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=Meaning of organization of subject matter=

_Relativity_ of importance is the second factor of good organization.
A cursory study of a well-organized chapter or merely passing
attention to a well-organized lecture reveals at once a distinct
difference in the emphasis on the various parts or elements of the
subject. The proportional allotment of time or space, the number of
illustrations, the number of questions asked on a given point, the
force of language--these are all means of bringing out the relative
importance of constituent topics or principles. In retrospect, a
well-organized lesson presents an appearance similar to a contour map;
each part stands out in distinctive color according to its
significance.

It is frequently argued by teachers that students of college age
should be required to distinguish the relativity of importance of the
parts of a lesson or the topics in a subject; that the instructor who
points out the changing importance of each succeeding part of a lesson
is enervating the student by doing for him what he ought to do for
himself. This is true in part, but it must be realized that the
instructor who through questions and directed discussions leads
students to formulate for themselves the relative importance of data
is not only carrying out the suggestion made in the preceding
paragraph but is also developing in his students a power they too
frequently lack. Those who have studied the notes that students take
in their classes have seen how frequently facts are torn from their
moorings; how wrong principles are derived from illustrations; how a
catch-phrase becomes a basic principle; how simple truths and axioms
are distorted in the frenzy of note taking. Through questions if
possible, through emphasis on illustrations and explanations, where no
other means is available, students must be made to see that all facts
of a subject are not of the same hue, that some are faint of tint,
others in shadow, and still others in high colors. Without this
relativity of importance, facts are grouped; with it, they are
intelligently organized.

_An underlying tendency_ can be discerned in well-organized knowledge.
Not only are facts arranged in logical sequence and emphasized
according to importance, but there is in addition a central principle
or an underlying purpose giving unifying force to them all. We can
illustrate the need of this third characteristic of good organization
by referring to a coll