1. Organizing Ideas Introduction Writing your thesis statement
Organizing your ideas
Creating your organizational plan
Creating your outline
Talk About It
Your Turn
Tech Tools in this presentation
FreeMind
ReadWriteThink

2. Introduction
Your research is complete. You’ve taken your notes, checked your quotations, and listed your sources.
What do I do with it all?
Where do I start?
How do I organize it?

3. 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.

4. Writing your thesis statement
Your thesis statement states the main idea of your paper. To determine your main idea, start by reviewing your notes.
These are a student’s notes about ecotourism, tourist travel to places with unspoiled natural resources.
Ecotourism does not emphasize luxury.
Ecotourism is international.
Ecotourism benefits communities.
???
Thesis
Ecotourism has become a big business.
Some ecotourism locations cut corners.
Ecotourism is popular.

5. Writing your thesis statement
As you review your notes, think about how you will approach your topic.
Possibilities include
exploring new information on the topic
examining how the topic has changed over time
comparing and contrasting points of view about the topic
analyzing a cause-and-effect relationship relating to the topic
Once you decide on your approach, you are ready to write your preliminary thesis statement.

6. Writing your 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:
Ecotourism is so popular that some locations cut corners to attract more people.
This thesis was too specific. Here is the revised thesis, which states the student’s main idea better.
The popularity of ecotourism is threatening its very existence. 6

7. 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. 7

8. Popularity of ecotourism
Organizing your ideas
First, give each card a label to show what it is about.
Then, put cards with similar information into groups.
Growth rate
Ecotourism is showing a 20%-30% growth rate each year.
Ecotourism is growing at a much faster rate than is regular tourism.
Reasons for growth
Overcrowding at popular tourist spots has spurred ecotourism.
Concern about the environment is one cause for ecotourism’s growth.
Popularity of ecotourism
Ecotourism is showing a 20%-30% growth rate each year.
Growth rate
Ecotourism is showing a 20%-30% growth rate each year.
Growth rate
Ecotourism is showing a 20%-30% growth rate each year.
Reasons for growth
Overcrowding at popular tourist spots has spurred ecotourism.
Overcrowding at popular tourist spots has spurred ecotourism.
Reasons for growth
Overcrowding at popular tourist spots has spurred ecotourism.
Growth rate
Ecotourism is growing at a much faster rate than is regular tourism.
Concern about the environment is one cause for ecotourism’s growth.
Reasons for growth
Concern about the environment is one cause for ecotourism’s growth.
Ecotourism is growing at a much faster rate than is regular tourism.
Reasons for growth
Concern about the environment is one cause for ecotourism’s growth.
Growth rate
Ecotourism is growing at a much faster rate than is regular tourism.
Give each group a category heading. The categories will become sections of your paper. 8

9. 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. 9

10. Creating your organizational plan
Some people prefer to organize their ideas in a visual way. One way to do this is by creating a mind map.
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. 10

11. 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.
Ecotourism description
A. Enjoy and protect environment
1. Appeal of unspoiled natural areas
2. Current environmental concerns
B. Benefit community
1. Support for rural economies
2. Connections formed by travel routes
C. Vacation examples
1. United States examples
2. Examples from other countries 11

12. Popularity of ecotourism
Creating your outline
The categories assigned to groups of notecards become main sections in your outline.
Notecard labels become subsection headers. Your notes become supporting details.
II.Popularity of ecotourism
A. Growth rate statistics
1.Yearly growth %-30%
2.Regular tourism growth rate 5%-8%
B. Reasons for growth
1.concern about the environment
Popularity of ecotourism
Growth rate
23. Ecotourism is showing a 20%-30% growth each year.
Reasons for growth
14. Concern about the environment is one cause for ecotourism’s growth. 12

13. Tech Tool: ReadWriteThink
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. 13

14. Tech Tool: ReadWriteThink
The ReadWriteThink toolbar includes all the features you need to create your outline.
start a new main idea
add, delete, or move subsections
open a notepad window
change your view by zooming in or out
see how your formatted outline will appear 14

15. 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. 15

16. 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. 16

17. Talk About It Discuss the following questions with your classmates.
Why is it important to make sure your thesis statement is neither too broad nor too specific?
2. How would you decide whether to use mapping or a formal outline to organize your research?
Why might a detailed formal outline be more helpful than one that only lists general points?
4. Why might you use online tools to organize your information rather than doing it by hand or in a word-processing program? 17

18. Your Turn
Use FreeMind or a pen and paper to create a mind map for the research topic below.
Community service opportunities for teenagers
Now create an outline for the same research topic, using ReadWriteThink, a word-processing program, or pen and paper.
Which method to do you think is a more effective way to organize your work? Which method would you prefer to use? 18

19. The End 20