Note taking is a skill that every student will take into their careers. Whether you’re in meetings, participating in brainstorming sessions, or making annotations during reading, notes are an effective way of learning, retaining, and recalling ideas and concepts. This article talks about the three notable mistakes most students make when taking notes in the classroom. Click here to read our other article that focusses on the best techniques for taking notes and how you can benefit from them. Note taking is different from dictation. During dictation, you’re expected to write everything your teacher says. Note taking, however, is more technical, it involves writing down pieces of information in a systematic way.
The Most Common Note taking Mistakes
1. Students try to write down every single thing the teacher says without actually listening. Taking notes should be 75% listening and only 25% writing. When listening, you should constantly be working the new concepts in your head in order to solidify them. This is the best time to consider questions that you may have about ideas you do not completely understand. When writing, notes should be short, and right to the point. Each sentence should be no more than 1-5 words long. This forces you to record only the critical information.
2. While taking notes, students do not think about the topics their teachers are saying. It is important to take notes in order to remember ideas, but it is more important to understand the new complex ideas that are being introduced to you at a fast rate. Notes are useless if you do not understand the underlying concept.
3. Students do not ask questions while the teacher is lecturing, when the ideas are fresh in their minds. This is so commonly said that it is almost cliche, but if you have a question, it is likely that another student has that same question. Regardless, questions show your teacher that you’re interested in learning, not pleasing. You should not wait until after the lecture (if possible) to ask questions. If you wait to ask questions, you will end up going through the rest of the lesson missing a piece of information.
Reference: Edudemic.com
5 thoughts on “The 3 Most Common Note-Taking Mistakes Students Make”
Excellent. Thanks
Please how can I register on your website
This is actually my first comment since i registered here, though have been following most of the posts, and also benefitting from the materials under the subjects I taught, while still teaches out of pay, just for the LOVE of the profession.
That was a nice and a reminding points to be checked while taking notes. Courageous and determined students learn under a condusive pressure to make them more intelligence beings.
Keep it up TEAM.
Excellent, well written
Students are just too young and they just don’t have the experience we have – that’s why they don’t ask questions and write everything they here – it’s tough task for them to distinguish which part of the information is more important.
Of course when at grad year and a bit before things change a lot.
So Tony, I could generally agree with your points, however only for students in the first 2 years in their studies. Good post overall and beautiful header image, by the way 🙂