Taking notes may be the quintessential study skill. Even people with no real concept of “study skills” know that students are supposed to take notes. Teachers like to say, “If I’m talking, you should be writing.” But how many students listen?
Students struggle with note taking because they are overwhelmed by the content covered in class. They don’t know where to start. They don’t know what to write because they don’t know the content well enough to identify the main ideas and key points.
No one is born knowing how to take notes.
Taking notes is a skill, but it’s easy to forget that skills need to be taught. It doesn’t come naturally to students. Of all the strategies that fall under the heading of “study skills,” note-taking is the most dependent on students’ cognitive and emotional maturity. Even with specific note-taking instruction, most students are not developmentally ready to take notes. regardless up to grade 10 or even 11. If no one takes the time to teach students these skills, they will struggle with the process well into college.
It is important to give students guidelines and a system for taking notes. Ideally, this would be taught in school, but most teachers are so overwhelmed by the expectations placed on them that they find it hard to squeeze note-taking skills. Frankly, teaching taking notes is as daunting for teachers as learning taking notes is for students; teachers don’t know where to start either.
Note-taking skills are essential
Note-taking skills have been found to be the biggest predictor of success in school. Good note-taking skills help students retain what they hear in lectures and read in their textbooks, preparing them for exams. The correct system should produce lecture notes that are effective study guides.
Whether you’re a parent or teacher, you can help teens learn to take notes and then watch their grades go up as they apply the skill.
What to write?
First, taking notes is infinitely easier if you have read the textbook before class. If you do some background reading before listening to the teacher read, it will be easier for you to pick out the main ideas.
Having some background information on the topic also makes it easier to make connections. Learning is about connecting new information with things you already know. If you enter a class with a little knowledge to connect with the lesson, you will learn much more than if you go in completely blank. Your class textbook is the best place to get that information.
Second, pay attention to the teacher, not just what he says, but how he says it. If your teacher yells or gets excited about a concept, or repeats it more than once, that’s a great clue for you to write it down! If your teacher takes the time to write something on the board, you should write it down too. If your teacher says, “This will be on the test,” well, you better write it down and put a star next to it to make sure you remember to study it.
Add visual elements to your notes whenever possible. Create your own images, graphs or diagrams. Recreate images your teacher shares in class or related images from the textbook. This will give you more of a way to think about the content, making it easier to remember.
Also remember that you don’t have to take your notes from top to bottom. You’re not just transcribing what your teacher says, so you don’t have to write things on the page in the exact order the teacher says them.
Instead, make a “mind map” by drawing lines connecting related concepts. If there is space, write related ideas next to each other. Draw boxes around each concept and draw connections across the page if necessary. This can get complicated, but it’s a great process to learning the material.
A common pitfall: writing too much
Students often try to write everything their teacher says, which is practically impossible. Or they try to summarize what their teacher says into complete grammatical sentences, which isn’t much easier.
The most essential rule of thumb for taking notes is to keep it short and simple. Write down only the key words and main ideas. Skip as many unnecessary words and “helpers” as possible.
A little help from technology
It is actually easier to explain the concept of “shorthand” to students today than it was before. i used to have to strength my students to use abbreviations and shorthand in their notes; nothing came naturally to them! Now, thanks to technology, I can give students some advice that they fully understand.
“Take notes like you’re texting,” I’ll tell them. Texting has taught them all about abbreviating and omitting all but the most important words in sentences. We may want them to use correct spelling and grammar the rest of the time, but they are on the right track for note taking. It is much faster for them to write “Xndr Gr8 kng mcdnia” in their notes than “Alexander the Great was the king of Macedonia”.
Google and Internet searches in general have also helped students understand “key words” and “main ideas.” Try to explain it in those terms: When you’re taking notes, type key words and phrases as if you were entering search terms. The correct keywords should evoke related information from your memory.
Conclusion
Taking notes is an important study skill, but parents and teachers can forget to teach students how to do it. Students need a system. They should prepare for the class by reading ahead of time to get an idea of the information they are going to learn. They should try to make connections between ideas to make a “mind map.” Must know how to use shorthand and write only key phrases and ideas. And, of course, they should watch their teachers for clues as to which facts and concepts are most important.
Taking notes is a skill that takes some practice, but it makes a big difference in grades and, most importantly, improves students’ ability to learn and feel successful in school.