Chapter 10 Summary
Organizing Information
gena gilbertson and Corey Place
This chapter explains the importance of organizing your information for clarity within interpretation for your audience.
There are a few ways to transform information into knowledge. One way is to create a “writer-based” document, which is a presentation or visual way of organizing. A following step to organizing information can be to create an “audience-based” document, which is a presentation or visual way to organize information to ensure effectiveness for the audience. Using both these tools is a way to make sure your document is complete and ready for presentation.
When you have an abundance of information is it important to organize it for further development. There are a few ways to arrange your information to maintain the information’s effectiveness. Outlines are one way to organize information in an easy draft form for further edits of the information. Electronic outlines are especially easy for revisions and are user friendly for continual edits. A successful outline results in a successful document. There are key questions to ask yourself during the creation and editing process of your outline; make sure you are clear regarding the content, context, audience, purpose, key points, organization, and professional standards to make your outline work for your document. Asking yourself these key categorical questions at various times during your edits makes for an efficient and well organized final document.
Another way to organize your abundance of information is to use a storyboard. Storyboards are a powerful organizational tool for writers and designers. They show a short and dramatic visual summary of the final project. There are different ways to show a storyboard, one way can be passively with the writer or designer walking the audience through the board which explains what happens throughout the process. Another element of a storyboard can feature animations on a timed program or even interactive components, requiring the designer to be engaged in the process.
Information can also be organized in a table and spreadsheet manner. This shows classification of information compared to groups and identifies with categories which can feature detail about each table or spreadsheet group. Electronic tables and spreadsheets are another great way to continue the organized editing process of your information prior to the finished document.
Within the ways of organizing information is the implementation of that data. There are various ways to organize your specific information for clarity. Print documents group information into paragraphs to which the audience reads. Electronic documents also group information into paragraphs which can be edited to use hyperlinks which can help the audience organize the information further. Oral presentations also group information to where the audience listens for cues about shifts to other topics. With all oral presentations it is essential for the presenter to focus on changes in vocal pacing, pitch and inflection to take the place of paragraph indentations and line spacing. Technical visuals group information as well as use labels and cues which direct movement through the visual presentation to the audience.
Each organized informational medium organizes the information in a variety of ways. There is the ever common alphabetical order which is good for documents dealing with words. Another type of organization is through numeric order which deals with a particular number or range of numbers. Lastly, a final way of organization is using a continuum, which ranks or rates the objects within the information.
From these types of organized sections it helps to identify further for the audience by using signals. A topic sentence is one way to further organize for the audience as well as transitions within the document used as another means of organization.
Further ways to organize a document are as follows: the whole/parts organization which gives the audience an understanding to the relationship between the whole (whether an idea, object, or entire system) to parts of that (whether on a micro level or a macro level), organizing information in a chronological order gives the audience material arranged by sequence or even order of occurrence which helps the development of ideas and presents the information in an appropriate manor; spatial order is the arrangement by relative physical location, which can help within a visual presentation to make the arrangement effective for the audience; ascending and descending order gives the audience information according to “quantifiable criteria” with most-to-least important and least-to-most important; comparison and contract tells the audience about similarities and differences within the information; cause-and-effect organization of information focuses on the precipitating factors and the results, understanding how the information is relative can further help the audience understand the vast information. Within cause-and-effect organization are inductive reason which moves from specific to broad and scientific which is used in research and experimentation and deductive reasoning is the opposite, moving from general to specific.
Organizing information is imperative for understanding verbally and visually and to make sure the audience understands the message you want to give.
12 comments:
Chapter 10 discusses the different types of outlining. I was not aware of all the different types or that outlining had that many specifications. After reading the chapter it was very easy to realize what types went best with certain subjects. I find that I use the numeric order the most. I find it easy to outline in and easy to follow.
While reading chapter 10 I was thinking about which formats of organization I have used. The most common for me is your typical outline. I usually start of with numerics and add alphabet letters for subpoints.
One organizational option I would like to become more familiar with would be the interactive storyboards. I think these would be more interesting to complete than your typical outline because they deal more with the visual aspect. I am a visual learner 100%, interaction also helps me retain information faster.
Chapter 10 talks about organizing and transforming information. Transforming informatoin into knowledge creates a different meaning of the original information. Two types of document that a writer creates are writer-based document and audience-based document. An audience-based document is a better document because a writer thinks about what he/she should write for the audience and what type of replys he/she will get from the audience. Information can be organized by using outlines, storyboards and tables.
Organizing information is the key to producing a good paper or project. This chapter discussed outlines, storyboards, spreadsheets and other ways to organize data. I usually use a outline to organize my information. In class I outline what the professor says to help me comprehend and learn more.
Outlines are very useful in life in general, especially for things like speeches, before you write papers, and also especially while taking notes during class. I like using outlines while taking notes also but especially before writing papers so that you can have correct organization in it. There are many different types of outlines and that is why they are so useful!
This chapter for me was positive reinforcement of other times I've been told organization is useful and a powerful persuasive tool. Yes there are several outlines we use on a day to day basis in class or when preparing information to be sure that we organize it effectively. I have used all of these methods except for storyboard, which would be more useful in organizing a plot sequence or movie. In my experience with debate the more convincing and believeable reasoning and analysis that you give the more likely you would be to persuade the judge in favor of your opinion. It was very common to use deductive reasoning by examining a quantity of inherent evidence to base or warrant a reason to believe a contreversial point. Also vice-versa using exemplerary cases or instances that really highlight an overlapping trend can help prove causual relationships with hard facts and real life scenarios that really hammer a point home.
I think that how i format a document makes a big difference in how i present info and this chapter really reinforced the use of an outline to effectively keep information organized.
Outlines seem to be the most common for college students. I've never used a storyboard, so this is my first look at it. Spreadsheets happen to be my favorite, becase they are easy to read and very easy to organize. Basically, writers want to come up with an organized game plan for whatever they are working on. If done correctly, the writer can quickly translate the outline to full blown presentation/paper.
As I work my way through college I have found numerous ways to make life a little easier on myself. This is by making good use of outlines and being organised, especially when it comes to writing papers and projects.
As others have said, I too like outlines...one of my favorites is when making powerpoint presentations you can get a printed copy in outline form to use during your presentation. I remember in high school when I first began to use outlines...they were tough at first because I wanted to write EVERYTHING down...then I got more used to only picking out the main points of the lecture.
I appreciated the information this chapter gave on organizing documents. The whole/part idea is helpful to give the topic context to relate to and to check understanding. The others are good resources so for each document there are more than one to choose from...
I found it very helpful in this chapter that it gave all sorts of organizational styles. I find that having an outline before writing a paper is an important part. Personally, it gets me organized and focused on the topics that I want to write about. Not only is outlining and organizing important for papers, it can also be used when speaking in public.
One of my favorite ways of organizing is organizing in chronological order. In about every aspect of life I remember things in some sort of order that way is just easier for me to remember. I also like the organizational method of comparing and contrasting. For example, sometimes when I read about two topics separately I don’t completely understand. But when given the differences in comparing and contrasting it makes it a whole lot easier to understand. I’ve heard about most of the organizational styles that the book discussed, but one that I was totally unaware about was the storyboards. After reading the chapter, I now have a better understanding of what storyboards are and what they’re used for.
I never really thought of storyboards as an organization tool, when talking about technical communication. I always thought that they were just used in film, tv, and animation. But now that I have read this chapter, the use of storyboards really makes sense for any medium.
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