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Lesson 7

On a Practical Note: Organizing Your Literature Review

Consider how the studies you've reviewed are connected. Were they asking similar questions, but in different contexts? Were they using different research designs to answer similar questions? Did they report similar or conflicting findings?

Then, look back at the studies you've read. They likely included some kind of literature review that you can look back at as a mentor text for your own writing. How did they structure that discussion? Two common approaches are organizing by theme (common findings, common approaches or questions, etc.) or by individual study. 

Organize Paragraphs by Theme

“a, b, c” studies found that some kids use writing to communicate with peers...(this paragraph is about studies that found this; next paragraph would be about another theme), like kids use writing to process school learning

“d, e, f” found that kids use writing to process school learning

Organize Paragraphs by Study

 “x” study found that to encourage kids’ writing, teachers should consider that blah blah (this paragraph is all about x’s findings; next paragraph is all about y’s findings)

“y” study found that.....

You might try both approaches and see what works best for introducing a reader to the ongoing conversation you're bringing them into. Often, I find that organizing by study is the easiest way for me to write a first draft since it forces me to really think about what each study is offering and how it's connected to the other studies and the overall conversation. However—recognizing that reviews organized by theme are much easier for me to understand as a reader while reviews organized by individual studies very often end up feeling repetitive and list-like—I typically find myself revising that first draft to organize by common themes instead.

Note: Another important purpose and part of writing a literature is building the case for how your study contributes to the larger conversation. This generally looks like taking a few sentences at the end of your literature review to think about how your study fills a "gap" in the existing literature and/or how it builds on or complicates the conversation. As you're reading and synthesizing the literature, keep this point in mind. How does this literature inform your study? But also how does it set up the need for the importance of your own study?

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