Transcript Taking Notes - Maywood Academy High School

Taking Notes
What should my notes look like?
• Use one of these strategies
• Quoting
• Paraphrasing
• Summarizing
To blend in source materials in with your own,
making sure your own voice is heard.
Quoting
• Quotations are the exact words of an author,
copied directly from a source, word for word.
• Quotations must be cited!
• Use quotes when:
• Disagree with the author
• Add the power of an author’s words to support your
argument
• Highlight powerful phrases or passages
Paraphrasing
• Paraphrasing means rephrasing the words of an author,
putting his/her thoughts in your own words.
• When you paraphrase, you rework the source’s ideas,
words, phrases, and sentence structures with your own.
• Remember to cite your source
• Paraphrase when
• Want to avoid overusing quotations
• want to use your own voice
• Understand the basic meaning of the text
Summarizing
• Summarizing involves putting the main
idea(s) of one or several writers into your
own words, specifically the main point(s).
• Summaries are significantly shorter than the
original & take a broad overview of the
source material.
• Remember to cite your source.
• Summarize when:
•
•
•
•
Establish background
Offer an overview of a topic
Describe knowledge about a topic
Determine the main idea of a single source
What should I write down?
• Anything and everything that will support your
thesis statement (essential question).
• Use more than 2 sources.
• Don’t forget bibliography information
• Author, title, editor, publisher, city of publication, year
of publication.
• Notes are a bit like drafts:
• You will not end up using everything you write down.
Tips to avoid plagiarism
• Paraphrase most of the time – compress and
write in your OWN words what you understand
to be the basic meaning of the text.
• Translate & rewrite your notable research
findings now!!!
• Don’t forget to write down the page number and
source of information.
Tips to help comprehension later
• Don’t use short-hand or a special language – you
might forget it later.
• Make sure you know where every note comes
from.
• Put a page number next to all notes
• If you don’t understand what you wrote – don’t
use it!!
• Keep everything as LEGIBLE as possible.
Works Cited
Valenza, Joyce. “What is Plagiarism?”. Mrs. V’s Lessons. Springfield Township
High School Library. 18 February 2009.
<http://www.sdst.org/shs/library/powerpoint/plagiarism.ppt>