Taking Effective Notes From Textbooks

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Taking Effective Notes From Textbooks

• Brown Bag Workshop II

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Taking notes from textbooks is a way to
organize and remember what you read
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Note taking from Textbook Evaluation

• To each question, circle Y for yes, S for
  sometimes, and N for Never.
• 1. The notes I take from my reading are easy to
  study and learn from?
• Y S N
• 2. When reading material that I need to learn
  or refer to later, I usually take some form of
  notes.
• Y S N
• 3. I know how to study without a lot of
  re-reading.
• Y S N
• 4. I take notes from reading using keywords,
  not full sentences.
• Y S N
• 5. I mark areas I dont understand in my text so
  I can ask questions about them.
• Y S N
• 6. I know how to use a highlighter effectively.
• Y S N
• 7. I know how to create margin notes.
• Y S N
• 8. I can locate the important information in
  reading material and take effective notes from
  it.
• Y S N
• 9. I use note taking as an active way to
  concentrate and learn when I read.

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Scoring

• Number of Ys ___ X 10 ___
• Number of Ss ___ X 5 ___
• Number of Ns ___ x 0 ___ Total _____
• 100-200 Poor
• 300-400 Fair
• 500-600 Average
• 700-800 Good
• 800-1000 Excellent

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Just Reading versus Active Reading

• Reading actively is more than just reading. It
  involves
• Pre-viewing to gain background knowledge
• Reading in key words to read faster and
  concentrate more
• Reading in phrases to read faster and
  concentrate more
• Reading with a pacer to read faster and
  concentrate more
• Adjusting your reading speed to reduce wasted
  time

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Effective Highlighting

• Helps you become more engaged because you are
  focusing on locating important information
• Leaves less time and energy for mind wandering

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Active vs. Passive Readers

• Passive learners
• Highlight too much waste time highlighting
  entire pages and have to re-read every thing
  when it comes time to study
• Active learners
• Highlight less and try to understand more

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Creating Margin Notes

• Margin notes either summary in the margin,
  question in the margin or personal comments
• You are locating important info. and then
• condensing it down to key words, a heading,
• question, or other summary
• When reviewing you will spend most of your
• time reviewing from your margin notes

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3.1 Matter AIM To learn about matter and its
three states. Matter, the stuff of which the
universe is composed, has two characteristics it
has mass and it occupies space. Matter comes in
a great variety of forms the stars, the air
that you are breathing, the gasoline that you put
in your car, the chair on which you are sitting,
the turkey in the sandwich you may have had for
lunch, the tissues in your brain that enables
you to read and comprehend this sentence, and so
on. To try to understand the nature of matter,
we classify it in various ways. For example,
wood, bone, and steel share certain
characteristics. These things are all rigid
they have definite shapes that are difficult to
change. On the other hand, water and gasoline,
for example, take the shape of any container into
which there are poured. (see Figure 3.1). Even
so, 1 L of water has a volume of 1 L whether it
is in a pail or a beaker. In contrast, air
takes the shape of its container and fills any
container uniformly. The substances we have just
described illustrate the three states of matter
solid, liquid, and gas. These are defined and
illustrated in Table 3.1. The state of a given
sample of matter depends on the strength of the
forces among the particles contained in the
matter the stronger these forces, the more rigid
the matter. We will discuss this in more detail
in the next section. Introduction to Chemistry A
Foundation Zumdahl P 55
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3.1 Matter AIM To learn about matter and its
three states. Matter, the stuff of which the
universe is composed, has two characteristics it
has mass and it occupies space. Matter comes
in a great variety of forms the stars, the
air that you are breathing, the gasoline that you
put in your car, the chair on which you are
sitting, the turkey in the sandwich you may have
had for lunch, the tissues in your brain that
enables you to read and comprehend this sentence,
and so on. To try to understand the nature
of matter, we classify it in various ways. For
example, wood, bone, and steel share certain
characteristics. These things are all rigid
they have definite shapes that are difficult to
change. On the other hand, water and gasoline,
for example, take the shape of any container into
which there are poured. (see Figure 3.1). Even
so, 1 L of water has a volume of 1 L whether it
is in a pail or a beaker. In contrast, air
takes the shape of its container and fills any
container uniformly. The substances we have
just described illustrate the three states of
matter solid, liquid, and gas. These are
defined and illustrated in Table 3.1. The state
of a given sample of matter depends on the
strength of the forces among the particles
contained in the matter the stronger these
forces, the more rigid the matter. We will
discuss this in more detail in the next
section. Introduction to Chemistry A
Foundation Zumdahl P 55
What are three Types of Matter?
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• Highlighting/Margin Notes Assignment
• Name ___________________
• Use highlighting AND margin notes to mark the
  following reading
• selections.
• Conflict
• We encounter conflict when we must choose
  between two or more alternatives. There are
  three basic types of conflict
  approach-approach, avoidance-avoidance, and
  approach-avoidance.
• The approach-approach conflict is the need to
  choose between two attractive alternatives. The
  need to choose between vacationing in England or
  Frances is an example of approach-approach
  conflict. This type of conflict is resolved when
  one possibility becomes more attractive than the
  other. If a vacation in England will include
  visits with friends and the trip to France will
  not, then England may become the more attractive
  choice.
• The avoidance-avoidance conflict exists when you
  must choose between two unattractive
  alternatives. An example is the need to decide
  whether you will have a tooth pulled or have root
  canal work done on it. This type of conflict is
  resolved when one possibility becomes more
  unattractive than the other. If having a tooth
  pulled becomes more unattractive, you may choose
  to have root canal work done on the tooth.