I removed one participant from the cluster analysis who sorted allthe cards, but in such a way as to skew the results. With a sharp wit, this participantcreated only two categories: “Byproducts of nuclear decay,” which containedonly one card,radiation; and “What an academic thinks of when he or shemisinterprets design as the synthesis of a set of design principles,” which con-tained all of the remaining cards. I did, however, include this participant’ssurvey responses, as they reflected an attitude toward design that favored artisticsensibility over using more formal methods such as design principles or designresearch. I address this attitude more fully in the conclusion to this article.

As I mentioned, Optimal Sort allowed me to survey participants before andafter the card sorting task (see Figure 3). In addition, the software includes asingle default comment field directly below the card sorting area, which userscan fill in with general comments (see the bottom of Figure 2)

The primary advantage of this online approach was quick and efficient accessto participants. However, there were two disadvantages. First, in a face-to-facecard sorting exercise, the researcher often observes the participant as he or shesorts the cards and uses the talk-aloud protocol to gather further informationabout participants’ thinking during the exercise. Because I would not attend thecard sorting, this kind of observation was not possible. Second, I would havelittle control over who agreed to participate. The possibility for spam is alwayspresent with online media

By design educators, I mean professional educators who teach design eitheras a primary focus or as a part of their primary focus. By practicing designers,I mean people who do design as part of their professional work. By designstudents, I mean people currently studying to become practicing designers ordesign educator

Rather than arranging the design principles accordingmy own sensibilities or some separate theory

These figuressuggest that despite the 198 principles in the raw list, for most authors a relativelysmall handful of principles, perhaps 5-7, serves most purposes

Include as a design principle whatever a text calls a design principle orsomething similar.• Include as a design principle any principle labeled as such in other texts,even if the author does not explicitly call it a “design principle.

This study took the form of two stages: a quantitative literature review thatcatalogued and analyzed visual design principles mentioned in books and web-sites on design; and a card sorting exercise with survey questions

Designers, in fact, often talk about the need to “break the rules”on occasion to bring attention or interest to a design. Some designers even denyusing design principles at all, arguing that they rely on instinct, artistic sensi-bilities, or a “good eye.

What is a design principle?•How do design principles relate to each other?•How and when do designers use design principles, particularly in these daysof user-centered, research-driven design?

Beginningwith the founding of the Design Research Society in 1966,

Many books, designers, and design educators talk about visual design prin-ciples such as balance, contrast, and alignment, but with little consistency

o makeourselves a force to reckon with in the content management discourse, arguesAndersen, we need to raise the visibility and accessibility of our scholarship in thisarea,

“process of collecting, manag-ing, and publishing information to whatever medium you need

technical communi-cation requires information and knowledge management

“a platform for managing the creation, review, filing,updating, distribution, and storage of structured and unstructured content”

Content management has a direct bearing on our field because a central issue incontent management is the role (or a lack thereof) of technical communicators inthe process of CMS design and implementation

Changing the way people work is animmensely difficult task, especially if the changes most clearly benefit the organi-zation while doing nothing clearly beneficial for the individual users.

need for us to teach content management in our tech-nical communication courses, it is high time for our field not only to gain a betterunderstanding of CMSs but also to formulate a theoretically sound and pedagogi-cally viable approach to content management

No longer can writers think in terms of texts or even publications. They haveto start thinking in terms of asset management:

glaring lack of involvement in CMS design

The very expressioncontent managementexcludes any idea of writingor communicating and focuses on information independently of the people whoproduce or consume it.

In other words, they teach you how to design and/or use such systemswithout critical examinations of why such systems should be used in the first placeand why they succeed or fail

Technical communication is a broad field and includes any form of communication that exhibits one or more of the following characteristics:

They make information more useable and accessible to those who need that information, and in doing so, they advance the goals of the companies or organizations that employ them

Technical Writers & Editor

incorporate, or concentrate on communication techniques other than writing, including editing, indexing, graphic design, video scripting and production, and instructional design

combines multi-media knowledge and strong communication skills with technical expertise to educate across the entire spectrum of users’ abilities, technical experience, and visual and auditory capabilities

n a profound sense, all meaning-making is multimoda

newly prominent modes and technolog

Pedagogy is a teaching and learning relationship that creates the potential for building learning conditions leading to full and equitable social participation

students and teachers and a new approach to literacy pedagogy that they call "multiliteracies."

Literacy pedagogy, in other words, has been a carefully restricted project - restricted to formalized, monolingual, monocultural, and rule-governed forms of language.

such as visual images and their relationship to the written word

Cultural differences and rapidly shifting communications media meant that the very nature of the subject - literacy pedagogy - was changing radically. This article is a summary of our discussions.

First, we want to extend the idea and scope of literacy pedagogy to account for the context of our culturally and linguistically diverse and increasingly globalized societies, for the multifarious cultures that interrelate and the plurality of texts that circulate

visual design in desktop publishing or the interface of visual and linguistic meaning in multimedia

newly prominent modes and technologies of communication; and changing text usage in restructured workplaces

yet it is by no means a finished piece

multiliteracies - a word we chose to describe two important arguments we might have with the emerging cultural, institutional, and global order: the multiplicity of communications channels and media, and the increasing saliency of cultural and linguistic diversity

Second, we decided to use the term "multiliteracies" as a way to focus on the realities of increasing local diversity and global connectedness

The article goes on to discuss six design elements in the meaning-making process: those of Linguistic Meaning, Visual Meaning, Audio Meaning, Gestural Meaning, Spatial Meaning, and the Multimodal patterns of meaning that relate the first five modes of meaning to each other.

Situated Practice, which draws on the experience of meaning-making in lifeworlds, the public realm, and workplaces; Overt Instruction, through which students develop an explicit metalanguage of Design; Critical Framing, which interprets the social context and purpose of Designs of meaning; and Transformed Practice, in which students, as meaning-makers, become Designers of social futures

These examples of revolutionary changes in technology and the nature of organizations have produced a new language of work. They are all reasons why literacy pedagogy has to change if it is to be relevant to the new demands of working life, if it is to provide all students with access to fulfilling employment.

market logic

teachers find their cultural and linguistic messages losing power and relevance as they compete with these global narratives.

not much space is offered in the marketplace of childhood that reflects genuine diversity among children and adolescents.

are now made unashamedly public

As these three major realms of social activity have shifted, so the roles and responsibilities of schools must shift

The danger of glib and tokenistic pluralism is that it sees differences to be immutable and leaves them fragmentary

To achieve this, we need to engage in a critical dialogue with the core concepts of fast capitalism, of emerging pluralistic forms of citizenship, and of different lifeworlds. This is the basis for a new social contract, a new commonwealth.

An order of discourse is the structured set of conventions associated with semiotic activity (including use of language) in a given social space

Reading, seeing, and listening are all instances of Designing.

isual Meanings (images, page layouts, screen formats); Audio Meanings (music, sound effects); Gestural Meanings (body language, sensuality); Spatial Meanings (the meanings of environmental spaces, architectural spaces); and Multimodal Meanings