Note-taking

The first classroom task in the Chinese EFL context which will be described here is a task of students’ note-taking during a lesson in the EFL Chinese tertiary classroom.

This will be discussed and analyzed in terms of the participants’ perspectives. It is very common in China that students take notes while they listen to lectures on a range of subjects. It is the same for students majoring in English in China. Various opinions on this practice from all data sources are presented here.

The data from quantitative questionnaires showed that 58.7 percent of the Chinese EFL student participants (61/104) believed that note-taking was very important in their English language learning. All of the Chinese EFL teacher participants (3/3) in this study agreed. The key teacher participant revealed during the SRI that she was concerned about whether or not notes were taken by the students. To the Chinese EFL teacher participant, true learning was a kind of acquisition of new grammar rules, structural patterns, meta-language, vocabulary items, and collocations – linguistic knowledge which her EFL students should take down in their notebooks and which they would rehearse, review, and memorise to the point of accurate reproduction upon request or tests.

160 I [am concerned] more about whether or not the notes are taken. It doesn’t matter whether… they take notes on notebooks or textbooks. As long as the key points are marked, the students… can review them later if they didn’t understand those key points in class. I don’t demand that each student has a notebook, and take note of everything I mentioned. I do the teaching mainly orally. Even if I give a sample sentence, I won’t write it up on the blackboard.

[CNT, SRI1, p. 6]

Because no matter what the beginning is like, the first round they have collected those useful materials such as proverbs and interesting sentences and articles. When there was something worth taking down, they all did take notes very earnestly.

[CNT, SRI2, p. 16]

When they took notes, they were given hints as well. You should take notes of these ways, and then I will ask you on the ways that people can release stress.

Normally at their round of teaching, the same, they would all take notes of important words and sentences. Besides, after the student mentioned the important words and sentences, after they finished their teaching, I would cover them one more time… Yet most of the time they were taking notes. They would write down in their textbooks or notebooks what they didn’t know.

[CNT, SRI2, p. 17]

The findings reveal that the reason for taking notes as explained by the Chinese EFL teacher was shared by her EFL students in the Chinese EFL context.

We all take notes so as to review, remember language knowledge well for examinations.

[CNS9, SRI2, p. 9]

Similarly, the New Zealand ESL teacher participant and one of her Chinese ESL students who viewed the Chinese videotaped lessons reported in an interview that the

161 note-taking task was independent and helpful learning for university students studying English.

Cause their taking their notes, making their own notes, and that’s independent learning, you know.

[NZT, Int1, p. 7]

Note-taking does a lot more help for university students majored in English.

[NZS7, Int2, p. 1]

From the videotaped lessons in the Chinese EFL classroom, the note-taking task was not only undertaken during the teacher’s lecturing but also during a task of student’s lecturing (see Student lecture 5.8.3) in the classroom. Generally speaking, the most important reported reason for this was that the class would be expected to answer questions asked by a student presenter after each presentation. Every student in the class had to write down some information or main points during a student’s lecturing in case he or she was asked to answer questions, a kind of informal test.

Generally speaking, after each presentation, the class would answer questions asked by the presenter. Therefore, we need to write down some details or key points in case we would be asked to answer questions.

[CNS7, SRI2, p. 9]

In contrast, there were some different opinions on note-taking heard from the ESL Chinese student participants who viewed the Chinese videotaped lessons and had studied for more than half a year in the New Zealand ESL context. They indicated that note-taking was a traditional activity and the main purpose for Chinese students doing it was for passing exams because notes taken by students in China would be tested, as in other subjects, such as Physics, Chemistry, Chinese and Math in the Chinese examination-oriented educational system.

In China, we would take notes without stopping, because we would be tested the contents of notes taken in class. Sometimes the teacher finishes before you could catch the meanings.

162 [NZS2, Int1, p. 5]

Tradition, tradition. The notes of every subject would be tested, like Physics, Chemistry, Chinese and Math, every subject would test the notes we took. It is boring to learn a language in this way.

[NZS3, Int1, p. 5]

In summary, the findings on the note-taking task reveal that note-taking is a kind of classroom task which is expected and required by Chinese EFL teachers but which is also accepted and implemented automatically and diligently by Chinese EFL students, perhaps in order to answer questions and perhaps due to the examination-oriented educational system in the Chinese EFL context. The data show that all the EFL participants in the Chinese EFL context and the New Zealand ESL teacher and some of her ESL Chinese students had a positive attitude on the note-taking task and accepted its role in English language learning. However, some of the New Zealand ESL Chinese students commented that the note-taking task was a traditional Chinese approach which was helpful for other subjects but not appropriate for language learning.