In a new research article Grant Hannis, of Massey University, examines a study module that introduces the basic concepts and practices of data journalism. The case study looks at a three-hour long data journalism module, part of the postgraduate journalism programme taught at Massey University, New Zealand.

The module goes through the following steps: introducing the concept, finding stories in the data, data visualization, and student demonstrations.

According to student feedback on the course, the most useful aspects of the class were learning how to produce interactive graphs and how to find stories from data.

Hannis presents observations from the module. Firstly, students had aversion towards mathematics, and the class attendance has been poor. Secondly, the teacher of the module needs technical skills.

The article “Teaching Data Journalism in New Zealand” was published in Asia Pacific Media Educator and is available on the publisher’s website (abstract free).

Picture: untitled by Pexels, license CC0 1.0