Summary

Knowing how to take effective notes is an essential skill for student success, starting in the early middle-school grades and growing in importance through high school to college. Taking notes involves learning a set of challenging and complex skills, which students cannot be expected to learn on their own or overnight. It falls on us then, as elementary teachers, to being developing the basic skills students will need for this task. Many of our language arts lessons based on standards of reading comprehension and writing research help our students develop the skills of an effective note taker.

There are several reasons why I particularly like using our Hidden Villa field trip as a way to introduce or reinforce note taking skills. First of all, students' experiences during the Hidden Villa field trip provide fun, meaningful and applicable reasons for students to take notes. Because students are engaged in the activities, they are more enthusiastic about taking notes, thus boosting their skill learning curve. Also, at Hidden Villa students are encouraged to take notes about what they believe is interesting or important about what they have learned. Since learning at Hidden Villa is hands-on, the skill of determining important main ideas and supporting details is separated from the skills of comprehending informational texts. This allows students more freedom to develop their note taking skills without the worries of understanding a hard passage of reading or of finding the correct answer. Finally, my students' Hidden Villa notes are immediately useful to my students as we use them the very next day to initiate and support our integrated classroom projects.

Students' experiences at Hidden Villa are very personal. Accordingly, their Hidden Villa notes should also be very personal - filled with the things that caught their own interest, delighted them, puzzled them or seemed of great importance to them. Before you embark on your Hidden Villa field trip, you will probably have already planned the projects your students will be working on back in class. I have found that it can be extremely helpful to give students a brief overview of the project(s) before the field trip. In this way, students can prompt their minds to notice those things they think will be helpful. However, students should NEVER be given a list of things on which to take notes. This stifles their ability to participate fully in the field trip and stunts the development of their independent note taking skills.

Some students may already have an idea about how to take notes, without being specifically taught. However, the majority of our students need structured lessons in order to be successful. In this short unit you will guide your students in learning three different types of notes: diagrams, informational notes and personal notes. If you have already taught your students to take notes in your classroom in a particular way, by all means simply explain how to apply this skill to their field trip.

Part I: Diagrams

Diagrams can be a wonderful way to organize information, particularly for your visual learners. At Hidden Villa, students can make diagrams of many things, such as the animals discovered under a rock, the six plant parts explored in the garden or of how to milk the cow.

Lesson I: Modeling diagrams

Lesson 2: Working in pairs to make a diagram

Lesson 3: Students make a diagram for homework

Part II: Informational Notes

Students will use informational notes most frequently throughout their education. When you introduce your students to informational note taking, try to keep the process fun and well within your students' abilities so that they do not become overwhelmed by the complexity of the skills involved. Taking informational notes during field trips is a wonderful way to accomplish this.

Lesson 1: Modeling note taking from a short video

Lesson 2: Supported note taking practice using a website

Lesson 3: Independent informational note taking

Part III: Personal Notes

Personal notes can be just as important as the informational notes. Back in class they can be turned into powerful personal narratives, poems or fiction stories.

Lesson Plans

Part I: Diagrams

Lesson 1: Modeling diagrams

Explain that you are pretending to be researchers who want to find out as much as possible about the learning community of your classroom. As researchers, you will organize this information in a diagram.

Share some examples of diagrams from textbooks, magazines or newspapers. What do students notice? Point our that diagrams often leave out unimportant details.

Model your thinking as you choose one object in the class you think offers important information about the classroom community (ex: bulletin boards, classroom library, rug area etc).

Demonstrate how to draw this object on the chart-paper diagram.

Brainstorm with class to choose other important objects. Guide class in writing labels and a synthesizing caption. This could be a good short class interactive writing project.

Lesson 2: Working in pairs to make a diagram

Students work in pairs to complete their own diagram. Particularly for younger students, you may want to have a photocopied worksheet to hand out with prompts for the three steps to make a diagram. There are many different things students could practice diagramming: playground or garden, animal terrariums, the insides of their desks etc.. At the end of work period, guide a class sharing and discussion. Particularly focus on how they chose what to include in their diagram and how they wrote their summary captions.

1. Make a representational drawing. This drawing doesn't have to be exactly to scale or contain all details. Students should learn to draw only the details they think represent important information.
2. Insert appropriate labels. Students should identify, with words or short phrases, each important part of the diagram.
3. Include a caption summary. Students should learn to write a quick sentence or two that synthesizes what they think can be learned from their diagram or what they find interesting about the information presented in their diagram.

Lesson 3: Students make a diagram for homework

For homework, have students make a diagram of an important room in their house. If they prefer, they could make a diagram of their favorite place in a local park, aunt or uncle's house, day care center or anywhere else they spend a good deal of time. This could make for a wonderful family-school homework assignment that parents and children can work on together. Putting your students in a teaching role supports their learning as well as inviting their parents to be involved in their children's learning.

Part II: Informational Notes

Lesson 1: Modeling note taking from a short video

Lesson 2: Supported note taking practice using a website

1. Understand the information given. To facilitate students' learning note taking skills, be sure to provide level-appropriate material.
2. Identify the main topics.
3. Remember supporting details about the topic that are particularly interesting or important to understanding the topic.
4. Write each detail as a bulleted item with just the pertinent information.

Lesson 3: Independent informational note taking

For homework ask students to watch a half hour informational TV program that is appropriate for children. While they watch the show, students should identify main topics and jot down important supporting details to share with the class. Again, this could make for an interesting family-school activity.

Part III: Personal Notes