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FS 34: Collecting Stories: Organizing your ideas

Research resources for Collecting Stories, a Fall 2020 First Year Seminar taught by Tommi Cahill.

The 5W and H questions

When journalists are trying to develop a story, they often start with a topic or an event and ask the "5W and H" questions.

These questions are a time honored way to discover what is interesting about a topic.

  • Who was involved?
  • What happened?
  • When did it happen?
  • Where did it happen?
  • Why did it happen?
  • How did it happen?

Based on Asking and Answering the 5 W's and H Questions by Thoughtful Learning, a work licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.

Reflection questions

  • How would you describe your ideal learning environment?
  • How can you use these note taking strategies to organize your ideas and develop your storytelling project?