“Open your notebook to page 116. It’s time to take notes.” One of my students took out her pencil bag; in it was a veritable treasure trove of colored pens. As I lectured, she switched colors for each sub-topic. Her notebook was beautiful, but it …
My student Mike had a problem. He had taken lots of notes for an exam on his computer and meticulously organized them in Evernote. But he needed to switch to taking notes by hand. (Why? It’s way more effective for learning!) How could he use …
“Ok, what is gerrymandering?” I asked Kierra. She had stayed after school for extra help before the unit test and I was quizzing her on important terms. Kierra recited the textbook definition of the term back to me. “Right, but put it in your own …
“So, moving onto the next topic . . .” “Wait, Ms P! I’m still writing down what you said a minute ago. Can you go back for me?” I heard this a lot, usually from the same kids over and over again. Some students really …
“Ms. P, I didn’t do well on the quiz. I read the book, but didn’t remember stuff from the reading.” “Did you take notes on the reading?” “Nope.” “How come?” “Um, well, I not really sure how to take notes from the textbook. When I …
In a recent post, I discussed strategies for taking effective notes. Notes play a few different purposes. One is the obvious: to record new information. Most students stop after this and never think about the second purpose: use your notes to study for review. For …
It was the last class on a Friday afternoon. It was hot in the classroom and smelled like freshman boy. You know, sweat with a layer of Axe body spray over it? Let the whining begin. “Why do we have to write this down? It …