Organizing Ideas

IntroductionWriting your thesis statementOrganizing your ideasCreating your organizational planCreating your outlineTalk About ItYour Turn

Tech Tools in this presentation• FreeMind • ReadWriteThink

Introduction

Your research is complete. You’ve taken your notes, checked your quotations, and listed your sources.

What do I do with it all?

How do I organize it?

Where do I start?

Introduction

Like an architect creating a blueprint, you will make a detailed organizational plan for your research project.

You will organize your notes into a thesis statement and outline, which will be the framework of your first draft.

Writing your thesis statement

Your thesis statement states the main idea of your paper. To determine your main idea, start by reviewing your notes.

???Thesis

Ecotourism is popular.

Ecotourism has become a big business.

Ecotourism benefits

communities.

Ecotourism does not emphasize

luxury.

Ecotourism is international.

Some ecotourism locations cut

corners.

These are a student’s notes about ecotourism, tourist travel to places with unspoiled natural resources.

Possibilities include

As you review your notes, think about how you will approach your topic.

Writing your thesis statement

exploring new information on the topic

examining how the topic has changed over time

analyzing a cause-and-effect relationship relating to the topic

comparing and contrasting points of view about the topic

Once you decide on your approach, you are ready to write your preliminary thesis statement.

Your thesis statement will tell both the topic of your research and your approach to the topic. You will write a preliminary thesis statement and revise it more than once as you work on your project. For example:

This thesis was too specific. Here is the revised thesis, which states the student’s main idea better.

Writing your thesis statement

Ecotourism is so popular that some locations cut corners to attract more people.

The popularity of ecotourism is threatening its very existence.

Organizing your ideas

After you have written your thesis statement, it’s time to organize your ideas.

Don’t let all the information overwhelm you.

Go through your notes and choose only those that support your thesis statement.

Then, organize your notes so that your ideas progress logically.

Ecotourism is showing a 20%-30% growth rate each year.

Ecotourism is growing at a much faster rate than is regular tourism.

Concern about the environment is one cause for ecotourism’s growth.

Overcrowding at popular tourist spots has spurred ecotourism.

Growth rateEcotourism is showing a 20%-30% growth rate each year.

Reasons for growthConcern about the environment is one cause for ecotourism’s growth.

Reasons for growthOvercrowding at popular tourist spots has spurred ecotourism.

Growth rateEcotourism is growing at a much faster rate than is regular tourism.

Growth rateEcotourism is showing a 20%-30% growth rate each year.

Growth rateEcotourism is growing at a much faster rate than is regular tourism.

Reasons for growthOvercrowding at popular tourist spots has spurred ecotourism.

Reasons for growthConcern about the environment is one cause for ecotourism’s growth.

Growth rateEcotourism is showing a 20%-30% growth rate each year.

Growth rateEcotourism is growing at a much faster rate than is regular tourism.

Reasons for growthOvercrowding at popular tourist spots has spurred ecotourism.

Reasons for growthConcern about the environment is one cause for ecotourism’s growth.

Popularity of ecotourism

Then, put cards with similar information into groups.

Organizing your ideas

First, give each card a label to show what it is about.

Give each group a category heading. The categories will become sections of your paper.

Organizing your ideas

You can order your information in several ways.

Chronological order presents events in the order they happen. This approach works well for subjects with a historical basis.

Logical order groups related ideas together. This approach works well for an idea with many subtopics.

Order of importance begins with the most important detail and moves to the least important (or the reverse). This approach supplies a logical progression to your ideas.

You will probably use a combination of orders in your project.

Some people prefer to organize their ideas in a visual way. One way to do this is by creating a mind map.

Creating your organizational plan

Mapping your ideas can give you an idea of the overall structure of your paper.

Now you will learn how to use a software program to create a mind map for your research project.

Tech Tool: FreeMind

FreeMind is a free software program you can download from the Internet to create mind maps.

FreeMind allows you to add, delete, expand, and move ideas in your map quickly and easily, with no erasing!

Tech Tool: FreeMind

To make a mind map with FreeMind, start by placing your topic in the center. This will be the parent node.

There can be only one parent node in each map.

Tech Tool: FreeMind

To add your headings under the parent node, right-click the parent node and select New Child Node,

You can add as many child nodes as you need to represent all of your ideas.

or click the lightbulb in the top taskbar.

Tech Tool: FreeMind

To add details and examples under your headings,

select the heading and click the lightbulb icon.

Tech Tool: FreeMind

You can edit any of the nodes by

• changing font size and color

• numbering the ideas in the order in which you plan to present them

• creating hyperlinks to important documents or Web sites

• moving nodes up or down to reorganize them

Creating your outline

You may be asked to create a formal outline to show each category of information in your work and the main ideas and details that support it.

I. Ecotourism descriptionA. Enjoy and protect environment

1. Appeal of unspoiled natural areas2. Current environmental concerns

B. Benefit community1. Support for rural economies2. Connections formed by travel

routesC. Vacation examples

1. United States examples2. Examples from other countries

Notecard labels become subsection headers. Your notes become supporting details.

The categories assigned to groups of notecards become main sections in your outline.

Creating your outline

II.Popularity of ecotourismA. Growth rate statistics 1.Yearly growth

20%-30% 2.Regular

tourism growth rate 5%-8%B. Reasons for growth

1.concern about the

environment

Popularity of ecotourism

Growth rate23. Ecotourism is showing a 20%-30% growth each year.

Reasons for growth14. Concern about the environment is one cause for ecotourism’s growth.

It’s easy to create an outline using the online features of ReadWriteThink. To start:

Enter your name.

Give your outline a title.

Select an outline style.

Click Next to begin building your outline.

Tech Tool: ReadWriteThink

Tech Tool: ReadWriteThink

The ReadWriteThink toolbar includes all the features you need to create your outline.

add, delete, or move subsections

start a new main idea

open a notepad window

see how your formatted outline will appear

change your view by zooming in or out

Tech Tool: ReadWriteThink

To begin your outline, add your first main section.

Then, add subsections to each main section.

Add, delete, or move boxes to create your outline.

Tech Tool: ReadWriteThink

When you have completed your outline, select Finish to print a copy.

You can also copy and paste your outline into a word-processing program.

Talk About It

Discuss the following questions with your classmates.

3. Why might a detailed formal outline be more helpful than one that only lists general points?

2. How would you decide whether to use mapping or a formal outline to organize your research?

1. Why is it important to make sure your thesis statement is neither too broad nor too specific?

4. Why might you use online tools to organize your information rather than doing it by hand or in a word-processing program?

Your Turn

1. Use FreeMind or a pen and paper to create a mind map for the research topic below.

Community service opportunities for teenagers

2. Now create an outline for the same research topic, using ReadWriteThink, a word-processing program, or pen and paper.

3. Which method to do you think is a more effective way to organize your work? Which method would you prefer to use?

The End