In Unit 3, your team started thinking about which author will write which chapter. But before you assign the work on this project, your team needs to make high-level group decisions so that the resulting textbook meets our Learner Focus criteria for success: Chapter is consistent in tone, approach, and style. This section walks you through approaches to content organization to give you ideas about how you might structure the material you plan to cover. During this unit you’ll use team meeting time to finalize chapter assignments and make initial decisions about chapter design choices.

Remember to use the Word List section of your {Course #} About This Book document to record decisions you make as a group about word choices, spelling, punctuation, and so on, so that your chapters are consistent. For example, your team may decide to call interactive chapter elements “Activities,” “Your Turn,” “Discuss and Do,” or something else. Any of these will work, as long as every chapter uses the same term.

Organizing Content

In Unit 3, you used your Parking Lot document to make a high-level list of 8 topics that will become the 8 chapters in your book. Now it’s time to revisit those topics and restate them as top-level outline entries that describe each chapter.

Textbooks are complex publications. They need to cover a body of knowledge in a structured way, using design elements to help the learner better understand the subject. Your book’s structure should be in place before you start writing so that you can maintain consistency between chapters. This reduces the cognitive load of navigating your book so that students can stay focused on learning. Your textbook’s structure may take a variety of forms depending on the curriculum content, learning context, pedagogical approach and other factors.

There are three standard textbook organizations: sequential, hierarchical, and horizontal. It’s rare that you’ll find a book that fits neatly into one of these patterns; most employ a hybrid organization. But it can be helpful to consider each separately before you look for ways to blend them together to accomplish the unique purpose of your text.

Sequential organization

Sequential organization orders the chapters according to a process, a timeline, or some other kind of logical progression. An example of sequential organization can be seen in the abridged table of contents for a child development textbook that covers life stages in chronological order:

1. An Introduction to Child Development
2. Theoretical Perspectives and Research
3. The Start of Life: Genetics and Prenatal Development
4. Birth and the Newborn Infant
5. Physical Development in Infancy
6. Cognitive Development in Infancy
7. Social and Personality Development in Infancy
8. Physical Development in Preschoolers
9. Cognitive Development in the Preschool Years
10. Social and Personality Development in the Preschool Years

Sequential organization is useful when you want to lead students through the steps or phases of your topic.

Horizontal organization

Horizontal organization, sometimes called parallel organization, arranges chapters by theme. An example of horizontal organization can be seen in the abridged table of contents for a sociology textbook that explores independent and equally important themes:

1. THEME 1: THINKING SOCIOLOGICALLY
   1. Digital Revolution
   2. Globalization
   3. Modernity
   4. Postcolonialism
   5. Postmodernity
   6. Rationalization
2. THEME 2: DOING SOCIOLOGY
   1. Ideal Type
   2. Qualitative / Quantitative Methods
   3. Realism
   4. Reflexivity
   5. Science
   6. Social Constructionism
   7. Structure / Agency
3. THEME 3: ENVIRONMENT AND URBANISM
   1. Alienation
   2. Environment
   3. Industrialization
   4. Migration
   5. Risk
   6. Sustainable Development
   7. Urbanism

With horizontal organization, the chapters can be taught or read in any order, and the book would still make sense. This type of organization is best suited for surveys, anthologies, or a book that is organized around a larger theme.

Hierarchical organization

Hierarchical organization breaks down a topic and organizes it either deductively (from general to specific), inductively (from specific to general), or a combination of the two. An example of hierarchical organization can be seen in the abridged table of contents for a sociology textbook in which chapter topics progress from general to specific, and within the chapters, the subsections are also arranged from general to specific.

1. What Is Sociology?
   1. What Is Sociology?
   2. Levels of Analysis
   3. Thinking Relationally: The Paired Concepts
   4. Different Careers of Sociology Majors
2. American Sociology: Theory and Contexts
   1. Thinking Like a Sociologist
   2. Sociology, Theory, and the Social Sciences
   3. Sociology in America
   4. Sociology Today
3. Doing Sociology: Research Methods and Critical Literacy
   1. Social Research
   2. The Research Process
   3. Three Common Strategies for Sociological Research
   4. The Social Nature of Social Research

Hierarchical organization brings coherence to a book that needs to touch on a lot of different topics.

Pros and cons of organization types

The different types of textbook organization each have their advantages and disadvantages. Sequential organization, for example, results in a straightforward outline. However, rigid sequential order can limit how people use and read the book, which means some instructors might not adopt the book if they can’t see how they can customize it to their curriculum’s needs. The horizontal outline is also readily understandable to the reader. However, a central theme or organizing principle is critical in making sure this kind of book doesn’t turn into an endless string of topics (“and then… and then… and then…” is not a compelling structure!). Hierarchical organization is common in textbooks, but if your scope is not well-defined, the reader can get lost in the weeds.

There is no right or wrong way to organize your textbook. You will find examples of excellent textbooks that break from these patterns or do something else entirely. What’s most important is that you find the structure that best fits your topic, makes sense to your students, and will also appeal to other instructors.

Having said that, though, there is one structure that this project avoids: using the bulk of the content for all the contributions of dead white men (to use a common shorthand for privileged identities), then, by the way, bringing the reader up to the present with a quick acknowledgement that women, people of color, queer people, and people with disabilities also exist. In most disciplines, the people whose accomplishments were historically recognized represent the most privileged identities. But our equity-minded approach to design encourages rethinking how these narratives are presented. This meets one of our Representation of Diverse Voices criteria for success: Chapter lifts up historically minoritized identities.

Licenses and Attributions for Textbook Visioning

Open content, original

“Textbook Visioning” by Open Oregon Educational Resources is licensed under CC BY 4.0.

Open content, shared previously

“Organizing Content” is adapted from Course and Textbook Development Pathway by Stephanie Lenox, which is licensed under CC BY 4.0.