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Feature Writing Handout

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Feature Writing

By Jeanne Acton, UIL/ILPC Journalism Director


Feature Writing …
tells the reader a story. It has a
beginning (lead), middle and end.
It uses quotes liberally and allows
the reader to see the story through
detailed description and vivid
writing.
Lead: Most interesting information.
Transition/ Something that will grab the reader's attention
and drag them into the story.

Quote Formula Nut Graph: A summary of what the story


is going to be about. Why the story is
important.

Linked Direct Quote: Connects to the nut graph.


Use more than one sentence. Direct quotes
should show the emotion of the story.

Transition: Next important fact. Use


transition words to help the story flow. They
can be facts, indirect quotes or partial quotes.

Linked Direct Quote: Connects to the first


transition. Do not repeat the transition in the
quote. DQ should elaborate on the transition.

Transition: Next important fact. Use


transition words to help the story flow. They
can be facts, indirect quotes or partial quotes.

Direct Quote: Connects to the second


Linked transition. Do not repeat the transition in the
quote. DQ should elaborate on the transition.
And so on… until the story is complete
Let's start at the
beginning with …

LEADS

Leads
The opening sentence must grab and
hold the reader's attention by using
specific, interest-arousing words.
Leads
The lead must catch the spirit of the story
and create the proper tone: serious,
sarcastic, ironic, flippant, melancholy.
Leads
▪ Can be and often are longer than one
sentenc
▪ Your chance to grab the reader's
attentio
▪ Should be specific to your stor
▪ Should not be filled with cliches
▪ Should be in third perso
▪ Must fit the mood or tone of the story
e

A Few Types of Leads


▪ Narrative - tells a stor
▪ Descriptive - describes a scene, person or
subject
▪ Direct Quote – must be used with narrative
▪ Startling statemen
▪ Contrast and Compare (then and now
▪ Twist

Narrative - tells a story


Justin Greer's 2,800 friends have never seen him cry. His father has seen
him cry only once — the day last October when doctors told the 16-year-old
football player that what he thought was a bad case of the flu was actually
leukemia
“He cried a bit then,” Mr. Greer said. “But then he squared off and said,
‘Well, I’m not dead yet.’ And I haven't seen him cry since, although he's told me
that sometimes he cries at night when he's all alone.”
.


Narrative - tells a story
On senior Alicia Brigg's two-hour trip with her parents to church, she
turned around and noticed that in the back of the Suburban all her bags
were packed
“All of the sudden, I realized I wasn't going to church; I was on my
way to the airport,” she said. “I started screaming, crying and swearing at
my dad, trying to figure out what was happening.
That's when her dad told his 17-year-old daughter he had put her up
for adoption.
.

Descriptive - describes a scene/person


It is 7:30 Thursday night and the Presbyterian Church of Utica is
deserted except for its well-lit cafeteria
Slowly they straggle in, single or in pairs. They are a friendly, yet
haggard group, bearing the signs of a long emotional struggle
They are the parents of problem teenagers. There are no straight-A-
honor roll students here. No football captains or cheerleaders. Only drug
addicts, alcoholics and runaways.
.

Descriptive
It's too disturbing to watch the big screen TV at his cousin's house. Too soon.
Too real
Instead, using his index fingers, Joshua Joseph twiddles a Dove soap box, the
one he used to scribble telephone numbers on when he was evacuating
He flips the box around. There's his girlfriend's number
Backward
His best friend's digits
Forward
His coach's number
This is Joseph's cell phone now. His real one is lost, somewhere back in New
Orleans along with most of his clothes, his family's house and life as he knew it.
.

Descriptive - describes a scene or person

Standing in the lunch line, the boy turned to April Haler and asked, “Will you
be my girlfriend?”
Then he turned to his buddy and started laughing.
Just another cruel joke on the fat kid.
April, who once weighed almost 300 pounds, is used to them. Since
elementary school she has been teased and taunted about her weight.
“I remember being called horrible names in elementary school every time we
went to the playground,” the sophomore said.
But life is changing.

Descriptive - describes a scene or person


Sarah Clark knows what they think. The smirks. The laughs. The way the other
girls, all week long in cheerleading practice, have been rolling their eyes.
They think she's a joke.
They think she's a big fat joke of an eighth grader with no prayer of becoming a
high school cheerleader.
Minutes before her tryout, Sarah paces the corridor. She sweeps the waves of her
long copper hair back over her shoulder. She tugs up on her socks and down on her
cheerleader skirt, pressed the night before.
Then, with her eyes open and in the privacy of her mind, she mutters a prayer.
Dear God, please …
By 8 p.m. she’ll have her answer.

Direct Quote - use sparingly. Must be very


powerful quote
“Don't be mad. I took some pills,” Karen Keaton cried as she stooped
over the toilet
A few hours later, the 14-year-old freshman died after a series of
coronary arrests.
.

Direct Quote - use sparingly.


“Coach Hawkins!
Brad Hawkins, the longtime Westlake athletic trainer, recognized
Coach Steven Ramsey's voice over the noise of the spectators behind
him. But he had never heard Ramsey's voice like that
Hawkins ran to Ramsey, who was crouched over varsity player
Matt Nader pleading with the athlete
“Hang in there.
“Don't leave us.
“Everything's going to be all right.

Startling Statement - creates


drama

She never knew she had it

_____________________________________

Junior Josh Duckworth has a fetish.


Startling Statement/Narrative/Descriptive
Zackary Jargowsky hates pronouns
He hates the “she” that sometimes slips out when he's playing
Quidditch with his friends, and the “it” he's been labeled by the ones who
don't understand
He hates the prolonged stares as people try to figure out what is going
on beneath his “Nightmare Before Christmas” hoodie and plaid, vertical
striped shirts — the ones the stylist said would help
.

Startling Statement - creates


drama

Melissa hates school


It's not that she's dumb. It isn’t that she doesn’t
fit in socially. In fact, it isn’t that anything is
particularly wrong.
It's more of a matter of nothing being particularly
right.

Twist - sets reader up for one mood and then


twists it, surprises the reader

A group of candystripers stand around the nursery, holding incubator babies. It's “loving
time.” Another young girl steps in with her mother and picks up a baby, too. She is not in a
uniform, but in a hospital gown, for the baby she holds is her own — and it's her “loving
time.
It's also time to say good-bye
“I sat in that rocker and held him and rocked him and I cried and cried and cried,”
Amber, a senior, said. “I wanted that moment to last forever so I could always hold him and
always be there for him.
“But I knew I couldn't. That's what hurt.”

Twist
How many children do you have
A simple question. Unassuming. Perfect for small talk
But Jim and Julie Silcock stumble
Dec. 29, 2002 flashes in front of them. And they don't know what to do
Haltingly, Julie responds. We have one son named James. He is a junior at
Princeton
But the questions don’t end there. For the past six years, they never have.
.

Another Twist

After tension-filled hours of last-minute


primping, the time had come for the contestants
to walk into the arena and strut their stuff in
front of the three judges and an appreciative
crowd
Some walked briskly with an air of
confidence. Others, distracted by the lights and
cameras, shuffled along slowly. A few, overcome
by the pressure, foamed at the mouth and
mooed.
.

Even though Saturday's market steer


competition at the Austin-Travis County Livestock
Show and Rodeo was like many other beauty
pageants, there were some obvious differences
The contestants — steers weighing more than
half a ton — were being judged on the type of T-
bones and rump roasts they would turn into
instead of their appearance in an evening gown or
bathing suit.

A few more good ones …


By his own admission, Adan Peña was a lousy student. Lazy. Apathetic.
A typical junior high slacker. He was heading in the direction of dropping out
of school and into a life of who knows what — at best, working on a dairy
farm. At worst, jail
.

A few more good ones …


Louis Staggers smiles all the time. Not often. All. The. Time.
“Louis is that kid who walks the hallway with the biggest smile on his
face,” says John Osborn, head basketball coach at Belton High School.

Writing devices for leads

▪ Repetition (Melissa
▪ Short, punchy sentences. Fragments. (Joshua, Louis
▪ Using dialogue (adoption, Matt
▪ Mixing sentence length to set a rhythm (adopt, rodeo)
▪ Breaking the rules … starting with “And”
)

The lead should open


with the specific,
then go to the general.

Rather than:
With America engaged in a war in Iraq, many students know U.S.
military men who have lost their lives
Leaguetown lost one of its own last month when Nicolas Barrera
was killed in Iraq.

Try this:
When Briana Barrera didn’t hear from her son, Nicolas, for a
week she knew something was wrong. Maybe it was mother's
intuition, but she knew
And when she saw two officers walking toward her door, her worst
fear was confirmed
“The officers said they were sorry to deliver the news, but Nicolas
died with honor,” she said. “Dying with honor? How does that help?
My heart was breaking. My boy was gone.”
.

Lead writing pitfalls:


• News or editorials leads. Avoid
first and second person

• Stating the obvious

• Using cliches

• “Imagine this…” lead


.

No news or editorials leads.


Avoid first and second person
Freshman Sarah Clark made the cheerleader squad for the
2007-08 school year

Congratulations to Sarah Clark for making the cheerleading squad.


We are proud of her.

Don't state the obvious

Every day, millions of people wake up, go to


work or go to school. But some days, they don't

Millions of teenagers have jobs. They work


for many reasons: college, cars, just to have
some spending money in their pocket.

No cliches
Take one for the team

Life is short

And the winner is . . .


.

Do not “Imagine this…”


Imagine what it would be like to sit through a hurricane.
Dallas-resident Carly Patty doesn’t have to. She was
stranded in Galveston during Hurricane Ike

Imagine what it would be like to be on a boat that is sinking


in the middle of the ocean
Daniel Palacios doesn’t have to imagine. He was on his
grandfather's boat over spring break when it capsized.
.

Try this instead…


Senior Daniel Palacios planned to spend spring break on a
relaxing fishing trip in Port Aransas with his father, grandfather and
two uncles. Instead, he spent most of the week praying to stay alive.
What's next?
After a strong lead
You need a strong nut
graph.

What is a nut graph?


Basically, it is a summary of what
the story is going to be about. It's the
5 Ws and H that you didn’t answer
in the lead

It's the thesis sentence of your


story.
.

Senior Daniel Palacios planned to spend spring break on a relaxing


fishing trip in Port Aransas with his father, grandfather and two uncles.
Instead, he spent most of the week praying to stay alive
On the second night of Daniel's family fishing trip, his grandfather's
boat filled with water and capsized. For three days, Daniel sat on top of
the capsized boat, hoping he and his family would be rescued
“I don’t know if I have ever prayed so much in my life,” Daniel said.
“I made a few bargains with God during those three days.
The Nut On the third day, after the Coast Guard called off its search, a fishing
boat found the men
Graph “It was a miracle,” Daniel said. “As soon as we were rescued, we all
got on our knees to pray and thank God.”

What's next?
After a strong lead and an
informative nut graph
Use the Transition/Quote
formula

Senior Daniel Palacios planned to spend spring break on a relaxing fishing trip
in Port Aransas with his father, grandfather and two uncles. Instead, he spent
most of the week praying to stay alive
On the second night of Daniel's family fishing trip, his grandfather's boat
filled with water and capsized. For three days, Daniel sat on top of the capsized
boat, hoping he and his family would be rescued
“I don’t know if I have ever prayed so much in my life,” Daniel said. “I made
a few bargains with God during those three days.
On the third day, after the Coast Guard called off its search, a fishing boat
found the men
“It was a miracle,” Daniel said. “As soon as we were rescued, we all got on
our knees to pray and thank God.”

transition

direct quote
.

On April 2, Daniel will share his miracle story when he


transition and his family go on the “Today Show.
“I am a little hesitant to go on the ‘Today Show,’” Daniel
direct quote said. “I am a pretty shy guy, and I don't relish the spotlight.
My grandparents love that show, though. My dad and I knew
it would be a highlight of my grandpa's life if he was on the
show.
transition Daniel's “miracle” story began on March 11 when his
grandfather's boat started sinking.
“We tried to pump the water out, but the pumps wouldn’t
direct quote start,” he said. “It took about three hours for the boat to fill
and capsize. My grandfather fired off three flares, hoping a
nearby oil rig would see us, but no one came.
transition As the boat filled with water, Daniel's father passed out
life jackets.
“He said the plan was to sit on top of the boat until we
direct quote were rescued,” he said. “My dad managed to get several
packages of crackers and candy bars into a bag just as the

So how do you end


a feature story?
End your story with …
- A powerful quote

- Tie the ending back to the lead


r

For example:
(Lead “Don't be mad. I took some pills,” Karen Keaton cried as she
stooped over the toilet
A few hours later, the 14-year-old freshman died after a series of
coronary arrests

(Ending) Since the death of her oldest daughter, the Keatons have found
themselves becoming more protective. “I find myself watching for
things,” Mrs. Keaton said. “I’m not sure for what. I’m just watching.”
)
.

For example:
(Lead A group of candystripers stand around the nursery, holding
incubator babies. It's “loving time.” Another young girls steps in with her
mother and picks up a baby, too. She is not in a uniform, but a in a
hospital gown, for the baby she holds is her own — and it's her “loving
time.
It's also time to say good-bye
“I sat in that rocker and held him and rocked him and I cried and
cried and cried,” Amber, a senior, said. “I wanted that moment to last
forever so I could always hold him and always be there for him.
“But I knew I couldn’t. That's what hurt.

)
.

(Ending) This was evident as she stated the one word that described the whole
ordeal
“Pain,” she said, tears streaming down her cheeks and falling onto her
sweater.
“True pain.”

:

For a Strong Feature Story


remember this …

GQ STUDD

Great
Quotes

Strong Lead
Transition/Quote Formula
Unique Angle

Description - Show Don't Tell


D Detail
G
Q
S
T
U
D

Yes, you can …


▪ Use the first name on the second
reference if the story is about a
student
▪ Add plausible description to flesh
out your lea
▪ Have a lead longer than one
paragrap
.

Pitfalls to avoid in feature writing …

▪ Using a news lea


▪ Writing in the passive voic
▪ Using too many adverbs and adjectives
instead of specific nouns and powerful
verb
▪ Messy handwritin
▪ Story doesn’t flow – doesn’t use T/Q
formul
▪ Lack of strong quotes
s

On contest day …
✏ Read the entire promp
✏ Take a moment. Remember what
stands out to you. Try to use that for your
lead
✏ Reread the prompt and highlight or
underline powerful quotes
✏ Also, mark your nut graph (usually
the news peg) in the prompt
✏ Cross out any unnecessary quotes or
people
✏ Write.
.

Good luck!

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