Directions: Usually before a writer begins to write an article, essay, journal entry, or any kind of informational text, she creates an outline to help her stay organized, but for this Activity, you are going to create an outline of a text that is already written. This is to help you see how the information is organized; once you can get a visual map of the text, you can start to think about why the information was presented in the way that it was.
Read over the article about Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Parks again and think about how it is organized, how the paragraphs work together to communicate information, how they transition from one to the other, etc. Then using the Text Editor, outline the information, or make a “map” of what the article “looks like” (do not include the “Introduction” as that is done for you as an example below). You can choose the outline format with which you are most comfortable; for example, you might want to choose a more formal outline format. If that is the case, the first part of your outline would look something like this:
Maybe a main sentence with some bulleted points underneath it would work better for you. It doesn’t necessarily matter what method you choose; the focus is on writing down the information and important points in the order in which it appears to help you better understand its organizational pattern.
Use the Text Editor to outline the remaining sections of the article. You do not need to do the Introduction since it appears above.