How to Take Notes While Reading?

Practical Science Posts:

How to Take Notes While Reading?

Do you ever copy down pages of notes while reading, but still struggle to rememberwhat you read? Perhaps you highlight or underline your read text but feel likemaybe you’re not getting the most from your reading. How can we take noteswhile readingwithout affecting our reading progress? Our librarians havesearched and summarized the following three methods for students’ reference.

Note-taking

method #1

Tabs

Post-it notes come in a variety of sizes and colours, and we can take advantage of this feature, combined with colour-coding, to transform them into meaningful labels.

When we are reading fictional works^①, we can use red to represent the thoughts we strongly agree with, yellow to represent fascinating scene descriptions, and green to represent vivid characters. Combined with appropriate circles and underlining, it is a very convenient method for making excerpts after finishing the entire book.

In the same way, we can use different colours to represent different reading experiences. For example, red for scenes that make you angry, yellow for those turning points that surprise you, and blue for when the plot makes you sad. After reading the whole book, glancing over these labels is like seeing the mental journey you took when read the book, so helpful if you are expected to write a reflection for it.

When reading non-fiction^② books such as personal growth books, we can also use tabs for things like quotes, specialized vocabulary, or new concepts that we want to look further into later.

Note-taking

method #2

Notecards

Notecards are especially suitable for textbook learning, as textbooks usually have chapter directories. We can use notecards for chapter recaps: We can draw a mind map or an outline structure diagram of the chapter on the card, and then bind each chapter recap notecard together as a tool for reviewing the entire textbook.

In addition, we can also use notecards of different colors for different categories (such as vocabulary, characters and theories, etc.) When reviewing the entire book, you can see at a glance which new vocabulary, new characters, new concepts, and new formulas you have learned. The notecards are also very portable, making it easy to review and organize in a timely manner.

Notecards are also applicable when reading fictional works with complex character relationships or story lines. For example, in fantasy stories, there are usually many new place names and new characters. In order to prevent confusion, we can write these two categories on cards for easy review.

Note-taking

method #3

Annotations

This method is simply writing short comments or questions in the book margins (that is, if it is your book). Your comment or question can be about your feelings or thoughts about a certain sentence, or it can be a question about a new idea or concept.

Our Learning Resource Center’s (LRC) reading month is underway – has the time you’ve spent reading increased recently? We hope that the methods above will be helpful for your reading process. Of course, there are many ways to take notes while reading, so if you would like to share any other effective methods, please leave a message in the comment area to do so！

Annotation：

①Fiction

A work of fiction is created in the imagination of its author. The author invents the story and makes up the characters, the plot or storyline, the dialogue and sometimes even the setting. Fiction is shared mainly through novels, but can also be experienced through poetry, drama and other works. Children’s literature, fairy tales, fables, and picture book stories also belong to the category of fiction.

② Non-fiction

Non-fiction is any writing created with the intention of relaying truth or information of actual events to the audience. Non-fiction can come in a variety of forms including writings on history, biographies and autobiographies, opinions, essays, news times and journalistic pieces, academic critiques, advertisements and instructions, etc.

Reference URL:

https://www.twinkl.com.hk/teaching-wiki/non-fiction

https://www.collinsdictionary.com/dictionary/english/non-fiction

https://learningcenter.unc.edu/tips-and-tools/taking-notes-while-reading/

https://theproductiveengineer.net/should-you-take-notes-when-reading/

Image Reference URL:

https://p3.ssl.cdn.btime.com/t0153e3a6bfccd3951d.jpg?size=400×535

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May 21, 2022 School News