How should students take notes from texts?
Summary: Once you have come to an understanding of the text, put the text aside and try setting out its argument in your own words. Karen: The way a student takes notes has a big bearing on how they write their essays. There is a way of writing where the student more or less copies what they’ve read – not quite word for word – but changing a bit of sentence structure here and putting a few words in there. The problem here is that we’re not entirely convinced that the student has understood the material. Writing in your own words means reading the material, going away and thinking about it – and then setting down the ideas as you’ve understood them . There will be times when you need to look back over the text – at something important or when the vocabulary is unfamiliar – or there’ll be a phrase that is crucial. But fundamentally you want to be writing it out of your own head, not just copying it. This comes down to having a bit of mental distance between you and the text. Graham: In r
