The Health Literacy Style Manual - Covering Kids & Families

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Project Planning Why, Who, and How PL A N F O R R E S O U RC E S C a reful planning is the best way to create an environment in which your project can flourish. The planning steps are the same whether y o u ’ re writing new material (because there’s a new program) or revising old material (because it’s outdated or otherwise p ro b l e m a t i c ) . Begin planning by identifying the audience for whom you’ll be p roducing the materials. You need to be able to describe the audience clearly (including any language groups other than English) so that you can re c ruit people to help you and can direct them as they work. Next identify all the stakeholders. Don’t leave anyone out. Most of the time, stakeholders will include the project manager, writers, designers, content experts, programmers, reviewers, community advocates, program staff, printers, lawyers, and of course clients and p rospective clients. Be particularly aware of the importance of having one or more computer programmers on the project team. The programmers can PRO JEC T PLAN NING | 7
help the rest of the team understand how the state’s computer system works, what its limitations are, and how those limitations might a ffect the way notices can look. Flesh out the plans by answering these questions: • Who will take the lead, keep the schedule, and make necessary decisions when there are conflicting opinions about what should be done? • What’s the timeline? • What’s the budget? • Who is going to do the writing? • Who is going to format or design? • Who will review and approve each draft? • Who will do the field testing, and when? PR E PA R E OT H E R S F O R C H A N G E Sometimes it’s hard to accept change, even when the change pro m i s e s to bring improvement. Not everyone will agree on what to do even when they all agree that the existing materials are bad. The change p rocess will go more smoothly if you pre p a re all of the stakeholders. Speak to them individually or in groups, and: • Describe the audience. • Summarize your concerns, explaining why you think t h e y ’ re important. • Explain that you want to produce materials that most of your clients will be able to read. Explain that the materials will be written in plain language, formatted with a clean and friendly design, translated (if appropriate), and field t e s t e d . 8 | TH E HEALTH LITERACY STYLE MANU AL
Page 1 and 2: The Health Literacy Style Manual Pr
Page 3 and 4: WR I T I N G 1 7 Write in plain lan
Page 5 and 6: C overing the cost Small-scale test
Page 7 and 8: and improving problem materials, an
Page 9 and 10: WHO ARE YOUR READERS? Nearly half o
Page 11 and 12: HOW CLIENTS “READ” HEALTH INFOR
Page 13: This is a “before and after” of
Page 17 and 18: This example of a poster, like that
Page 19 and 20: CR E AT E A LO O K A N D F E E L Al
Page 21 and 22: u n f o r t u n a t e l y, explaini
Page 23 and 24: 16 | THE HEALTH LITERAC Y STYLE MA
Page 25 and 26: vocabularies. Using common, everyda
Page 27 and 28: The left column shows words that ar
Page 29 and 30: B u r e a u c ratic language and le
Page 31 and 32: USE THE ACTIVE VOICE Write in the a
Page 33 and 34: Longer sentences are not necessaril
Page 35 and 36: Here is the revised notice. US E A
Page 37 and 38: You can improve the readability of
Page 39 and 40: This notice contains important info
Page 41 and 42: LINK NEW INFORMATION TO OLD Readers
Page 43 and 44: OF F E R H E L P TO R E A D E R S M
Page 45 and 46: CHOOSE A CLEAN DESIGN The first pag
Page 47 and 48: CHOOSING FONTS For readers with lim
Page 49 and 50: PRINT SIZE The point size of type (
Page 51 and 52: LAYOUT To lay out a page is to arra
Page 53 and 54: When the alignment is right-justifi
Page 55 and 56: CONTRAST Text is easiest to read wh
Page 57 and 58: • I t a l i c s . The contrast be
Page 59 and 60: The blue on this brochure (written
Page 61 and 62: H e a d i n g s Headings and subhea
Page 63 and 64: Be careful to write an introductory
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• Make them illustrative. Visual
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• D o n ’t print over a graphic
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This form (still in draft when we r
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The small print and difficult vocab
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Folding and mailing When you’re p
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application itself. Don’t begin t
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• Avoid using the word “optiona
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• Many readers have no context fo
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PROBLEM CHARTS AND TABLES Forms and
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This application doesn’t avoid cr
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Income charts Income charts are par
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80 | THE HEALTH LITERAC Y STYLE MA
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d i ff e rent point of view. But fo
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a little more, and the re s e a rch
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Small-scale testing is a significan
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p rompt the participant if she’s
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TRA N S L AT I N G I S A S P E C I
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When your quality assurance person,
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For more information For more detai
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