Overview

 

While generating ideas is a crucial step in the Writing Process, it is only a beginning, a gathering of raw materials.  For a piece of writing to be truly effective, it must be planned out carefully, and executed according to that plan. 

 

Think about how a piece of machinery, like a car, is manufactured.  Do the factory workers just slap parts onto each car according to how they think they should fit together?  Of course not.  Cars are complex pieces of machinery, designed very carefully to do certain things and have certain features.  Factories follow plans to ensure that each car works as it should.   Another example: have you ever tried to put together a bookcase or other piece of furniture without the instructions?  It’s pretty difficult.  Writing is the same way: it needs a logical plan to make sense.

 

Let’s take, for a moment, a more writing-related example to drive the point home.  A lawyer is defending her client, a corporate CEO who is being sued for many millions of dollars by people who feel the product his company made has adversely affected their health.   When the lawyer makes an opening statement to the jury, does she simply “wing it” and hope the jury understands what she is talking about?   When she offers her closing statement, her impassioned summation of all the evidence in the case, does she simply speak from the top of her head, making up her statement as she goes along?   Surely not:  any lawyer that would do such a thing would quickly find herself sued for malpractice.   People who communicate for a living—writers, lawyers, media specialists, web designers—all go about planning, to a greater or less degree, exactly what they want to say before they say it. 

 

There are a number of primary ways to organize your writing.  In this chapter we will discuss two:  mapping (or “idea mapping” or “mind mapping”) and outlining. We will also cover how to apply these methods to your own writing and the essays you will be asked to produce in English 101.

 

Before we begin, it is important to note that the material you generated in the generating ideas part of the Writing Process is going to be indispensable here; your planning process will make extensive use of the “raw materials” that you generated through your brainstorming, freewriting, questioning, clustering, and looping exercises. 

 

Principles of Organization

 

Different modes of writing are organized in different ways.   Narrative essays, for example, are in most cases organized chronologically.  Expository or explanatory essays are organized according to the classifications or logical divisions within their subjects; comparison-contrast essays are organized conceptually, by the features of the subject being compared.   Argument essays are perhaps the most sophisticated and difficult essays to organize: they must follow a clear logical progression and development of evidence to be effective. 

 

Global Organization vs. Local Organization

Writing is organized both as a total entity—the “whole” piece of writing—as well as the individual parts that make up that whole.   In effective writing, both the “global” or “whole” piece of writing, and the “local” or constituent parts are logically connected.   More specifically, an essay should have an overall controlling idea that supplies structure, and be well- organized at the paragraph, and even sentence level.  

 

The key here is to consider how ideas and details fit together logically.   Seeing connections between ideas is often time-consuming, and in most cases requires considering, reconsidering, and considering again the ideas you are examining to find the most logical connections between them.  The successful writer conducts many thought “experiments” before making a commitment to a particular wording. The great American novelist Ernest Hemingway reportedly revised the conclusion to Farewell to Arms 43 times before he was satisfied with it. And that was in the days before computers made revision easy.

 

Starting the Planning & Organizing Process:  Listing, Grouping, and Ordering  

One of the first steps writers consider when planning out their writing is examining the similarities and differences between the ideas that they have generated for the project. 

 

Examine the following list of items, and group them into at least two distinct categories, according to criteria that seem logical to you:

 

Goat, lamb, lion, giraffe, pig, chicken, duck, horse, zebra, elephant, tiger, cow, baboon

 

One possible way of organizing the list above is through where the animals live or where they are located.  There seems to be some farm animals on this list, as well as some animals that live in the jungle. 

 

Category I:  Farm Animals	Category II:  Jungle Animals
Goat, Lamb, Pig Chicken, Duck, Horse Cow	Lion, Giraffe, Zebra Elephant, Tiger, Baboon

 

Now consider a slightly more complicated problem of organization:

 

Chicken Parmesan, Sushi, Veal Marsala, Polish Sausage, Orange Roughy, New York Strip Steak, Pork Chop, Lake Trout, Pasta Primavera, Shrimp Tempura, Fried Chicken, Grilled Leg of Lamb

 

What are some ways that we could organize this particular list? 

 

By cultural origin of cuisine? 

 

By food origin (land v. sea)?

By method of cooking? 

 

 

Now let’s move on to something a bit more applicable to your writing:  organizing a list of things conceptually via sequencing or via logical similarities.

 

Topic:  The Process of Enrolling in College

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What is the most logical sequence for the events below?  Order them in the order that would be most appropriate to describe the process to someone unfamiliar with it.   What would the underlying scheme be?  How would your audience best make sense of all the things that one has to do to enroll in college?  Think carefully about how the process of applying to and attending college works, and let the organizational scheme you choose reflect that. 

 

Raw Materials (Brainstormed Ideas)

 

Reading enrollment brochures

Taking the SAT

Applying online

Registering for classes

Choosing the colleges to apply to

Meeting with an academic advisor

Putting in a deposit

Waiting for the admissions decision

Researching available majors

Attending the first class

Deciding that college is worthwhile

Moving to campus

Finding financial aid

Accepting the admission offer

 

Topic:   Benefits of a college education 

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  Raw Materials (Brainstormed Ideas)

 

Make more money

Learn more about the world around you

Develop useful job skills

Meet people

Develop positive life-long learning habits

Have fun

Increase ability to communicate

Make useful professional contacts

Learn about and practice tolerance

Appreciate diversity

Become qualified for different or better jobs

Learn how to argue and defend yourself intellectually

Expand social horizons

Develop a network of social and professional supporters

Increase relationship attractiveness or eligibility

Develop critical thinking skills

Provide a better quality of life for children or family

Set a good example for friends and family

 

 

To begin to organize this list, start with the first item, and think carefully about what it means in relation to your topic.  Then put it in the left-most column below.   Then move on to the next item in the list.  Compare it to the item you’ve already put in the first column. What do they have in common?   Do they benefit the education-seeker in the same way?  Do they provide the same things?   If so, put the second item in the first column.  If not, put it in the next one to the right. 

 

Here, the first item, “make more money,” is pretty straightforward:  having a college education enables a person to make a lot more money over the course of her life.  This is a financial and personal benefit.  The second item, “learn more about the world,” is not financial, but is personal, and is a lot more abstract than the first.  So we’ll put it in the next column.    The third item, “develop useful job skills” returns to the basic idea that an education helps you make money through work; it’s personal and will lead to more personal success.   The fourth, “meet people,” is not really like the first three items—it’s primarily a social benefit, so we’ll put it in the third column.   Try organizing the rest of the list yourself—and be ready to explain why you think these things are similar and different!

make more money   develop job skills

Learn more about the world around you

Meet people

 

 

Grouping and sequence are key organizational ideas.  But how do we put them into a paper?   There are several ways to do this, but they fall into two main categories:  “mapping” and “outlining.”  Both serve similar functions in slightly different ways.

 

Continue to Composition 03: Mind Mapping and Outlining