Note-making and Summarising

Objectives

Take notes from a lecture or a reading textOrganize notes systematically for referencingBe careful about plagiarism

Introduction

• Making notes is an essential part of the reading process. It helps you internalise difficult ideas by putting them into your own words and can help you be more focused during the exam revision. You are more likely to remember material you have thought about and made notes on than material you have read passively.

• There is no right or wrong way, just find a method that suits you (for example, bullet points, mind maps and diagrams, highlighting, annotating or underlining significant words).

• Note-making depends on• what is expected of you (e.g. learning outcomes listed in

your reading texts)• what each assignment requires you to do• how you learn best (so you can choose the most effective

technique)

• If you are given a handout before or during a face-to-face session, use this as the framework for taking notes.

• Revisiting your notes helps you learn the material and prepare for assignments. It helps you 'pull together' all the different ideas you have recorded, so you can make cross-links with earlier study.

• Many people find it effective to take notes in two steps.

• First step: Identifying and writing down the main points

• Second step: Summarising, condensing and organising the notes so that they can be used when writing assignments or revising for exams.

• In general, your notes should be brief and to the point.

Steps in note-making

Step 1: Identifying and writing down the main points

Main points help you understand the content, the writer’s perspective, attitude and the purpose.

Read and understand the text carefully.Look for signposts while reading.Ask yourself questions about the rationale

behind the title, paragraphing and discourse structure.

Think about the purpose of the text. What is the author's purpose in writing the text? What is your purpose in writing your summary? Are you summarising to support your points? Or are you summarising so you can criticise the work before you introduce your

main points?

Find the main ideas - what is important. They may be found in topic sentences. Distinguish between main and subsidiary information. Delete most details and examples, unimportant information, anecdotes,

examples, illustrations, data etc. Find alternative words/synonyms for these words/phrases – but do not

change specialised vocabulary and common words.

Change the structure of the text. Identify the meaning relationships between the words/ideas - e.g.

cause/effect, generalisation, contrast. Express these relationships in a different way.

Change the grammar of the text: rearrange words and sentences, change nouns to verbs, adjectives to adverbs, etc., break up long sentences, combine short sentences.

Distinguish between main and subsidiary information. Delete most details and examples, unimportant information, anecdotes, examples, illustrations, data etc. Simplify the text. Reduce complex sentences to simple sentences, simple sentences to phrases, phrases to single words.

Examples:

People whose professional activity lies in the field of politics are not, on the whole, conspicuous for their respect for factual accuracy.

Politicians often lie. Failure to assimilate an adequate quantity of solid food over an extended period

of time is absolutely certain to lead, in due course, to a fatal conclusion.If you do not eat, you die.

The climatic conditions prevailing in the British Isles show a pattern of alternating and unpredictable periods of dry and wet weather, accompanied by a similarly irregular cycle of temperature changes.

British weather is changeable. It is undeniable that the large majority of non-native learners of English experience a number

of problems in attempting to master the phonetic patterns of the language.

Many learners find English pronunciation difficult. Tea, whether of the China or Indian variety, is well known to be high on the list of those

beverages which are most frequently drunk by the inhabitants of the British Isles.

The British drink a large amount of tea. It is not uncommon to encounter sentences which, though they contain a great number of

words and are constructed in a highly complex way, none the less turn out on inspection to convey very little meaning of any kind.

Some long and complicated sentences mean very little. One of the most noticeable phenomena in any big city, such as London or Paris, is the steadily

increasing number of petrol-driven vehicles, some in private ownership, others belonging to the public transport system, which congest the roads and render rapid movement more difficult year by year.

Big cities have growing traffic problems.

Once we list main points, the next task is to organize them.

Rewrite the main ideas in complete sentences. Combine your notes into a piece of continuous writing. Use conjunctions and adverbs such as 'therefore', 'however', 'although', 'since', to show the connections between the ideas.

Check your work.There are different formats to organize notes.

Step 2: Organizing main points

Outlining method

The information which is most general begins at the left with each more specific group of facts indented with spaces to the right. The relationships between the different parts is carried out through indenting.

Place major points farthest to the left. Indent each more specific point to the right. Levels of importance will be indicated by distance away from the major point. Indention can be as simple as or as complex as labeling the indentations with Roman numerals or decimals. Markings are not necessary as space relationships will indicate the major/minor points.

Well-organized system if done right. Outlining records content as well as relationships. It also reduces editing and is easy to review by turning main points into questions.

However, it requires more thought in class for accurate organization. This system may not show relationships by sequence when needed.

Example:•Extrasensory perception

• definition: means of perceiving without use of sense organs.

• three kinds• telepathy: sending messages• clairvoyance: forecasting the future• psychokinesis: perceiving events external to situation

•current status•no current research to support or refute•few psychologists say impossible•door open to future

Charting method

If the lecture or the text is chronological in structure, you may set up your paper by drawing columns and labeling appropriate headings in a table.

Determine the categories to be covered in the lecture/ text. Set up your paper in advance by columns headed by these categories. As you listen to the lecture/ read the text, record information (words, phrases, main ideas, etc.) into the appropriate category.

This method helps you track conversation and dialogues where you would normally be confused and lose out on relevant content. Reduces amount of writing necessary. Provides easy review mechanism for both memorization of facts and study of comparisons and relationships.

Test will focus on both facts and relationships. Content is heavy and presented fast. You want to reduce the amount of time you spend editing and reviewing at test time. You want to get an overview of the whole course on one big paper sequence.

                                                                                   

Example:

Sentence method

Write every new thought, fact or topic on a separate line, numbering as you progress.

Slightly more organized than the paragraph. Gets more or all of the information. Thinking to tract content is still limited.

Can't determine major/minor points from the numbered sequence. Difficult to edit without having to rewrite by clustering points which are related. Difficult to review unless editing cleans up relationship.

Use when the lecture is somewhat organized, but heavy with content which comes fast. You can hear the different points, but you don't know how they fit together. The instructor tends to present in point fashion, but not in grouping such as "three related points”.

Example:At first, Freud tried conventional, physical methods of treatment such as giving baths, massages, rest cures, and similar aids. But when these failed, he tried techniques of hypnosis that he had seen used by Jean-Martin Charcot. Finally, he borrowed an idea from Jean Breuer and used direct verbal communication to get an unhypnotized patient to reveal unconscious thoughts.

Sample Notes: Freud 1st -- used phys. trtment; e.g., baths, etc. This fld. 2nd -- used hypnosis (fr. Charcot) Finally -- used dirct vrb. commun. (fr. Breuer) - got unhynop, patnt to reveal uncons. thoughts.

Mapping method

Mapping is a method that uses comprehension/concentration skills and evolves in a note taking form which relates each fact or idea to every other fact or idea. Mapping is a graphic representation of the content of a lecture. It is a method that maximizes active participation, affords immediate knowledge as to its understanding, and emphasizes critical thinking.

This format helps you to visually track your lecture regardless of conditions. Little thinking is needed and relationships can easily be seen. It is also easy to edit your notes by adding numbers, marks, and color coding. Review will call for you to restructure thought processes which will force you to check understanding. Review by covering lines for memory drill and relationships. Main points can be written on flash or note cards and pieced together into a table or larger structure at a later date.

What is a mind map?

A mind map is a diagram used to visually outline the information.

It can be used to generate, structure and classify ideas.

It is usually created around a single idea, placed in the centre.

What is a mind map?

Categories and sub-categories radiate as branches or sub-branches.

These can be further divided or sub-divided as more and more information is added.

Different colours/ shapes/ sizes can be used to show different groups.

Why do we need mind maps?

No need for pages and pages of information.

Allows you to quickly identify and understand the structure of an idea.

Helps to understand how pieces of information fit together.

Easy to recall and quick to review.

Helps to make easy associations between different aspects and thus generate new ideas.

Shows the relative importance of different facts.

Note making and summarizing - example

Let’s look at an example.

On a cloudy September day in the humid central Chinese city of Jingzhou, a group of Chinese officials quietly inaugurated a new canal designed to address a growing water shortage in an area normally plagued by flooding. The “Bringing the Yangtze to help the Han River” canal project is needed because of a much larger project, 250km to the north, that cuts the flow of the Han, a Yangtze tributary. About a quarter of the water in the Han will be reallocated to arid northern China in a $60bn engineering effort that critics say will create shortages in the south.Water from the middle leg of the south-north diversion project officially begins flowing this month, a moment that will probably be marked with much greater ceremony. The project, inspired by an offhand remark by Mao Zedong that the north should borrow water from the south, is designed to alleviate chronic water shortages in the industrial north and bring additional supply to growing cities such as Beijing and Tianjin. Beijing argues that its titanic effort to redistribute water is necessary for the north. But the impact is just beginning to be felt in the south. “This project from the beginning has been as controversial as the Three Gorges,” says Dai Qing, a Chinese journalist and environmentalist who led the charge against the 1990s project, which has been plagued by environmental problems since its completion in 2006.

On a cloudy September day in the humid central Chinese city of Jingzhou, a group of Chinese officials quietly inaugurated a new canal designed to address a growing water shortage in an area normally plagued by flooding. The “Bringing the Yangtze to help the Han River” canal project is needed because of a much larger project, 250km to the north, that cuts the flow of the Han, a Yangtze tributary. About a quarter of the water in the Han will be reallocated to arid northern China in a $60bn engineering effort that critics say will create shortages in the south.Water from the middle leg of the south-north diversion project officially begins flowing this month, a moment that will probably be marked with much greater ceremony. The project, inspired by an offhand remark by Mao Zedong that the north should borrow water from the south, is designed to alleviate chronic water shortages in the industrial north and bring additional supply to growing cities such as Beijing and Tianjin. Beijing argues that its titanic effort to redistribute water is necessary for the north. But the impact is just beginning to be felt in the south. “This project from the beginning has been as controversial as the Three Gorges,” says Dai Qing, a Chinese journalist and environmentalist who led the charge against the 1990s project, which has been plagued by environmental problems since its completion in 2006.

Worrisome signs of shortage are already cropping up in central China, where cities along the mighty Yangtze were historically far more concerned about floods. The Three Gorges dam has lowered silt deposits in the river beneath it, causing some islands in the Yangtze delta to shrink, while barge traffic has been left stranded when water levels run low. Shanghai, China’s financial centre, has had to fight incursions of seawater into its water supply when the Yangtze’s flow slows. That could become worse with the regular diversion of 9.5bn cubic metres a year of water from the Danjiangkou dam on the Han river, which will feed canals and pipes running 1,400km north across two provinces to Beijing. The Yangtze’s water is being siphoned off even as the cities, industry and agriculture along the river claim a greater share than in the past. A 2012 study by the Hubei Academy of Environmental Science found the diversion project was likely to result in water levels too low for shipping along the Han, make some irrigation networks unusable and annihilate fish species that rely on seasonal flood cycles. Less water to dilute polluted waste and run-off could pose a greater risk to human health and raise the cost to cities and industry to treat the water.

Worrisome signs of shortage are already cropping up in central China, where cities along the mighty Yangtze were historically far more concerned about floods. The Three Gorges dam has lowered silt deposits in the river beneath it, causing some islands in the Yangtze delta to shrink, while barge traffic has been left stranded when water levels run low. Shanghai, China’s financial centre, has had to fight incursions of seawater into its water supply when the Yangtze’s flow slows. That could become worse with the regular diversion of 9.5bn cubic metres a year of water from the Danjiangkou dam on the Han river, which will feed canals and pipes running 1,400km north across two provinces to Beijing. The Yangtze’s water is being siphoned off even as the cities, industry and agriculture along the river claim a greater share than in the past. A 2012 study by the Hubei Academy of Environmental Science found the diversion project was likely to result in water levels too low for shipping along the Han, make some irrigation networks unusable and annihilate fish species that rely on seasonal flood cycles. Less water to dilute polluted waste and run-off could pose a greater risk to human health and raise the cost to cities and industry to treat the water.

The diversion project has progressed in fits and starts, resulting in huge cost overruns (the original budget was about $20bn) and creating a complex cast of winners and losers. Among them are the 250,000 villagers forced to relocate to make way for the expanded Danjiangkou reservoir. “They wanted it to be done in one fell swoop but society has changed,” says Ms Dai. “Now everyone wants to know: what’s in it for me?” The smaller Yangtze-to-Han canal shows how national authorities have had to accommodate local concerns. By replenishing water diverted from the upper Han, the 67km canal allows the lower Han to remain navigable and preserves the industrial base around Wuhan, a city of 6.5m at the confluence of the Han and the Yangtze. “But that won’t resolve the problem,” says Du Yun, of the Institute of Geodesy and Geophysics in Wuhan. “The problem of not enough water in the south will certainly crop up.” An initial phase of the south-north project’s middle route, designed to increase water supply to Beijing during the 2008 Olympics, depleted reservoirs needed for irrigation in the impoverished countryside around the capital. This summer water from the Danjiangkou dam was used to offset a drought in Henan province – a diversion that will not be allowed once the middle leg is fully complete and the northern cities claim their full allocation.

The diversion project has progressed in fits and starts, resulting in huge cost overruns (the original budget was about $20bn) and creating a complex cast of winners and losers. Among them are the 250,000 villagers forced to relocate to make way for the expanded Danjiangkou reservoir. “They wanted it to be done in one fell swoop but society has changed,” says Ms Dai. “Now everyone wants to know: what’s in it for me?” The smaller Yangtze-to-Han canal shows how national authorities have had to accommodate local concerns. By replenishing water diverted from the upper Han, the 67km canal allows the lower Han to remain navigable and preserves the industrial base around Wuhan, a city of 6.5m at the confluence of the Han and the Yangtze. “But that won’t resolve the problem,” says Du Yun, of the Institute of Geodesy and Geophysics in Wuhan. “The problem of not enough water in the south will certainly crop up.” An initial phase of the south-north project’s middle route, designed to increase water supply to Beijing during the 2008 Olympics, depleted reservoirs needed for irrigation in the impoverished countryside around the capital. This summer water from the Danjiangkou dam was used to offset a drought in Henan province – a diversion that will not be allowed once the middle leg is fully complete and the northern cities claim their full allocation.

The eastern leg is less complex because it follows the existing route of the historic Grand Canal. But planners found to their dismay that the water pumped from the mouth of the Yangtze up the length of the historic Grand Canal to the port city of Tianjin was too polluted to be used once it arrived, requiring additional spending on water treatment plants. The tally of the cost and benefits of the water diversion projects already under way will determine whether Beijing presses ahead with the most expensive and controversial western leg, which would tunnel through the hard rock of the Tibetan plateau to bring water from mighty southern rivers into the upper reaches of the Yellow river. Critics say China would be wiser to raise the cost of water in places where it is in short supply, rather than engaging in massive transfers to suit political constituencies in the north. Leo Horn-Pathanothai, an environmental economist at the World Resources Institute, says: “China’s answer to date has been engineering to increase supply. Now the problem is national scarcity and the solutions are better economics and governance.”

(859 words)

The eastern leg is less complex because it follows the existing route of the historic Grand Canal. But planners found to their dismay that the water pumped from the mouth of the Yangtze up the length of the historic Grand Canal to the port city of Tianjin was too polluted to be used once it arrived, requiring additional spending on water treatment plants. The tally of the cost and benefits of the water diversion projects already under way will determine whether Beijing presses ahead with the most expensive and controversial western leg, which would tunnel through the hard rock of the Tibetan plateau to bring water from mighty southern rivers into the upper reaches of the Yellow river. Critics say China would be wiser to raise the cost of water in places where it is in short supply, rather than engaging in massive transfers to suit political constituencies in the north. Leo Horn-Pathanothai, an environmental economist at the World Resources Institute, says: “China’s answer to date has been engineering to increase supply. Now the problem is national scarcity and the solutions are better economics and governance.”

Paragraph 1Context: China, Project ‘Connect Yangtze to Han’ (rivers), rivers in the south – project to take water to the arid northKey words: quietly inaugurated, criticism about water shortage in the south Paragraph 2Why this project: (i) chronic water shortage for industries in the north; (ii) water supply to big cities like BeijingCriticism: As controversial as Three Gorges dam  Paragraph 3Problems with Three Gorges: (i) water shortage in Yangtze (but earlier there were floods); (ii) islands shrinking; (iii) barge traffic stranded; (iv) seawater entering drinking water supplyHow is this connected with the present project: Such problems may become worse 

Paragraph 4Social and economic problems: (i) huge cost; (ii) displacement of people; (iii) demands of people Paragraph 5Link with the information in the first paragraph – the canal mentioned earlier was opened as a result of problems mentioned in Para 4Other issues: Cases from the past Paragraph 6Unexpected problems (eastern leg water became too polluted); Controversial and expensive western leg in Tibetan plateauChina’s answer earlier – engineeringBut it may not work – better governance and economics

China’s answer to water shortage problems so far has been building dams, canals and other such expensive projects. However, such engineering solutions have led to other serious problems. One such case connecting Yangtze and Han rivers to address water shortage to industries in the north and to supply water to the ever-growing big cities. Environmentalists and research organizations have pointed out that this project will create problems similar to those created by Three Gorges dam. Because of this project, the areas which have been traditionally affected by floods are likely to face severe water shortage resulting in shrinking of river islands, stranded barge traffic, seawater mixing with potable water, etc. This project also has socio-economic implications: many people are being displaced and their rehabilitation has not been easy. The project has already incurred huge expenses. Therefore, some experts feel that China should now concentrate on better governance and economics rather than ambitious engineering solutions.

(154 words)

Summary

Read the following texts. Identify main points and prepare summaries.

Money is not everything, but money is something very important. Beyond the basic needs, money helps us achieve our life's goals and supports — the things we care about most deeply — family, education, health care, charity, adventure and fun. It helps us get some of life's intangibles — freedom or independence, the opportunity to make the most of our skills and talents, the ability to choose our own course in life, financial security. With money, much good can be done and much unnecessary suffering avoided or eliminated. It can give us the time to appreciate the simple things in life more fully. Money can give us the time to develop our gifts and talents, but not the courage and discipline to do so. Money can give us the power to make a difference in the lives of others. It can give us the time to develop and nurture our relationships. We need money to eat, sleep, dress, work, play, relate, heal, move about, and enjoy comforts. Money can buy us some happiness, but only if we spend our money properly.

Text 1

The coffee plant begins to produce fruit 3 or 4 years after being planted. The fruit is hand-gathered when it is fully ripe. The ripened fruits are processed to separate the coffee seeds from their covering and the pulp. Two different techniques are in use: a wet process and a dry process. The wet process - First the fruit is pulped by a pulping machine. Some pulp still clings to the coffee, however, and this residue is removed by fermentation in tanks. The few remaining traces of pulp are then removed by washing. The coffee seeds are then dried either by exposure to the sun or by hot-air driers. The dry process - In the dry process the fruits are immediately placed to dry either in the sun or in hot-air driers. Considerably more time and equipment is needed here. When the fruits have been dried the seeds are mechanically freed from their coverings. The characteristic aroma and taste of coffee appear only later and are developed by the high temperatures to which they are subjected during the course of the process known as roasting. This releases steam, carbon dioxide, carbon monoxide and other volatiles from the beans, resulting in a loss of weight. Internal pressure of gas expands the volume of the coffee seeds. The seeds become rich brown in colour; their texture becomes porous and crumbly under pressure. But the most important phenomenon of roasting is the appearance of the characteristic aroma of coffee, which arises from very complex chemical transformations within the beans.

Text 2