Introduction
A Literature Review Matrix and a Literature Synthesis Matrix will help you organize the articles, etc. you've found along the way and will help you prepare to write your literature review.
Writing a Literature Review
Unless you have a reason to present the literature chronologically (to show development over time, perhaps), the preferred method for organizing your literature is thematically.
Step 1: Identify your themes.
Step 2: Identify the articles that address those themes
Step 3: Identify the similarities and differences among the articles within the themes
A Literature Synthesis Matrix will be especially helpful in this process.
The video below provides an excellent overview of the entire Literature Review process. (North Carolina State University Libraries)
Click on the title to go to the e-book.
Health Sciences Literature Review Made Easy: The Matrix Method, 6th ed. by 
The Literature Review: Six Steps to Success, 3rd ed. by 
Literature Reviews for Education and Nursing Graduate Students by 
A Nurse's Step-By-Step Guide to Writing a Dissertation or Scholarly Project, 3rd ed. by Tools to Help you Organize your Literature Review
Literature Review Matrix
This type of matrix will help you see the content of all of your articles at a glance. Each row represents an article, and each column and element of the articles. Typical columns can include things like
However, the exact columns you chose depend on the elements of each study you want to discuss in your paper. You get to decide!
Here are couple of examples to give you a better idea.
Literature Synthesis Matrix
In essence a synthesis matrix is a way to organize your literature by theme, which is generally the way writers organize their whole literature reviews. The real benefit is that it helps you identify the articles that talk about the same themes so that you can write about them together in your literature review.
North Carolina State has a very nice description and example of the process.
This YouTube video also explains the process.
Here is a template you can use (this one is in Word instead of PPT).
