How to Structure a Large Amount of Information

Every person’s life is overloaded with the amount of information available. To avoid drowning in this ocean of data, it is vital to learn to select the necessary information from the large flow. In this article, wow essays service has described popular ways of structuring information.

By information, we mean knowledge, thoughts, ideas, and any computer or printed material. To systematize or structure information indicates to put it for convenient problem solving, or more precisely, to distribute it into specific groups and establish a logical connection between them.

Why should you structure information?

The need to structure information appears more often than it may seem at first glance. A systematic approach to information processing dramatically speeds up the ability to analyze, decide and learn. That’s why it’s crucial to organize your data:

Make it easier to find information

For example, you have a stack of different documents and need to find the right one quickly. Or the library has thousands of books, and the reader wants to find a particular genre or author. Or you have a stack of files on your computer and need to organize them into folders so you can access them faster and not lose what’s important.

Speed up work with tasks and ideas

Quick access to tasks is like a particular case of simplifying the search for information. For example, at the planning meeting, employees suggested many ideas for developing various projects. To continue working on these ideas, they need to be structured. Or another example. In a company, there are usually many tasks at work. They belong to different projects but overlap and have other deadlines and performers. How do we discuss and control them?

Facilitate the perception and memorization of the material

The human brain is built so that it is better to remember the information, which is “laid out in clear ways.” For example, pay attention to the structure of the article you are reading. Does it help you understand the material, or does it just confuse you more? If a person does not study sufficiently ordered material, he is doing his structuring of knowledge in his head, and this is an additional effort. Therefore, if you are writing a book, training course, or manual, you need to present the information in such a way that there is a clear logic that makes it easier to understand the elements.

Three fundamental principles of organizing data

Structuring the material means simplifying it. You need to break down complex logical connections into simple elements. How to do it correctly? Use the following principles of structuring information:

• Identify several groups. Before you structure your data, it is important to form an idea of what you want to get as a result and what data is of value to you. For example, you have the task of doing a competitor analysis. What is information about your competitors important to you? At a minimum, it may be the cost of the product and its characteristics. Based on this information, identify the key groups of data — price and features. If necessary, the groups can be further broken down into subgroups. For example, if there are a lot of product characteristics, you can structure them by creating subgroups “Material,” “Manufacturer,” and “Colors.”
• Create logical links between the groups. The groups must be interconnected and ordered about each other. For example, data about competitors can be distributed in order of priority — which information is the most important for you. At this point, there is an additional check to see if the groups have been adequately organized or if they need to be changed. The result should be an ordered scheme of data — a structure.
• Fill the structure with information. When the structure is ready, distribute the material over it. Depending on the task, some information will be important to you, and some will not. Weed out unimportant data. For example, if you have information about your competitor’s company history that is not valuable to you, you can discard it.

Later in this article, let’s look at ways of processing information based on these principles.

Methods for Structuring Information

Depending on the specifics of the task, different methods of structuring information are chosen. These can be simple sorting, grouping, or visual representation. Combine these methods to better organize your data.

Sorting

It is the easiest way to organize information. It’s handy to use when there is a huge amount of data. For example, terms in a dictionary or names on the phone. People often use sorting to structure data without even noticing it.

A variety of criteria can sort data:

• Alphabetically (A to Z). For example, it is convenient to use for sorting a list of students
• By number (ascending or descending). For example, the head of a vehicle fleet may keep a list of drivers, sorting it by the number of violations per year.
• In chronological order (by date and time). For example, on our blog’s home page, all articles are sorted by date of publication, from newer to older

Visualization

Any material can be structured with the help of visual elements — presenting data in graphs, charts, structural schemes, tables, and mental maps. Let’s dwell on the latter in more detail.

Mindmap, a mental map, is a way of presenting information using a flowchart. The idea is to depict a central object from which links associations diverge, connecting it to other objects (for example, records and images). Such a map can have an infinite number of elements.

Mental maps are often used for multilevel data structuring, proper goal setting, and project management. It is convenient to draw a map using a special service like MindMeister or Miro. Some people prefer to draw on paper by hand.

How to Structure Learning Materials

Professionals, who design courses often ask themselves: How can I structure a lot of material so students can understand it easily? So that they quickly absorb new information and understand how it relates to previous material. It all depends on how well the course is structured.

We have already said that the presentation and sequence of the information affect how it is perceived, understood, and remembered. The material’s structure can make it as easy for the student to learn or as difficult as possible. Here are some tips on how to organize course material when creating a course:

• Create a course structure. It is important to structure all material so that one section is a logical continuation of another. The course structure should be guided by the learning objectives — what the student needs to learn. Identify the main goal and break it down into several steps using the information analysis methods described.
• Coherently present the material. When describing the new information to the student, follow three simple rules: tell from the simple to the complex, from the general to the particular, and from the first to the last. Then the knowledge will be easy to absorb, overlapping with the student’s personal experience.
• Add diagrams and pictures. Visual content is easier to remember and digest than long text. So use visual elements when it’s easier to show than to tell.
• Put ready-made materials on the platform. An online learning platform helps you structure learning material. You can combine lessons into courses and courses into entire learning programs. Programs allow you to set a specific sequence for learning courses.

Following these rules when designing a course will make it easy for students to understand the new material.

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