Note-taking
Appropriate Reading Strategies work better when you record, store and apply the insights and understandings that your reading has given you. Note-taking is crucial here.
This section looks at three important dimensions of effective note-taking:
- Techniques (e.g. diagrams, annotation, analytic technique)
- Paraphrasing and Summarising.
- Avoiding Plagiarism and Integrating Sources.
Techniques (e.g. diagrams, annotation, analytic technique)
Whatever you’re studying, you’ll need to take notes on what you read.
Students sometimes believe that highlighting key pages or paragraphs is a good way to do this. Identifying key passages is of course important - but you must take time to analyse and understand them thoroughly. Markers will look for reasoning ability and critical thinking in what you submit. Take thoughtful notes before you write.
See our ASU flyer on Taking notes from text (54KB | PDF)
Passively highlighting section after section of your reading would be ineffective and inefficient. You need to exercise your mind to develop your knowledge and understanding – and thus produce better work.
See our ASU flyer on Active learning (56KB | PDF)
You might also like to explore mind-mapping
Paraphrasing and summarizing
At university, you need to show more than just an ability to locate information. You should show understanding and engagement. Work from the notes you’ve taken. Write out in your own words the main points or overall argument that you noted down (i.e., paraphrase and summarise the material).
The Purdue Online Writer’s Lab includes good advice about how to do this – see http://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/563/01/
See also the Writer’s Guide from the University of Victoria, British Columbia: http://web.uvic.ca/wguide/Pages/summariesTOC.html
Avoiding plagiarism and integrating your sources
‘Plagiarism’ happens when a writer takes material from another writer without proper acknowledgment. The material may be sentences, diagrams, examples or particular information. More on this crucial topic can be found in the ASU flyer on What is Plagiarism? (57KB |PDF) and the downloadable booklet, Plagiarism (3.24MB | PDF).
Sometimes plagiarism results from a narrow, mistaken idea of what a marker is looking for. Markers are not only interested in observing what material you located and read. They want to see you display reasoned judgment and some individual understanding of complex – frequently controversial – issues. Copying and pasting something you’ve read cannot help in this.
Our ASU flyer Incorporating sources (54KB |PDF) suggests some ways you can develop a conversation, in your own writing, with the work of others.
See also our ASU flyer on Active learning (56KB | PDF)