978-0073403267 Chapter 5 Answers to Textbook Assignments

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Module 05 – Designing Documents, Slides, and Screens

Part 2: Answers to Textbook Assignments

Questions for Comprehension

5.1 How can you create white space? (LO 5-1)

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Module 05 – Designing Documents, Slides, and Screens

5.2 How do you decide whether to use bullets or numbers in a list? (LO 5-1)

5.3 What are three criteria for good web pages? (LO 5-3)

5.4 “Closed captions” for people with hearing impairments are almost always typed in full

capital letters. Why is that a bad idea? Are there any advantages to using full

capitals? What arguments could you use for changing the practice? (LO 5-1)

Of course, students may answer this question in any number of ways. Research suggests that full

capital letters are harder to read. As Appendix 5-H suggests, visual cues that help readers to see

where sentences begin and end, and in come cases what information is most important, get lost

5.5 Suppose that, in one company, a worker says, “We don’t need to worry about design.

People pay a toll charge to call us, and we make a slight profit on each call. So, if they

have questions about the product, that’s OK. If better design reduced the number of

calls, we might actually lose money!” How would you persuade a person that good

document design is worth doing? (LO 5-1)

While the company may be making a profit on the calls received, it may also be losing customers

who either aren’t satisfied with the product or customer service, or who don’t call in the first

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Module 05 – Designing Documents, Slides, and Screens

5.6 Central Community College is preparing a brochure to persuade prospective students

to consider taking classes. The college doesn’t have the money for full-scale document

testing. What free or almost-free things could it do to make the document as effective

as possible? (LO 5-1)

First, the college should follow basic principles of good design: use white space to separate and

emphasize points, use headings to group points, limit the use of words set in all capital letters,

use no more than two typefaces in a single document, and decide whether to justify margins

5.7 Design choices may have ethical implications. Indicate whether you consider each of

the following actions ethical, unethical, or a gray area. Which of the actions would you

do? Which would you feel uncomfortable doing? Which would you refuse to do? (LO

5-1)

a. Putting the advantages of a proposal in a bulleted list, while discussing the disadvantages

in a paragraph.

b. Using a bigger type size so that a resume visually fills a whole page.

c. Putting the services that are not covered by your health plan in full caps to make it less

likely that people will read the page.

Students’ answers will vary. Look for threads of explanation that use terms and concepts from

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Module 05 – Designing Documents, Slides, and Screens

5.8 Evaluating Page Designs (LO 5-1)

a. In the top pair, the one on the right uses photos that fill the grid and also puts headings in

the grid. White space is improved in the margins. In the bottom pair, the one on the right

contains many improvements. White space is improved by using bigger margins. The

number of fonts is reduced from five to two: a sans serif style for the headlines and a serif

5.9 Improving a Financial Aid Form (LO 5-1)

This problem works well as a collaborative assignment. Put students in large groups to

Some of the things which are unclear in the form will have to be assumed. For example, Kitty

assumes that less-than-full-time status matters only for college students and that information on

support for the academic year can be replaced with information on dependents for tax purposes.

This original document has at least 15 problems:

1. The year isn’t clear. Are people supposed to fill it out for the current year or for the year

the student will receive aid? Presumably the latter is what the office wants. The problem

2. There isn’t enough room to write in names.

3. The terms “full-time,” “half-time,” and “less than half-time” are confusing. Some

schools just have courses, not hours. Elementary, middle, and high school students may

4. The form asks parents to return it “to the above address,” but no address is given.

5. No due date is given.

6. The form buries the information that the financial aid application will not be processed

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Module 05 – Designing Documents, Slides, and Screens

7. The form invites people to contact a member of the “needs analysis staff” but doesn’t

give a phone number to make it easy to do so. The form probably shouldn’t invite

8. It’s not clear whether one parent’s signature is enough, or whether both must sign it.

self-contained. Let parents sign the FAF on the FAF; let the signature on this form just

refer to this form.

11. The directions are hard to follow. Numbering the steps would help.

12. The form lacks a title.

13. Full capital letters make the form unnecessarily hard to read.

to check) would be “List family members whom you claim as dependents on your federal

tax return.”

5.10 Using Headings (LO 5-1)

Information can always be organized in more than one way. Here is one acceptable answer.

a. Rules and Procedures for a Tuition Reimbursement Plan

Eligibility

You are eligible to be reimbursed if you have been a full-time employee for at least three

months.

How to Apply

You must apply before the first class meeting.

Reimbursement

You must earn a “C” or better in the course.

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Module 05 – Designing Documents, Slides, and Screens

b. Activities in Starting a New Business

Choosing Your Business

Identifying the market for your products or services

Investigating Resources

Identifying government and university programs for small business development

Planning Financials

Pricing your products or services

Getting Legal Clearances

Getting any necessary city or state licenses

Opening Your Office

Choosing a location

Selling Your Product or Service

Advertising and marketing

5.11 Analyzing Documents (LO 5-11)

Students’ answers will vary, depending on the organization and documents they’ve selected.

Allow two weeks’ lead time if you’re requiring a written evaluation or a formal presentation

evaluating a document. Some students find it hard to obtain documents. Suggest that they ask

5.12 Revising a Document (LO 5-1)

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Module 05 – Designing Documents, Slides, and Screens

5.13 Evaluating PowerPoint Slides (LO 5-2)

Is the background appropriate for the topic?

The background is acceptable for a slides, although the “opening” slide seems too dark. For b

Do the slides use words or phrases rather than complete sentences?

Is the font big enough to read from a distance?

For c, the slides are readable, but the fonts on a and b slides are not. (If you can’t read the text in

Is the art relevant and appropriate?

The clip art in slide a-2 seems cartoonish. The frog photo in slide a-3 seems irrelevant. In the b

Is each slide free from error?

5.14 Evaluating Web Pages (LO 5-3)

Students should focus on both the content and the expression of information on web pages. For

The best revisions of the form usually use a sideways page (landscape orientation) and redesign

the form pretty completely.

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Module 05 – Designing Documents, Slides, and Screens

Polishing Your Prose: Active and Passive Voice (Odd-numbered answers are in the back of

the textbook.)

Several answers are possible—here are likely ones.

2. Rewrite the sentence for brevity and active voice: The hiring committee reviewed two dozen résumés.

4. Change to active voice: Jessica Malone and Dylan Toshi wrote the final report.

Unit 1: Cases for Communicators

Old Navy Taken to School

The unit case describes the difficulties that clothing retailer Old Navy encountered when it

produced t-shirts for 70 colleges and universities that contained an error. The t-shirts were

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Module 05 – Designing Documents, Slides, and Screens

manner. This document may not be copied, scanned, duplicated, forwarded, distributed, or posted on a website, in whole or part.

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