NOTES AS AN ACTIVITY AND VALUE

Note-taking is an important representation of the knowledge transaction that takes place in formal learning environments […] It is a form of record keeping and, as such, is part of the objective data related to the evaluation of experiences that occur within the total learning environment […] It is one of the few objective indicators that bears a direct correspondence to a learner’s thought processes (Ganske, 1981: 156).

As the result of cognitive processing, notes are synonymous with studying and learning, whether notes are word processed, written on a sheet of paper, or even hand written directly in the pages of a book, or whatever other hard copy source is being read from, such as an assignment brief, tutor hand out or a printed journal paper. The day before typing this I was sat in a university library, watching students still enacting the practice of hand writing notes while surrounded by several hard copy books. During the same period, the student I was having a tutorial with at the time was hand writing notes on a notepad during our discussion about her digitalised and Word formatted

assignment draft that was loaded on her Macbook screen.

Much of the research on students’ approaches to making notes focuses on a higher education context and especially within lectures, therefore with students who are assumed to be more

academically experienced than most FE students, due to the level of qualifications already attained that enable them to be an HE student. When hand written notes are made there is haptic feedback gained from holding and moving a pen or pencil on paper, or even by using a computer mouse, or through the movement of a finger on a laptop trackpad or by the act of typing on a computer

keyboard, or other portable technologies with digitalised keyboards. The level of sensory feedback to the brain is considered to be much stronger through handwriting rather than typing (Alleyne, 2011), which can be heightened by the typically longer time it takes to handwrite than type (Mangen and Velay, 2010). There are further and significant haptic differences between writing when using a pen and paper to digital writing through the use of a mouse, trackpad, keyboard and computer monitor. The argument is that there is a concentrated visual attention during handwriting with a focus to the tip of the pen, or pencil. In typing the visual attention is more detached from the haptic input of the keyboard by a need to also look at the screen. Furthermore, in handwriting there is a need to graphomotorically shape each letter (ibid: 385-386). The level of attention for this is

tightly focused, whereas typing oscillates attention between ‘two spatiotemporally distinct spaces’ (ibid: 396). From this emerges a question of how much distraction can infiltrate during the

oscillation of attention, especially if there are other activities occurring nearby, or on the computer screen itself. These are questions that are seemingly ignored by research at this point of time. Taking notes during a lecture is considered an aid for concentration due to the product, which are the notes constituting a review process (Badger et al, 2001). Students’ reasons for taking notes were that they, ‘aid recall of what was in the lecture, they helped with examinations and

assignments and […] were educational in a more general sense’ (ibid: 409). The more formal lectures that HE students experience rarely occur in FE and classroom sessions involve a greater range of interactivity between tutor and students, but there can still be the opportunity to make notes. Research has indicated that despite students valuing the post-event function of notes, there can be a lack of interest in learning the skills of note-taking through a discreet skills course (Badger et al, 2001), suggesting that learning these skills may be more appropriate within a main course session and therefore considered more purposeful to the context.

The processes of the students listening to the educator talking and making notes at the same time involves dividing attention to both listening and writing, which demands an efficient working memory and can be disadvantageous to those with, for example, dyslexia where short term memory can be challenged in these situations. Whereas, it is suggested that both educator and students prefer more interaction with the other while the educator is delivering the topic (Stefanou, Hoffman and Vielee, 2008). As such, these periods of discussion, which are typical of some aspects of FE pedagogy, could facilitate students to make more choices of what content is useful to record, as a mode of ‘generative learning’ (ibid.), instead of attempting to retain all the content of a tutor’s dialogue and the risk of being overwhelmed with the volume of information.

The suggestion is that note-taking, when performed post-event as a generative activity, that is when the notes contain something additional to the original material (Stefanou, Hoffman and Vielee, 2008), the learning that is taking place by the student, as an active participant, is far greater than just, ‘a simple abbreviated transcription of information that is heard or read’ (Piolat, Olive and Kellogg, 2005: 306). Conjoined with this is the level of tutor direction at those points during a lecture when it is deemed prudent for the students to make notes. This is considered a valuable intervention by the tutor as when some students are left to their own methods they can be susceptible to compiling notes that are disorganised and hence reduced in their utility and subsequent quality of use (Kiewra et al, 1995). Although, there may be some concerns with

students becoming over-dependent on this tutor led activity and only making notes at these points, so there needs to be a level of judgement by the tutor throughout these processes. An argument is (ibid.) that if these principles are established in one practice, for example during seminars, or lectures, they will then be transferred by the student into other contexts, and in this research context it could be when accessing online information in more independent working conditions.

The quality of notes made is suggested as being relative to the process involved (Ganske, 1981). Enmeshed in this activity of comprehension, selection and production are the limited resources of the working memory for good temporal information management (Piolat, Olive and Kellogg, 2005), consequently the most efficient process should also be the most effective. Importantly, the

perceived value of the context also appears to determine the quality of notes made, as do firm and directed prompts by the educator as a mediator in the process (Ganske, 1981).

Thus, pedagogy, metacognition and intent are important in viewing the utility of having notes. It is argued that both during the event and post-event, non-linear note-takers perform significantly better than those making linear notes in terms of increased academic performance. This is gained from a deeper understanding of the material through engaging with the activity in a ‘semantically more connected and meaningful way than their peers with traditional, linear note-taking strategy’ (Makany, Kemp and Dror, 2009: 633-634). Non-linear note taking involves using creative and visual recording methods, such as, clustering, concept mapping, Ishikawa diagram and mind mapping where links are formed between the notes. The benefits of using these more visual approaches is that this format reduces the cognitive load on students and hence can render it as being more effective (Piolat, Olive and Kellogg, 2005), especially to those who are more visually orientated in their approach to learning. These methods can be formed on paper, but dedicated software can be used, or through the combination of the drawing and text tools of Microsoft Word. Therefore any student using computers extensively could use these methods, if they were guided, or directed towards these strategies.

What this section has aimed to project from the literature is that note taking is certainly a productive and creative aspect of learning. Though, learning how to make notes is most successful when it is taught in context and directly relates to the subject being studied. The literature identifies the value of this process, although there appears little research on students’ use of notes when using

computers as a primary resource. Hand written notes are a semiotic for an engagement with

there is a trail of evidence, it is harder to identify. This has not been pursued by research and therefore forms a valuable aspect of the ethnographic enquiry into learning and literacy practices when students use computers extensively.

Once information has been engaged with at some level, and decisions made about its value, the next stage is to use it to inform the content of coursework evidencing. Digital text, especially with the level of manipulation that software can offer can disguise both its source and ownership, unless credited and therefore have an effect on the level of academic integrity. With this consideration in mind the section below approaches the academic fear of plagiarism and an alternative viewpoint of this, which is more that of ‘fixable errors’.

2.2.6 OWNERSHIP AND INTEGRITY OF TEXT WHEN DIGITALLY SOURCED AND