The Five W's (Not a Doo-wop Group)

[Alan Brady's Hair]

Do they still teach the "Five W's" in school? That when you're trying to write about an incident or event, then you should try to answer very basic questions very quickly:

WHAT happened?
WHO is involved?
WHERE did it happen?
WHEN did it happen?
WHY did it happen?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Five_Ws

The questions can usually be answered in two or three sentences, as who, what, where, and when are easily presented in one sentence.

It's struck me that using this format can be very useful, especially as we see so many political postings now. It's so easy to generalize about things, but it becomes more challenging to make a point if you don't have clear answers to each of the questions above.

[bmasters9]

Originally Posted by Alan Brady's Hair

Do they still teach the "Five W's" in school? That when you're trying to write about an incident or event, then you should try to answer very basic questions very quickly:

WHAT happened?
WHO is involved?
WHERE did it happen?
WHEN did it happen?
WHY did it happen?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Five_Ws

The questions can usually be answered in two or three sentences, as who, what, where, and when are easily presented in one sentence.

It's struck me that using this format can be very useful, especially as we see so many political postings now. It's so easy to generalize about things, but it becomes more challenging to make a point if you don't have clear answers to each of the questions above.

Much of what passes for "news" on television, especially cable and satellite, doesn't even use the original 5 Ws. In fact, it would seem to me that FOX "News" and MSNBC are 24-hour conservative and liberal talk shows (i.e. echo chambers) respectively, with news updates sprinkled in as needed (at least for FOX, to somewhat make a stab at being what its name implies).