CHILDREN SPEND A DAY AS BUDDING EL PAÍS JOURNALISTS

“PSOE urges Pepe to marry him." "On Friday we’re going on holiday to Cadiz". "Auditions for Harry Potter 8". "Cristiano Ronaldo has a heart attack during Champions final".

Madcap, out of this world, serious; signed by budding reporters from Paris, Rome and Wellington. These were just some of the 30 front-page El PAÍS stories written by a team of very special correspondents – the children of employees and subscribers of the newspaper. Throughout the morning they visited the newsrooms of El PAÍS and AS, the printers, and finally they all attended a journalism workshop given by Pedro Zuazua, Director of Communications at PRISA Noticias.

The goal was to understand what a good news should be: "What, when, who and where. That's what has to be in your headline and in your text," Zuazua told the group of kids. Previously they had to decipher the secrets of newspaper sections. And they gave answers such as International is about "the globe" or Opinion is where  "you can give your opinion on anything you like."

The group visited the newsrooms of the newspapers AS and EL PAÍS. In the VIP room of the sports newspaper, they reviewed two yearbooks, one current and one from the eighties. Seeing them together – with the help of Laura Jimenez, from the PRISA Noticias communications team – showed them how publications have changed over the decades. They also got to see two legendary shirts from the Spanish football squad: from the World Cup ( No. 6) and the UEFA Euro (No. 9), sported by Andres Iniesta and Niño Torres, respectively. At the printers, the children were fascinated by the room that held the huge rolls of paper used to print the newspaper.

Yet when asked how many future journalists were among the group of thirty, only one of the children timidly put up his hand. He said he was sure he wanted to be a journalist. Jimenez explained that to get there, reading and writing were really important. This seemed to be a popular activity among the group, and a few more showed an interest in the profession.  Perhaps, in the near future they’ll be sending in stories from Wellington, Rome or Paris.