Building the foundation: How I write knowledge organisers

In my last post, “Knowledge Organisers: the good, the bad and ugly”, I argued that while knowledge organisers can be a powerful tool of inclusion, they only work if they are focused, sequential and accessible.

When I first started writing knowledge organisers two years ago, my attempts did not even come close to meeting these criteria. As a result, they were cluttered, unfocused and ultimately an exercise in fashion over function. Since then, I have devised a standard method to ensure that any knowledge organisers I make have an impact and can be used in the long term:

1. Identify key knowledge.
2. Group your facts into sections.
3. Write your sections.
4. Number or code your sections.
5. Quality assure your sections.

1.       Identify key knowledge

It’s easy to fall into the trap of including too much in a knowledge organiser, particularly when writing about topics we’re interested or about which we know a lot. We want to share our passion and subject knowledge with pupils and so often we fall into the trap of seeing everything we know as key.

This issue can be solved by working backwards; rather than thinking about what I want pupils to know, I try to think about the end goal, whether that is an exam, an assessment or a final piece of work.

The ultimate principle to remember is that knowledge organisers are a foundation. They are designed to support and reinforce the teaching you deliver in the classroom. Just because something isn’t in the knowledge organiser, doesn’t mean you can’t teach it.

This process can also be used to make sure that learning is an incremental process. Once I’ve mapped out what pupils need to understand, I can omit, scale back or make links between concepts which have been covered in previous topics or years.

2.       Sequence and group your knowledge.

Once I’ve identified the key knowledge, I sequence it into a logical order, building up to the final task. This process has the added bonus of essentially sketching out a scheme of work at the same time, while avoiding a focus on activities over content.

3.       Write your sections.

Each of the sub-topics which I identified in the sequencing stage now forms a ‘box’ in the knowledge organiser. When writing my knowledge organisers, I always try to come back to three key questions:

1. Do students need to know this or do I want them to?
2. What is the best way to present this information? I’m a big advocate of tables or diagrams over walls of text.
3. Do any of these key terms need defining?

I try to highlight key words as I write each section and then go back and add definitions to the key words box. As I will discuss in my next blog about how I use knowledge organisers, I believe that key words should help pupils to access knowledge organisers, but are not necessarily part of them.

(Wherever possible, I also either make my own diagrams or use images which are licensed for reuse.)

4.       Number or code your sections.

This step is largely administrative. However, I find that it makes using knowledge organisers much more efficient and effective. Rather than organising topics by title, I organise them by code or number. This not only makes it much easier to set homework, but also remove excuses and confusion when it comes to what pupils are expected to focus on or use.

5.       Quality assure your sections.

The word’s “quality assurance” can often strike fear into the hearts of teachers and leaders alike. However, rather than looking at compliance, quality assuring knowledge organisers is an excellent opportunity to gauge their accessibility. The quality assurance within my department has two main steps:

• Staff quality assurance: A faculty meeting in which each person quality assures someone else’s knowledge organiser. This process focuses on whether the administrative side of has been completed (coding and layout) and whether any necessary content has been missed. At the end of last year, this also served as an excellent opportunity to fill in gaps in my subject knowledge and have discussions with topic specialists.
• Student quality assurance: A group of pupils reads through the knowledge organiser and gives feedback on the clarity and ease of comprehension of the document. During this stage it is vital to remember that although knowledge organisers should be as accessible as possible, this does not mean that the pupils should understand everything without your input.

Arguably, the most important thing to remember when writing knowledge organisers is that they should be the foundation of a good scheme or work, not a bolt-on. Following these steps and writing knowledge organisers well takes time. However, if done well, this is time well spent.