Improving listening skills - 10 steps to improve the note taking skills

A. Listening

A valuable skill for students to develop is to be able to take notes from a speaker and a recorded or live TV/Radio programme.This is a difficult skill for two reasons. First you cannot go back
over a speaker’s lecture in a way you can with a written passage. Secondly, many speakers/lecturers do not organise their lecture in as helpful and logical a way as writers arrange their materials.

Given below are 10 steps for effective note taking:

STEP 1:

Take and keep notes in a large, loose-leaf notebook; use only one side of the paper.

STEP 2:

Sit close to the source, if it could be helped. There are fewer distractions and it is easier to hear, see and attend to important material.

STEP 3:

Be selective; don’t try and write down everything you hear verbatim; you won’t have time.

STEP 4:

Write legibly and use abbreviations (use abbreviations of your own invention when possible) (e.g. ~ = approximately, + = and, ref = reference, vs = versus) and acronyms to save time when writing.

STEP 5:

Record notes in paragraph form; skip lines to show end of ideas or thoughts.


STEP 6:


Capture general ideas, not illustrative ideas; spend more time listening and attempt to take down the main points.


STEP 7:

Listen for cues: transition form one point to the next, repetition of points for emphasis, changes in voice inflections, enumeration of a series of points, etc.

STEP 8:

Review or read through your notes and make it more legible if necessary.

STEP 9:

Develop and use a standard method of note-taking including punctuation, abbreviations, margins, etc.

STEP 10:

Jot down ideas or key words. (REDUCE) You will have to spend a little time re-organising and correcting your notes while you can still remember the lecture/talk; re-read the ideas and reflect in your own words.