The students rewrote the titles of banned books using synonyms. For example, The Location at Which the Cement Pathway Terminates was really Where the Sidewalk Ends. Students had fun and learned a few new vocabulary words. News teams consist of two anchor people, two camera people, a floor manager, a sound technician, and a mixer to fade from one scene to the next. The students take turns working on the sound, handling the camera, and managing the action.
Students brainstorm ideas, create storyboards, shoot the video, and then edit.
They include appropriate music in the background, and the final product looks quite professional. Interspersed with the announcements are parodies of popular commercials. Discovery teachers often request advertisements for school clubs. For one parody of a Taco Bell commercial, kids invited real policemen to come to school for the video shoot and superimposed a student's mouth on a Chihuahua. Each year, the final project is a live talk show in which students play the role of David Letterman, Oprah Winfrey, or another favorite host.