HIT: Notetaking

[Lloyd <lloydg@ERSKINE.MEANS.NET>]

LM_NETTERS:

Thanks to all for the notetaking ideas:

School Library Media Activities Monthly, February 1996, pp. 29-32, "Reading
for Information: The Trash-'N-Treasure Method of Teaching Notetaking", by
Barbara A. Jansen.
This can also be found at
http://ericir.syr.edu/big6/Action/Lessons/K-12/jansenart.html

Nine Steps To A Quality Research Paper, by Harry Stuurmans. (Linworth Pub.)

Brainstorms and Blueprints: Teaching Library Research As A Thinking
Process, by Barbara K. Stripling. (Libraries Unlimited)

Integration of the Secondary Library Media Center into the Curriculum, by
Patricia G. Winn. (Libraries Unlimited)

Building Reference Skills in the Elementary Schools (grades 6-8
compatible), by M. Ellen Jay. (Shoe String Press)

The current LM_NET Listserv Archive has some helpful ideas under
"Notetaking"

From Virginia LaFrance: A simple thing I do is have the kids make their own
notes on a lined page that is folded in half lenghtwise. I ask them to not
write their notes in sentence form; I want them to eliminate all of the
connecting words. They write their notes on half the paper folded
lenghwise, this acts as a reminder not to use sentences.

From Debra Balsam:  My best notetaking lesson goes like this: I have a
photocopy of an article related to the students project, whales in this
case. After explaining note taking and how and why it is done, I model
notetaking in front of the class. They follow along while I do all the
thinking out loud. On the second paragraph I start asking them questions.
Everyone is also suppose to be writing everything down. After the lesson
the teacher conducts a lesson on writing and expository paragraph from the
children's notes. This was done with a third grade, 5 classes.

From Kaaren Linton:  I teach notetaking for middle schoolers. I pattern
what I teach after what they are taught in our district's sixth grade
library research curriculum. First, we have them web (brainstorm, mindmap,
whatever you want to call it) for key words or questions related to their
topic. Second, we use a notecard (1/2 sheet of paper with top two lines for
a bibliographic entry--second line indented to remind them to indent--and
the rest of the lines divided by a vertical line about 1/4 of the way
across the page. The left side of the line is for the key word or questions
that were generated during the webbing phase. The other side is for the
notes related to that key word or question. I take a simple subject (for
4th graders, I used the book "An Octopus Is Truly Amazing", because animals
have easy key words...diet, appearance, reproduction, habitat, etc. Then I
use the "stop" method. A fourth grade teacher taught me how to do this. She
reviewed the key words, told the kids that she would read and when they
heard the answer to one of these words, they would say "stop". She would
ask them, "Which question did you hear an answer for?" and they would tell
her "diet", "habitat", or whatever. Then she would ask, "What did you hear
that was the answer?" They would respond with the info. If they gave her a
whole sentence, she would say, "How can I write that using less words?"
"What is the least amount of words I can use to write down the needed
information?" She would enter the key word on the left side of the vertical
line and the info on the right side of the line. She would resume reading
where she left off and repeat the process until almost all the kids were
saying "stop" and she felt they had the idea of how to take the notes. Then
they were turned lose to take notes on their topic...or the practice sheet
that they were given.


Mary Gran
Fertile-Beltrami Public School
Fertile, MN 56540