Reading comprehension success - LearningExpress 2005

Lesson 6 Start from the Beginning: Chronological Order
Structure

Now that you’ve covered the basics, you can begin to focus on one specific reading comprehension strategy: structure. How do writers organize their ideas?

You might want to think of a writer as an architect. Every building has a number of rooms. But how these rooms are arranged is up to the architect. The same goes for a piece of writing—how the sentences and ideas are arranged is entirely up to the writer. However, most architects—and most writers—generally follow certain patterns, not because they can’t think on their own, but because these patterns work. In this section, you’ll study four organizational patterns that work for writers:

1. Chronological order

2. Order of importance

3. Compare and contrast

4. Cause and effect

You’ll learn to recognize these patterns and some of the reasons why writers use them.

Lesson 6 Start from the Beginning: Chronological Order

Lesson summary

This lesson focuses on one of the simplest structures writers use: chronological order, or arrangement of events by the order in which they occured.

There are many ways to tell a story. Some stories start in the middle and flash backward to the beginning; a few start at the end and tell the story in reverse. But most of the time, stories start at the beginning. Writers often begin with what happened first and then tell what happened next, and next, and so on, until the end. When writers tell a story in this order, from beginning to end in the order in which things happened, they are telling it in chronological order. Chronology is the arrangement of events in the order in which they occurred.

► Chronology and Transitions

Much of what you read is arranged in chronological order. Newspaper and magazine articles, minutes of meetings, explanations of procedures, and so on are usually arranged this way. For example, look at the following paragraph that might be found in a company newsletter:

This year’s employee award ceremony was a tremendous success. The first award was given to Carlos Fe for Perfect Attendance. The second award, for Most Dedicated Employee, went to Jennifer Steele. Then, our president, Martin Lucas, interrupted the awards ceremony to announce that he and his wife were having a baby. When he finished, everyone stood up for a congratulatory toast. Afterward, the third award was given to Karen Hunt for Most Inspiring Employee. Finally, President Lucas ended the ceremony by giving everyone a bonus check for $100.

You’ll notice that this paragraph tells what happened at the ceremony from start to finish. You’ll also notice that you can tell the order in which things happened in two ways. First, you can tell by the order of the sentences themselves—first things first, last things last. Second, you can tell by the use of transitional words and phrases, which signal a shift from one idea to the next. Here is the same paragraph with the transitional words underlined:

This year’s employee award ceremony was a tremendous success. The first award was given to Carlos Fe for Perfect Attendance. The second award, for Most Dedicated Employee, went to Jennifer Steele. Then, our president, Martin Lucas, interrupted the awards ceremony to announce that he and his wife were having a baby. When he finished, everyone stood up for a congratulatory toast. Afterward, the third award was given to Karen Hunt for Most Inspiring Employee. Finally, President Lucas ended the ceremony by giving everyone a bonus check for $100.

The underlined words—first, second, then, when, afterward, third, and finally—are transitional words that keep these events linked together in chronological order. Look at how the paragraph sounds without these words:

This year’s employee award ceremony was a tremendous success. The award was given to Carlos Fe for Perfect Attendance. The award for Most Dedicated Employee went to Jennifer Steele. Our president, Martin Lucas, interrupted the awards ceremony to announce that he and his wife were having a baby. He finished; everyone stood up for a congratulatory toast. The award was given to Karen Hunt for Most Inspiring Employee. President Lucas ended the ceremony by giving everyone a bonus check for $100.

It doesn’t sound quite as good, does it?

► Practice with Transitional Words and Phrases

Practice Passage 1

Here’s a more extreme example of a paragraph with the transitional words and phrases omitted:

I went to work early to get some extra filing done. I got there; the phone started ringing. My boss walked in. He asked me to type a letter for him. He asked me to make arrangements for a client to stay in town overnight. I looked at my watch; it was already 11:00.

Now, take the paragraph and add the following transitional words and phrases:

immediately  yesterday

as soon as  a moment later

when   then

... I went to work early to get some extra filing done. ... I got there, the phone started ringing. ... my boss walked in. ... he asked me to type a letter for him. ... he asked me to make arrangements for a client to stay in town overnight. ... I looked at my watch, it was already 11:00.

See how much better the paragraph sounds with transitional words and phrases to guide you?

Answers

You might have come up with a slightly different version, but here’s one good way to fill in the blanks:

Yesterday, I went to work early to get some extra filing done. As soon as I got there, the phone started ringing. A moment later, my boss walked in. Immediately, he asked me to type up a letter for him. Then he asked me to make arrangements for a client to stay in town overnight. When I looked at my watch, it was already 11:00.

Practice Passage 2

Here is a series of events listed in random order. Use the transitional words and phrases in each sentence to help you put them in proper chronological order. Number the sentences from 1-6 in the blank provided.

If the penalty structure is to your liking, make sure that the money market account is FDIC insured.

After you’ve found the best terms, be sure to find out what the minimum account balance is and ask what the penalties are if your account drops below the limit.

In order to open a money market account, you should follow several steps.

Then you should shop around for the best terms and yields available.

Finally, once the account is opened and you are earning interest, you should consider using that interest to pay off outstanding credit card debt.

First, you should decide what features are important to you.

Answers

You should have numbered the blanks in this order: 5, 4,1, 3, 6,2. Here’s how the sentences look together in a paragraph.

In order to open a money market account, you should follow several steps. First, you should decide what features are important to you. Then you should shop around for the best terms and yields available. After you’ve found the best terms, be sure to find out what the minimum account balance is and ask what the penalties are if your account drops below the limit. If the penalty structure is to your liking, make sure that the money market account is FDIC insured. Finally, once the account is opened and you are earning interest, you should consider using that interest to pay off outstanding credit card debt.

Practice Passage 3

Read the following paragraph, which describes a local community event.

The International Dinner raised $15,000 to renovate the Berkshire Park Community Center. Three-hundred and fifty people attended the dinner, which was held in the ballroom of a local hotel. Tickets were sold in advance for $50 each. The attendees left the event feeling very good about their community. The Berkshire Park Community Center was damaged in a fire six months ago. An energetic committee of eight community members came up with the idea of the International Dinner to raise funds to repair the damages. The plan was to celebrate the diversity of the Berkshire Park Neighborhood Association by serving ethnic food that represents the various cultures in the neighborhood. The committee also organized a silent auction with prizes donated by local businesses to take place during the dinner. The committee chairperson talked to a local newspaper reporter at the dinner and stated that the goal was to raise $10,000. A follow-up letter to community members thanked everyone for the huge success of the fundraiser and outlined a schedule for the renovation.

Notice that this paragraph is not arranged in chronological order. Take the ten different events that make up the story and rearrange them so that they are in chronological order.

Here’s the order of events as they are presented in the story.

■ The International Dinner raised $15,000 to renovate the Berkshire Park Community Center.

■ Three-hundred and fifty people attended the dinner.

■ Tickets were sold for $50 each.

■ The attendees left the event feeling very good about their community.

■ The Community Center was damaged in a fire six months ago.

■ A committee of eight community members came up with the idea of the International Dinner to raise funds for repairs.

■ The plan was to serve foods that represent the various cultures in the neighborhood.

■ The committee organized a silent auction to take place during the dinner.

■ The chairperson talked to a local newspaper reporter stating the goal was to raise $10,000.

■ A letter to community members thanked everyone and outlined the schedule for renovation.

Now put the events in chronological order.

1.

2.

3.

4.

5.

6.

7.

8.

9.

10.

Now, take these chronologically ordered events and make them into a cohesive paragraph. To do this, you need to add transitional words and phrases. Here is a list of transitional words and phrases often used in chronologically organized passages:

first    soon

second   after

third   before

next   during

now   while

then   meanwhile

when   in the meantime

as soon as  at last

immediately  eventually

suddenly  finally

Write your paragraph, putting the events in chronological order with transitional phrases, below or on a separate piece of paper.

Answers

There are, of course, many possible ways of using transitional words and phrases to put this story in chronological order. One paragraph might look like this:

The Berkshire Park Community Center was damaged in a fire six months ago. Soon after, a committee of eight community members came up with the idea of an International Dinner to raise funds to repair the damages. The plan was to serve foods that represent the various cultures in the neighborhood. In addition, the committee organized a silent auction to take place during the dinner. Before the event, tickets were sold for $50 each. During the dinner, the committee chairperson talked to a local newspaper reported and stated that the goal was to raise $10,000. Three-hundred and fifty people attended the event which raised $15,000. When the attendees left the event, they felt very good about their community. After the event, a letter was sent to community members thanking them for everything while outlining a schedule for renovation.

Practice Passage 4

Chronological order is very important, especially when it comes to procedures. If you perform the steps out of chronological order, you won’t get the results you desire. Just imagine, for example, that you are trying to bake a cake. What happens when you do things out of order? You go without dessert.

Of course, the consequences of not following proper chronological order at work can be much more serious, so it’s important that you strengthen this skill. Read the following paragraph, marking it up to help you keep track of the steps that an employee must follow to get tuition reimbursement.

Our company will be happy to reimburse you for college courses that enhance your job performance. Before you register for the course, you must get approval first from your immediate supervisor and then from Human Resources. If you are taking the course for credit, you must receive a C+ or better in the course. If you are not taking it for credit, you must pass the course. After you have completed the course, you must write a report explaining the content of the course and its relevance to your position. Then, you must fill out a reimbursement request. Attach a tuition payment receipt, your report, and a copy of your grades to this request and promptly submit this request to your supervisor. Once your supervisor has approved the request, you can then submit all these forms to Human Resources, and you should receive your check within two weeks.

There are eight separate steps an employee must take to be reimbursed for college course work. What are they? List them below in the order in which the employee must do them.

1. ...

2. ...

3. ...

4. ...

5. ...

6. ...

7. ...

8. ...

If you marked up your paragraph, you should easily see the different steps. Here’s how you might have marked it up. The transitional words and phrases are highlighted in bold.

If you miss a step in this process, you won’t be reimbursed. Thus, it’s critical that you be able to identify each step and the order in which the steps must be taken.

► Summary

Chronological structure is, of course, a very useful organizational pattern. Events happen in a certain order, so writers often present them in that order. Keep an eye out for the transitional words and phrases that signal this type of organization.

Skill Building until Next Time

■ As you think about things today, try to organize them chronologically. If you think back to something that happened over the weekend, for example, think about it in the order it happened: First ..., then ..., suddenly, ..., and so on.

■ As you read about events in the newspaper or in other places, put the different pieces of each event in chronological order, as you did with the story about the International Dinner.