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Editing for Organization

Editing for Organization. TECM 4190 Dr. Lam. Job Materials Overview. What you did well: Persuasive editing – providing tangible and practical suggestions for making the paper more persuasive. Comment phrasing - clear, thoughtful, polite Goodwill memos – Most were very thorough and polite

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Editing for Organization

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  1. Editing for Organization TECM 4190 Dr. Lam

  2. Job Materials Overview What you did well: • Persuasive editing – providing tangible and practical suggestions for making the paper more persuasive. • Comment phrasing - clear, thoughtful, polite • Goodwill memos – Most were very thorough and polite Areas for improvement: • Style edits – Being more confident in actually implementing them. • Commenting vs. Making the change • Editing comprehensively – Going through the entire process

  3. Example of Style Edits • Original: “Participated in a special and creative workshop for outstanding and exceptional students.” • Revised: “Participated in exclusive workshop for exceptional students.” • Original: “The money was counted daily in amounts totaling nearly $5 million dollars.” • Revised: “Counted money daily totaling nearly $5 million dollars.”

  4. Importance of Organization • In nearly every document, organization can be improved • Makes information easy to learn and easy to use • Impacts comprehension, usability, and user attitude

  5. Multiple Levels of Organization • Content organization - throughout the entire document • Paragraph organization - organizing ideas within a single paragraph (connecting ideas from one sentence to another) • Within Sentence organization – organizing ideas, even words, in an individual sentence

  6. Principles of Content Organization • Follow pre-established document structures (e.g., memo vs. email vs. research paper) • Anticipate reader questions and needs (e.g., FAQ style document vs. traditional paragraph format) • Arrange information from general to specific and familiar to new • Apply conventional patterns of organization • Group related material • Use parallel structure for parallel sections

  7. Follow Pre-Established Document Structures • Some documents can be structured by an entity outside of the writer (e.g., RFPs, organizational manual) • Some documents have widely accepted document structures (e.g., Scientific research paper- IMRaD, Resume and job letter)

  8. Anticipate Reader Questions and Answers • Considering the reader is as important for an editor as it is for a writer • Ask key questions from the reader’s perspective: • What is this document? • What is it about? • Why is it important and why should I care? • How do I get started? • Sometimes it is good to explicitly answer these questions

  9. Arrange from General to Specific and Familiar to New • Familiar information helps readers contextualize and ultimately learn new information • Look at the document holistically and start at the beginning • Look at chapters/sections/paragraphs

  10. Use Conventional Patterns of Organization • Chronological, spatial, comparison-contrast, and cause-effect • Chronological good for narratives, instructions, and process descriptions • Spatial good to describe 2D and 3D objects or spaces (e.g., orientation to a software system) • Comparison-contrast good to help users weigh options (e.g., recommendation report) • Cause-effect can be good to help readers make decisions (e.g., feasibility study)

  11. Group Related Material • Avoid mixing unrelated information (within chapters, sections, paragraphs, and sentences) • Establish controlling idea in every paragraph or major group of paragraphs • Use visual cues to establish visual hierarchy • Explicitly provide a roadmap at beginning of major dividers in a document • E.g., “This section will discuss sample selection, measurement instruments, and experimental procedure”

  12. Use Parallel Structurefor Parallel Sections • Parallelism can be applied at multiple levels: • sentence • paragraph • section • chapter • document

  13. Paragraph Organization • Link sentences to create cohesion (Given/New Pattern) • Repeat or use variations of key words to keep a paragraph focused • Build transitions by using transition words (coordinating conjunctions, conjunctive adverbs, and subordinating conjunctions)

  14. Helpful Tips • Use the TOC function in word to reveal document hierarchy • Continually ask yourself: does this make sense? What is this (sentence, paragraph, section, document) about? • Organization can be difficult because it sometimes feels “abstract” • Always fall back on simple edits first (e.g., introduce meaningful headers, introduce a numbering system, use given-new principle, begin a paragraph with a controlling sentence, use transition words) • Ask someone else to read it

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