STUDENTS’ CHOICE AWARDS III

BEST SITES: Only nine sites were recommended. Of these, one received five "votes" and five other sites received multiple nominations. In order of preference, they were:

http://www.csbsju.edu/academicadvising/help/lec-note.html

• Clear, concise advice
• Thorough and gives examples
• Extremely useful for students in lecture classes
• Gives methodology in addition to descriptions
• From an accredited university’s academic advising department–credible

www.sas.calpoly.edu/asc/ssl/notetaking. systms.htm.

Academic Skills Center — Notetaking Systems". Gives many variations of notetaking systems

• EXTREMELY thorough and clear
• Not too concise, but makes up for this by the usefulness
• From an accredited university organization specializing in notetaking and academic skills–credible

http://www.ucc.vt.edu/stdysk/notetake.html

This site totally rocks. It gives a good list of points on how to pay attention during lectures and to take good notes. It is a site set up by Virginia Tech in order to help students to take better notes during college classes. It lists thirteen effective note taking qualities, such as: asking questions, listen for cues, voice inflections, and repetition by the teacher, and also to copy everything on the board

www.byu.edu/stlife/cdc/Learning_Strategies/study_skills/note-tak.htm

This web site provides you with a 6 step system to taking notes called the Cornell System, created by Walter Pauk. It also provides you with a sample of the system. It goes into detail about the six steps. It says to record (record as many facts as you can), reduce (reduce your facts into key words or phrases), recite (recite your notes to gain retention), reflect (think about the information you have learned), review (review your notes periodically), and recapitulate (summarize your notes at the end of the page). It also gives you tips on what to do before, during, and after the lecture to make sure you are taking the best notes possible.

http://www.usu.edu/arc/idea_sheets/index.htm

Utah State University: Idea Sheets. They are simply called idea sheets, but are helpful, informative pages. Professionally designed and easy to navigate, the Utah StateUniversity website provides strategies to help, including:

The site is maintained by Carol Rosenthal, and a link was provided, so you can email her questions and comments. The site was last modified October 15, 2001. This is a great site to gain note taking advice.

http://www.utexas.edu/student/utlc/makinggrade/notetaking.html.

"Note-Taking." University of Texas Learning Center. 17 Oct 2003. By: University of Texas Team Web. 20 Oct 2003. Several useful tools were included at this site that I did not find anywhere else. There are self-scoring quizzes to give one an idea on how developed one’s note taking skills are in three different areas–pre-class, in class, and after class. There are three corresponding links to give tips on how to work on skills that one needs to improve. There are also links to help with formatting one’s notes– and there is not just one format suggested–` one can pick what suits how he or she learns best. Overall the site is well- organized and the information is provided in a easy to understand manner.

http://www.wwu.edu/depts/tutorialcenter/notetaking.htm

Western Washington University: Tutorial Center. The theme and structure of the site are also very professional, lending to greater credibility of the source. The tutorial center at WWU provides detailed strategies involved in note taking. Preparation is stressed as the key to being a successful note taker during large lectures. Other topics addressed in detail on the website include the following:

• Formal (Roman Numerals)
• Informal (Outline)
• Paragraph

http://www.richland.cc.il.us/staff/jodell/notes.html.

Not only explained why and how to take notes, it gave examples of shorthand. Not many people understand how to do these things.

http://www.crazycolour.com/os/notetaking_01.shtml

"Effective Note Taking." By: Office Survival. 24 Apr 2003. CC Consulting Limited. 20 Oct 2003. Included in this site are eight subtopics concerning note taking. The more important a topic is to a note taker, the more bulleted information is available under the topic, for instance what one should do while taking notes is covered in more depth than why note taking is difficult. The site could easily help one prioritize the skills he or she needs to acquire to take notes. How to take notes is not the only subject of the site, either. There are questions on the site to be asked before one takes notes. This helps focus one’s energy toward goals and efficiency. Although this site is intended for use in a workplace the information is useful to students as well.

There are apparently many "bad", or at least not too useful sites out there — sixteen were nominated! Among our class, only two received more than one nomination as "worst" (one of the two received three votes). They are:

www.mtsu.edu/~studskl.notes.html - three votes

www.arc.sbc.edu/notes.html - two votes