How to Improve your Note Taking & Note Making Skills Notes How to Improve your Note Taking & Note Making Skills

At the end of the session you should be able to: Aims of the Session The following slides will help you to understand the basics of successful note taking & making At the end of the session you should be able to: Understand the difference between note taking and note making Successfully take notes from an audio source Understand the concept of mind mapping Identify and highlight important parts of a piece of text

Some useful questions are posed by Stella Cottrell (2003): Before we start however, there is no right or wrong way of taking notes! Try to keep your notes brief and succinct Don’t try and write everything down. Just focus on the important bits Your notes should reflect the main themes and areas you have identified as important You should leave out any bit of information which is not useful to your work Some useful questions are posed by Stella Cottrell (2003): Do you really need this information? If so, which bits? Will you really use it? When, and how? Have you noted similar information already? What questions do you want to answer with this information?” Cottrell S. (2003) The study skills handbook. 2nd ed. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan

Note Taking and Note Making Note TAKING and note MAKING are two different things…. They refer to two different processes in using notes for study The next 2 slides will explain the differences

This process is also done at someone else’s pace – not at your own! Note TAKING This process involves taking notes from general speech (lectures, videos, audio tapes and dictation) and writing them down as the person speaks The note taker has less control of this process as you are dependent on being able to decipher, interpret and write down what is said This process is also done at someone else’s pace – not at your own!

Note MAKING This involves reorganising your thoughts and ideas and putting them into your own words Note making is usually something you do after the event eg. after a lecture you may rewrite the notes you made in class It also refers to when you make notes from another source eg. when you make notes from a textbook or a website This process allows more control for the student as you can do it in your own time

Reasons for Note Taking & Making To engage/interact with the material being studied To assist in writing essays and assignments To formulate ideas To remember and make sense of material For revision purposes For reviewing and reformulating ideas Enables you to avoid unintentional plagiarism

Write source references and page numbers in the margin Leave out unnecessary words (and, a, the) Only write on one side of paper, double space the lines and leave plenty of space (you can then add points later) Use bold or different coloured letters to highlight words and phrases you do not understand Post-It notes are excellent for bringing specific facts to your attention Use arrows to link information and to show connections

We will look at 4 of the best known types next…. Note Styles There are many different styles of note taking and making that you can use It is entirely your personal preference and you may use a combination of more than one type Some types may suit visual learners better, whilst some may suit audio or kinaesthetic learners So experiment until you find a type of note taking/making that works best for you! We will look at 4 of the best known types next….

Linear Notes Advantages Taking notes in a linear or sequential fashion is probably the most common way of laying out your notes. A wide left-hand margin is used so that you can add material at a later date. Advantages Conventional, as it is similar to other writings such as essays and reports Organises material effectively Neat Chronological, as it should reflect logically the argument and points made in the order they were made

Mind Maps This method can also be known as concept maps or brain patterns. It is a way of organising your notes using images, colours, symbols, arrows and capital letters. It helps to convey meaning by showing the relationship between concepts and highlighting important points. Using mind maps can help you to think creatively and is especially good for visual learners. Advantages Using images and colour can stimulate the mind and aid memory Limited use of words leads to conciseness New ideas and information can easily be inserted It promotes the free flow of ideas by being open-ended Revision is made easier as their uniqueness aids recall

Four Quarter Method Advantages Encourages interactive note taking This is where you divide your pages into quarters, each quarter representing a 15 minute slot of an hour lecture. Psychologically and visually this is a satisfying method, since you are always aware of just how far into the lesson you are. Furthermore, because space is limited, it encourages you to use abbreviations and key words. Once the notes have been written they will become a user-friendly and efficient tool for revision as all the information you want is written on just one side of paper. Advantages Encourages interactive note taking Encourages you to be concise and brief Psychologically encouraging as it helps keep concentration throughout a lecture 1st Quarter 15 mins 2nd Quarter 15 mins 3rd Quarter 15 mins 4th Quarter 15 mins

The Two Column Method Advantages This method is also known as the Cornell method. You divide the paper into two columns: The left hand column is smaller and is used to record the main points/keywords The right hand column is larger and is used for taking notes and expanding on your keywords. Advantages It can be used as a useful study aid. Simply cover up the right hand column and see if you can recall the information using the keyword prompts It is efficient and encourages you to think about your subject in more detail Creates effective study sheets

Using Highlighters You can use highlighters to identify and highlight key terms and phrases in a piece of text This allows you to be an active learner. This is much more effective than simply reading a piece of text as you then have the danger you will glaze over and miss the important parts! Active learning will help you to remember and retain the information much more successfully

Highlighting Remember there is no correct answer – This is what a highlighted piece of text COULD look like… The Psychology of Memory Memory underpins every thought we have and everything we have learned, from how we walk and talk, through to recognising our favourite movie stars in a magazine. Memory is at the heart of cognitive psychology; the branch of psychology that deals with mental processes and their effects on human behaviour. Most of us take memory for granted until the point when it fails and we forget something. Psychologists talk about different kinds of memory: sensory memory, working memory and long-term memory. Sensory memory is the direct pathway to the mind. It is the impression that new information makes on the mind and lasts for only a fraction of a second before fading forever. Imagine if you remembered absolutely everything that you saw or heard? Every second, millions of stimuli bombard your senses. You would soon be overwhelmed with too much information. Luckily, we only remember things that grab our attention and get processed in working memory. Even then, we are severely limited in terms of the amount of information we can work on and keep in memory at one time. When we have to remember a new phone number without the help of pen and paper, we are using our working memory. When it comes to words, we can only keep fresh as many words as we can say in about two seconds. People who speak very quickly tend to have a high working memory capacity because they can pack more words into those two seconds than slow talkers. Even information in working memory will fade unless it is transferred to the permanent store known as long-term memory. But once it is there, we cannot always get it out. We have all had trouble recalling someone’s name or the answer to an easy quiz question. Psychologists have found that new memories can interfere with old ones, making us believe that something happened when it never actually did. This finding is of great importance in criminal prosecutions, when witnesses try to recall events of critical importance. It also has implications for cases of recovered memories, where adults who previously thought they had had a normal childhood begin to recall traumatic events such as sexual abuse. Remember there is no correct answer – Just highlight as much or as little as you find useful

Some Points to Remember Choose the type of note making and taking that suits you best: Linear Mind Maps Four Quarter Two Column Sometimes different types of note making works better with different topics Also remember when note taking it is a passive activity – therefore you cannot expect to write absolutely everything down! Note making is an active activity so you have control over the information you record. This is your opportunity to put your notes in a structure that suits your own study style