Writing headlines is hard. It became even more difficult when I realized those first few words will determine whether or not the rest of the story gets read. I found the tips on the EReserve handout to be helpful with the headline assignment this week. The most beneficial tip for me was to read the story all the way through before writing the headline. It's nearly impossible to write an interesting and relevant headline if you don't know what the story is about.
I am used to writing teases for broadcast news, which try to convince the viewers to stay through the commercial breaks. I find it a lot easier to time a tease than fit words into an exact amount of space on paper. One thing I've found that helps with teases and headlines is using a dictionary. It's good to mix up the words you use so people don't get bored. Plus, some words will fit better with the space you have than others.
An editing mistake I found this week was in a text from my friend. It said, "Oh my gosh i cant believe he wont leave me alone he needs to understand im done." There is no punctuation in this text. I know it's just a text, but I would have liked to see some apostrophes, periods, and capitalization. It would have made the message a lot easier to read.
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