Go to
for information to help you deal with the following tasks and questions:
01 – Compare the consumption of newspapers in Britain to consumption elsewhere.
02 – Which 6 terms used to describe the front page elements of both a tabloid and a
broadsheet do the pictures in the pop-up windows illustrate?
(M . . . . . . . , D . . . L . . . , ... , … , … , …)
03 – Compare tabloids and broadsheets with regard to the proportions of their
mastheads, headlines and pictures.
04 – How do broadsheets compare with tabloids as far as text is concerned?
05 – The site claims that "tabloids and broadsheets do not look different by accident".
What is the site author implying here?
06 – Who decides a paper's "style"?
07 – Which is closer to TV news – the tabloid or the broadsheet?
Find two arguments to support your answer.
08 – What percentage of tabloid space is dedicated to pictures? How does that
compare to broadsheets?
09 – How do tabloids make use of pictures?
10 – Which adjectives are used to describe the dominant features of the language
(a) in a tabloid, (b) in a broadsheet?
11 – In what manner do broadsheets deal with facts (through their choice of
language)?
12 – In choosing their language style, what effect are tabloid writers after?
13 – An offline activity invites us to compare the lead story of a tabloid and a
broadsheet of the same day. What aspect are we invited to study?
Guess what the result is likely to be. Justify your opinion.
14 – Why are editors so keen to give their readers what they want?
15 – What are the two categories "news" can be divided into?
16 – Give three examples of the first category.
17 – By what standard can you decide whether a given story is 'hard news' or
'gossip'?
18 - What procedure is suggested for the second offline activity?
19 – How do you know a story can classify as a "top ten story"?
(a) with a newspaper, (b) with a TV news item?
20 – Why are we asked to compare the newspaper stories with the TV news of the
day before?
21 – The third offline activity invites us to write tabloid-style headlines. What advice
does the site give us?
22 – In what respect are broadsheet headlines different?
© Jürgen Wagner http://www.wagner-juergen.de/englisch/newsquest.html