Re: Is known-new the best cohesion lesson?

["Kathleen MacDowell" <kathleen -at- writefortheuser -dot- com>]

When I first saw your post, Rob, I didn't have a clue what you were
talking about (in my defense, it was late :-).

Another way to think about the known-new idea is as giving people a
context in which to think about/absorb the "new" information. That
might help business people a bit, so long as you explain that they
need to give some thought to how much people need to know to
understand the new. Or get the point they're trying to make....

To me, the notion of context helps explain why illustrations and
examples can be very helpful, even when they seem to be a stretch.

Regards,

Kathleen

On Thu, Sep 25, 2008 at 4:23 PM, Geoff Hart <ghart -at- videotron -dot- ca> wrote:
> Rob Hudson wondered: <<... is "known-new" the way to teach cohesion
> in a paragraph? Or should I do something more natural that doesn't
> seem to rely so much on placement, which can feel forced?>>
>
> Known/new is very effective for some things, but blindly following
> that structure is way too draconian an approach. The actual best
> approach depends entirely on the goal of the paragraph and on
> context. For example, if you're talking about something unknown, it's
> perfectly natural to say "here is something we didn't used to
> understand", followed by "here's what we speculate is actually
> happening".
>
> (Of course, one could argue that the "this is what we didn't
> understand" could constitute "known". Fair enough.)
>
> Known/new works very well when you're trying to teach something that
> requires readers to muster their intellectual tools before they try
> to build something new. Then, the "known" part reminds them of what
> they need to have available, and the text that follows shows them how
> to fit new knowledge into that existing framework.
>
> ----------------------------------------------------
> -- Geoff Hart
> ghart -at- videotron -dot- ca / geoffhart -at- mac -dot- com
> www.geoff-hart.com
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-- 
Kathleen MacDowell
www.writefortheuser.com
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