

That is a huge benefit of this. I'm gonna be taking you through the whole process from setting up the club to what it looks like when you are recording some tips and tricks for editing, some fun segments, and all of that process from start to finish and how you can manage it throughout the year and the doors are officially open. So make sure you jump in on that at Naomimeredith.com/newsworkshop where you can join us live for the workshop. And if you can't make it live or if you're listening to this months later, don't you worry. The whole experience is recorded, and all the resources and templates are in there for you so you can go about it at your own pace. If you are listening to this podcast or video in real time, then the benefit of being there live is you get a chat with me and other teachers while it's happening. So, you definitely don't wanna miss out on this experience. It'll be a lot of fun and something I'm very passionate about.

Naomi Meredith [00:02:37]:

So make sure to check it out in the show notes for that link. In the last episode, 116, I talked about 8 different types of STEM after-school clubs that you can host. And one of them is the one that I'm gonna be talking about today. And that is having a school-wide video news team. And in the 11 years of being a teacher, this was the one club that I was totally obsessed about. I will say Battle of the Book I hosted was pretty much up there. It was a competition, and we won in the district. So that might be why I'm a little bit biased about that club.

Naomi Meredith [00:03:17]:

But other than that, I loved, loved, loved having a school-wide news team, and we actually called it the RHL News crew. RHL is our was our abbreviation for our school, and it was a whole experience. and I love this club so, so much. I know video news isn't a new concept. whether it's live or prerecorded. Ours was pre-recorded. I know this isn't new, but there's a reason why I actually started this at our school. When I first got my K-5 STEM teacher job, the announcements were over on the intercom, and they would come kind of at random times.

Naomi Meredith [00:04:05]:

It was within this 20-minute block where they would randomly come on, and they were extremely loud. Like, so loud I had to cover my ears. They were extremely loud. And I know some schools have the opposite problem. You can't hear them at all. So either way, they were super loud, and they sometimes took up to 10 minutes. Now this was during my planning time, so a lot of times, I had meetings during this, so I had to mute myself because they were going on forever. But then, the times I was covering in classrooms, I noticed that when the announcements came on, kids wouldn't stop and listen.

Naomi Meredith [00:04:44]:

It just maybe wasn't part of their routine, or they knew it was gonna go on for a long time that the teacher just said, hey, just keep doing what you need to do because it's gonna be a while. But the biggest thing that I realized is that the content and the announcements were really good, but It wasn't getting absorbed. It was like in one ear out the other. And I really felt that way with teachers and students. even for myself, I wasn't listening to them half the time because I knew it would take forever, and it was kind of the same old same old thing. You might even have a similar experience at your school. So one summer, just really thinking about the passion that I have for creating videos and podcasting, I figured I’d pitch to my principal that, hey, I wanna start a video news crew, and I had another teacher who was willing to help me with this.

Naomi Meredith [00:05:42]:

I wanna start this out. Here's how it's gonna go. We're gonna figure it out. And thank goodness. I jumped in, not having a clear plan. I had some idea, but I'm so glad that I did because this was definitely an experience. Not only by me hosting the club, but it was something that brought our school community together in ways I had never ever even imagined. And it was just a favorite of not only me but everybody in the building. So I'm gonna be sharing with you those things that you might not even know.

Naomi Meredith [00:06:21]:

These are things that I didn't even know that I was missing out on until I started doing it. There were experiences that I didn't know could exist. So let's jump into those reasons. Now if you're feeling like, you know what? Who cares? Like, we should just keep the announcements the way they are. Sure. Go ahead. Turn me off right now.

Naomi Meredith [00:06:41]:

But I'm telling you, this was such an amazing club and worth the work, worth putting in all the systems and routines because it brought up those amazing experiences. The first thing that you're missing when not having a school-wide news video club is helping your school community be better informed. Not to say that your school isn't informed, but maybe your school was like mine. We got a lot of information, but our information was coming from all sorts of places. There was a sign outside of school when you would drive in. There were signs inside of the school, whether they were paper or digital. Multiple emails from our admin, emails from our PTCO of events coming up, and emails from teachers who were hosting various after-school clubs and their own events. There were all sorts of ways that information was being thrown at us.

Naomi Meredith [00:07:47]:

It wasn't really streamlined, and it was very easy to miss what that information was. Likewise, all of the ways that this information was being thrown at us was really teacher-centered, which is very important, but the kids weren't really aware of what was going on. They had to rely on their teachers and their parents to let them know, which, yes, that's what we're doing in the video news. But there wasn't any other way for students to access that information. So if they had a substitute or long-term sub, they might miss out on some things, or just depending on their parents' communication style, they might be missing out on things. So there were a lot of holes in how information was being communicated in our building, and that was something that I definitely wanted to streamline where everybody could hear that information all in the same place. I also told you about our announcement, where I guess this is where kids would get information.

Naomi Meredith [00:08:51]:

They weren't very consistent, whether it was the person who was saying the announcements or the time that it went on, or sometimes they didn't go on at all. There was a lot of information that was being missed, whether it wasn't being said or just being missed where people weren't listening. So, again, there just wasn't really any consistency in the way that information was being delivered, and I thought that we definitely needed something that was student-centered. Student to student, where we are really communicating and putting everything in one place and something that they can count on. Think about the regular news, like everyday news. It's on at a certain time, and people can count on it. There are certain things that you know are going to be said, and you're going to get information.

Naomi Meredith [00:09:43]:

I wanted the same thing for our teachers and our students. The information still was coming out in random places, but I figured out a system where I could gather all of that information in one place, and teachers were able to communicate those upcoming things in one place, so it did help streamline everything that was coming in, and the teachers were more informed about what was happening and so were the students, like, actually informed. So much so informed that if I ever made a mistake, kids would come up to me right after they watched it in their classroom and let me know that there was a mistake. like, I would mess up a club, or I didn't say their birthday. I would get all the texts when something would go wrong, but at the same time, It didn't bother me as much because I knew people were paying attention. This was never an issue before. So people meaning teachers and students, were very into watching the news to get the information for the day. You're probably wondering how I kept all of this information together and kept it organized so that it would come out on time for the news.

Naomi Meredith [00:11:00]:

I am going to be sharing my whole system inside of my workshop, Naomimeredith.com/newsworkshop, and that template and system will be explained there. It's really not very complicated once you get the rhythm of it. And so this is how all the information was organized in one place so that we could produce a daily news show that everybody could depend on and actually get useful information that they needed. Another thing that you are missing out on when not having a school-wide video news club is another opportunity for students to build skills that they need for their future. We hear about this all the time. We need to be preparing kids for jobs that don't exist. And that's absolutely true. I never knew that I would be creating a podcast and have an online business when I was in 2nd grade. had no idea, but somehow the things that I learned led me to this position today.

Naomi Meredith [00:12:02]:

Likewise, that's for our kids. There are things they think they might wanna do now, and it might actually happen, but there's also a ton of different jobs that are out there that don't even exist, and we need to build up their skills now. A big thing with that is video. I know a lot of students, and you probably too, that when they grow up, they want to be a YouTuber or a Tiktoker. And it does sound pretty silly, but they're really not that far off. In fact, there is a lot of research out there showing that YouTube is the number 2 search engine compared to Google. And you might be thinking to yourself, oh, I'm going to Google it. And if I can't find the answer by reading, then I am going to find a video to teach myself how to do this.

Naomi Meredith [00:12:56]:

I did this the other day. I found a video of a person who explained very, very clearly in 5 minutes how to fix your microwave if it won't stay closed It was a great video. Really well done. It explained everything I needed, and I fixed my microwave in 10 minutes. So not only that, whether students become YouTubers or not, just having the skills to be able to talk on video is a skill. It's an absolute skill. Think about when you might have had to teach online during COVID or even another time. Now pre COVID, I had been making videos and talking on video for a long time.

Naomi Meredith [00:13:42]:

So that was definitely a skill that I was completely comfortable with, and teaching online wasn't a big deal for me. So whether aside from that or not, this is just a skill that I already had. Also, for the students, this is something they need as well. If you're not even that convinced, there are common core based standards about producing work in a digital platform. They're writing standards about this. and there are speaking and listening standards about being able to communicate ideas clearly, and this can also be in the form of digital content. digital content, especially video, is definitely not going away whether you like it or not. What's really funny is my teacher, honey, who's not my husband, but he is a high school Spanish teacher, and I wanna say he's someone who is super techie.

Naomi Meredith [00:14:37]:

He's not bad. He actually is pretty good. He does actually ask me for advice on Instagram, which is pretty funny. But he would see me come home and edit these videos from school, and he would watch and giggle, and I would show him all the bloopers and all the little segments. And even for him, he would say many times how great of an opportunity this is to have a school video news, and he wishes that his school, the high school that he teaches at, had this, which may be really sad that his high school didn't have anything like this, but it is something that kids are really passionate about, and we really wanna play upon things that kids are passionate about and that they love. Not only that, whether it's just something they're passionate about, this is a skill they'll need in a job. Being able to present on video, whether it's in a video meeting or creating content for their job, or talking to students if they do become a teacher. So this is a very helpful skill being able to be on camera and having a school-wide news after-school club can definitely play upon this experience, not only for the students who are on camera but the kids who are watching. This will help them build their skills, and I'm not even kidding you.

Naomi Meredith [00:15:58]:

I did this for 4th and 5th grade, who were on my news crew. But when I had my younger students make videos, just videos explaining their work in Seesaw, K-5 did this with everybody, even the kids who were not on my news crew would talk in a certain way on their videos and try to explain their thinking a lot more. and even tried to explain their thinking better because they saw a video every day of their peers presenting in a clear way. And I could even use that as a teaching point where, oh, when we make a video, we don't want the camera to be shaking the whole time, just like our RHL news. Do they do that? No. Oh, when we talk in our videos, we need to speak clearly, and we're not making silly voices because that's not what we do in our school-wide news. And I'm watching you so you could be on our news one day. So it really helped the kids who were not even on the news at all. They saw what high-quality kid videos can look like.

Naomi Meredith [00:17:01]:

But you also might be thinking, oh, but what about the kids who don't like to be on camera? Sure. There are those kids as well. And so that's why when you set this up, another great benefit to this is what's happening behind the scenes. Another excellent skill is being able to edit video to make it not only interesting for others to watch but also where it can clearly display the information in our video news, which I will definitely show examples of during our workshop. We added fun little segments that we recorded on the side, whether it was something about the artwork or crosswalk questions, which is something that I love to do, but adding in fun segments and video overlays and tech and adding in all of these different elements to really make it engaging for our audience. Not all kids like to be on camera. It is something they need to learn how to do, but there are kids who like to edit more. For me, I like both. I do actually like to be on camera, and I also do like to edit videos, but there are kids who like that too.

Naomi Meredith [00:18:12]:

So both skills are super powerful and having both. You have kids who are on camera, and then kids who are editing. You are able to mesh their skills together, and they are collaborating in a really interesting way. The third thing that you're missing out on by not having a school-wide video news crew is you are building your school community in a creative way. There are lots of ways to build your school community. And the two biggest ways that I thought were my actual news crew and everybody else who wasn't on it, so everyone in the school. With my news crew, especially the 1st year that I hosted it, I built this really special relationship with these kids. Now maybe you're a STEM teacher who wants to get started with this, or maybe you're not. Maybe you're a classroom teacher.

Naomi Meredith [00:19:04]:

But the kids that you do this with, you really build this special relationship with them all year. And for me, it was like having my own class again because teaching all the kids in the school, you're pumping out kids really fast, in a sense. They're going in and out of your classroom all day, so your relationships are just different. But having this news crew that we met every week was really, really special, and we got to know each other in a different way. Also, this RHL news crew was a brand. Let me tell you. I definitely branded this whole experience. We had a logo.

Naomi Meredith [00:19:39]:

We had shirts that the kids would wear on camera and they would wear around school. There were parents who were emailing me. Oh my gosh. Can I get another shirt, or my kid who's in kindergarten really wants to be on the news. Kids would see another, like, a little kid would see an older kid, and the older kids wearing the new shirt, they're like, oh my gosh, are you on the news? The older kids would feel so proud and say yes. I am. Or I would be wearing this shirt, and kids in class would be wearing this shirt. and I'm like, oh my gosh, I'll see you later for news club, or I'd say, oh, I like your shirt.

Naomi Meredith [00:20:14]:

Who designed it? And they would laugh to say, you made it, Miss Meredith. I'm like, oh, yes. I did. But it was just a whole thing, a whole brand, and it was something that kids really strived and wanted to be a part of. And with that, with building the school community, there was everybody else who wasn't on the news crew, but we created ways to involve them in the news. So, yes, they watched it in their classroom every day, but we did some fun segments that I mentioned before. We did some fun segments to involve more of the kids, even if they were officially on the crew. One of the ways that we did that is we had teacher segments. So we interviewed every teacher in the building.

Naomi Meredith [00:20:58]:

We asked the same five questions, and the teachers responded to those questions, and we would throw those in. I also did something called crosswalk questions, where on my crosswalk duty, when it was during slow points, I would have a question of the day. I had a little small microphone, and I actually interviewed kids with their responses. I'd put all of their responses together, and that would be a fun little video clip that we would do. We also promoted our school clubs when it was time to sign up for our clubs. Me and the other special teachers PE, art, and music, and other teachers who had after-school clubs, created little commercials to promote those things. We even had a joke box that sat in our school library since kids had library every week. Students could submit a school appropriate joke that we would possibly read on the news, and we would also share their names.

Naomi Meredith [00:21:49]:

And then we also read birthdays every single day. So, yes, we have the kids who are the stars. I have, in quotation marks, the stars on the camera and the kids who are editing, but we involved the other kids in the building as much as possible. And again, something that everybody looked forward to. This was also really powerful when we were doing our school fundraiser. When we were getting those sign-ups for clubs, we got an overwhelming amount of response because the kids would hear about it every day, and their parents were getting emails, and the teachers were getting emails, and everybody was informed and knew what was going on, and they were excited about it. My PE teacher even wrote about this.

Naomi Meredith [00:22:34]:

She was really sweet, and she said that our news program was such a great addition to our elementary school. Kids paid more attention to the morning announcements because they were listening to other kids. Now we set up an easy way for teachers to submit announcements and items that needed to be included in the news. I truly believe that the news was the reason our fun run funds did so well the past 2 years, we shared important info and exciting videos about the run that was in front of all of our students every day. So our PE teacher was sweet and wrote that comment. It was such a great experience. Everybody thought, why didn't we start this years ago? Because it was such a positive experience and something that they are continuing as well. Also, this whole system of setting up the school was such a success that even my friends at a neighboring school implemented the same exact system that I set up, and they're still using this, and I'm actually gonna have them on the podcast in a few episodes, and make sure you don't miss out on that one.

Naomi Meredith [00:23:37]:

As a recap, here are the three things that you are definitely missing out on by not having a school-wide news video club. First is keeping the school community more informed. Next is building skills that kids need for the future. And third, you have the opportunity to build your school community in a creative way. In the next episode, I'm going to be sharing with you some tips for getting started with your school-wide video news. And if you're ready to dive in and get all of the ideas on how to start it from start to finish, Make sure to join in on the workshop. The doors are open. You can grab that link in the show notes or go straight to Naomimeredith.com/newsworkshop.