Note Taking Why people take notes

Note Taking
    Good morning. Today I’ll talk about how to take notes. Note taking is quite an interesting topic to discuss. First I would ask, "Why do you take notes?" I think you might consider two reasons.
    First, notes are an aid to memory. Obviously, if you are reading for a long essay over a period of weeks, or for two or three essays simultaneously (同时地，同步地), then you must have some systems of sorting and recalling the information you will need when you finally come to plan and write the essay.
    Second, your notes provide the raw material on which your mind must work in relation to your set essay topic. When you take notes, the process of doing it helps you to summarize ideas and arguments, select points relevant to your purpose, and finally understand and interpret (解释；理解) the original sources.
    Now we come to the question: What do you note down, and how much do you take notes from reading?
    We often consider the following three ways. First, what is the writer’s intention in the passage? You know the writer has selected and structured his material to suit his intentions, but these are unlikely to be precisely the same focus as your essay topic. Therefore, while recognizing the writer’s own purpose, you must sift (筛选) his information and ideas according to your own interests.
    And then, the discipline (专业，科目) in which you are working. In disciplines in which you are working with original sources, for example, history or literature, you will have to include many direct quotations (引语，引文) in your notes. As you will want to include some of these quotations in your essay, you must copy them with absolute accuracy. You must remember to attribute the work to the original writer, too.
    The last is your own purpose in relation to your essay topic. If your purpose is clear, you can select and record relevant material in as much detail as you want.
    Now I’ll deal with our last question: How do you take notes? There are three general principles that apply to all the methods of compiling (汇编) notes:
    1. Clear identification. Your notes must be clearly headed with all the bibliographical (书目的) details you may later need, when you want to use these material in your essay. In practice, this means you must record the author, title, place of publication, publisher and edition, and date. And next to each key point or direct quotation, you must note the exact page reference.
    2. A flexible system. You should record your notes in such a way that is easy to rearrange (重新安排；重新整理) them for the purpose of your essay. Notes made on loose-leaf paper (活页纸) and cards have the advantage that they can be shuffled (改变……的顺序) combined and reorganized at the planning and writing stages of your essay.
    3. Room for comments. Wide margins (页边的空白) are useful. As you build up your material, you will find you want to add cross-references to other sources. You may also want to include your own comments or reactions to the text, or just indicate that a certain point may be crucial to your essay.
    My lecture is going to stop here. Thanks for your attention.