Do online students take notes when reading lecture content or watching video lectures? Can they benefit from note-taking supports, such as graphic organizers, to improve their study skills? These are among the questions explored in a pilot study with student participants enrolled in a 100% online graduate program. Students were provided academic…

Three experiments examined note-taking strategies and their relation to recall. In Experiment 1, participants were instructed either to take organized lecture notes or to try and transcribe the lecture, and they either took their notes by hand or typed them into a computer. Those instructed to transcribe the lecture using a computer showed the…

Note-taking in lectures is often taken to be the distinguishing characteristic of learning at university. It is typically assumed that this is a commonsensical skill that students either have or will learn through trial and error. The data from a research project in one New Zealand university suggest that taking good notes is not a skill that…

Students with learning disabilities lack effective note-taking skills for a variety of reasons. Despite the important role that notes play in helping students to understand lecture content information and serving as documents for later review, many students with learning disabilities are simply not effective note-takers. Many of these students…

Generally, teachers are good students. Most know how to successfully address a variety of academic tasks demands. Many know how to compensate for any personal weaknesses they have with specific skills. Sometimes teachers are such good students that they forgot what it was like to struggle to learn something. Unfortunately, students with emotional…

Describes using the graphic organizer as an instructional tool prior to lecturing to help students take accurate lecture notes. (SR)

Reviews the major research on notetaking, the conclusions of these studies, and suggestions for the classroom. Argues that moderately hearing impaired students can take their own notes under certain circumstances and that severely hearing impaired students can use others' notes since review is the most important function of notetaking. (RS)

Two experiments, involving 195 undergraduates, investigated how different note-taking formats influenced student note taking. Results reconfirmed that a flexible outline framework in which the order of subtopics corresponds to the order of lecture presentation produces more note taking than a collapsed matrix framework presenting fewer subtopics.…

Described are five techniques to improve student learning during lectures: (1) separating listening from recording and requiring note-taking to be undertaken from memory; (2) using active review during the lecture; (3) using structured discussion; (4) using instant questionnaires; and (5) having students summarize important things from the…

Notetaking research using short lecture readings and using actual classroom notes is presented. The pros and cons of taking notes are examined and tips for taking notes are detailed. Included are tips for preparing a lecture. (CT)

Fifty-two field-dependent and 52 field-independent female undergraduates were studied under four study technique conditions using a taped lecture. Analyses of test performance and notes taken by students revealed a significant interaction of cognitive style and study technique. Performance differences and relevance for future notetaking research…

Literature on the efficiency of student note taking from lectures and the extent to which students learn as a direct or indirect result of taking notes is reviewed. Attention is also given to the relevance of research in this area to modern lecturing practice and to the problems of such research. (Author/MSE)

Research indicates that students with learning disabilities may experience significant difficulty with taking notes during teacher lectures. Approaches for helping students include task accommodations (such as taping the lectures or purchasing notes) and notetaking skill/strategy instruction (such as paraphrasing, outlining, using abbreviations,…

These suggestions for helping adolescent students with mild disabilities take notes emphasize use of a skeleton outline of the main ideas and related concepts of a lecture, with space to maximize student responding as the student completes the outline during the lecture or reading of an assigned chapter. (DB)

Self-questioning, summarizing, and review of lecture notes were compared as strategies for learning from lectures for 56 underprepared college students. Subjects were randomly assigned to self-questioning (19 students), summarizing (19 students), and notetaking-review (18 students) conditions. Self-questioners performed better than summarizers and…