CHAPTER 5: NOTE-TAKING

Note-taking does not only

guarantee that you
understood other peoples
ideas about your topic on
paper, but also ensures
that you got your own
ideas written down
(1) You cannot tell
ahead of time
exactly what
information you
will need, and
(2) You cannot copy
everything that
you read
Paraphrase, summary,
direct quotation
Paraphrase
See p. 79
Summary

See p. 79
Direct quotation

See p. 80
See pp. 80-82
Interpolation
Steps 1-2: Main parts
Step 3: Mini-summaries
Step 4: Thesis
Step 5: Summary
Step 6 and 7: Review and
refinement
Main Parts

Why take down notes

It is important to remember that when you take down notes, you

will meet two unavoidable difficulties:

There are different types of notes to suit different types of purposes:

Is a restatement of another authors ideas and arguments in your
own words
Though it^ seems easy enough to do, it is helpful to keep the
following points in mind:
Is also a restatement of anothers ideas, but unlike paraphrase, this
is shorter. It is usually just a sentence or two, and it focuses mainly
on the central idea of the material passage
How to summarize:
Quoting from the material means writing down the authors
original words. No changes are made with regard to content
Use this type^ if:
When using direct quotation remember the following:
A word or more of explanation to be inserted in a quotation(See p.
81)
Demonstration: How to summarize (See pp. 86-92)

After thoroughly reading the material you will probably come up

Mini-summaries

Thesis
Summary

Review

refinement
Using note cards, using a
notebook,
See pp. 97-98
See p. 99
Plagiarism
Word-for-word
plagiarism, paraphrase
plagiarism, mosaic
plagiarism, source,
incomplete citation
See pp. 107-108
See p. 108

with the following division of its parts

Now that you have identified the different parts of the material, as
well as the main ideas of each section, you can now construct onesentence summaries. This step also ensures that you do not use the
language of the original when making your summary
To determine, go back to your mini-summaries and find out the
main point of that these all point to
Draft this by combining the thesis you formulated with the minisummaries you came up with. Always start with the thesis, and then
arrange the details according to how these were organized in the
original
Entails comparing your summary with the original to make sure
that the information is accurate and that you have not lifted words
and phrases from the original
Once you have finished editing the content of your summary, edit
for language and coherence.
Note taking techniques
When using an note card, keep the following in mind:
Questions
See p. 102
Is the act of using another persons ideas or words and passing these
off as your own
Types of plagiarism(explain.. see pp. 103-

Avoiding plagiarism
Safeguarding against plagiarism