Information Pyramids

As you organize information within your paragraph (and longer writing), you can choose which way makes the most sense to organize your message.

Sometimes a chronologiical or step-by-step listing is best.
Other times there is no clear first or last, and you need to find other ways to sort.

Generally, the topic sentence is first in the paragraph, and it is a broad statement that all other information falls under. However, there can be cases where we want to start with a single, powerful, fact, and and then expand from that to more general information.  We call these kinds of information presentation designs "pyramids" or "information triangles."