Notemaking and Research Skills

1. Notemaking and Research Skills This icon indicates that detailed teacher’s notes are available in the Notes Page. This icon indicates the slide contains activities created in Flash. These activities are not editable. For more detailed instructions, see the Getting Started presentation.

2. Notemaking and research skills This presentation will help you to • understand where and how to find information • learn about different ways of recording your information • synthesize your information for your purpose and audience.

3. Finding information You have one minute to jot down reasons why you might need to find information and/or make notes on it. Click on the timer to start the minute. Share your ideas with the class. Did you get any of the following? Find out how to do something e.g. how to make Banoffee Pie. Make notes while a teacher is explaining something. Find out information for homework or a project. Preparing a talk. Curiosity about someone or something.

4. Finding information Once you know what you have to find out you have to choose where you can find help. How many places can you think of where you might find information? Click for some ideas. Internet Book Video Library Talk Teletext Magazine What sort of information might you use each source to find?

5. Finding information We have tremendous amounts of knowledge and information available to us. We need to know how to find the information we need quickly so as to minimize the time we spend finding answers to our questions. Can you think of any tools that help us to find information quickly?

6. Finding information

7. Finding information One of the sources of information available to you will be a library. The problem with libraries is that they contain thousands of books! How can you find what you need? Well, of course, the librarian will be glad to help. But you can become independent of the librarian by learning about… The Dewey Decimal Classification System.

8. The Dewey Decimal Classification System This system divides up knowledge into ten main areas.Each area is allocated 100 numbers. For example, all the encyclopedias and reference books are numbered from 001 to 099. All the books about languages have numbers 400–499 written on the spines of the books. Books about literature will be found between 800–899. When you go to the library, you can head for the numbers that deal with the subject you are researching. Libraries usually keep a copy of the system on a wall.

9. The Dewey Decimal Classification System

10. The Dewey Decimal Classification System Within each section, the different areas of the subject are allocated numbers. So, in the language section each language will have a different section of the numbers from 400–499. Sometimes a book will be on a very specialized subject. The Dewey system can give a book a number which has decimal points. So, this way the librarian never runs out of numbers.

11. You can also look up the topic in the catalogue. That will tell you the names of all the books on a subject and the precise Dewey number, so you can go directly to where they are on the shelf.

12. Finding information Quite often we are looking for specific information. If that’s what you have to do, then a good place to start is the contents page. It’s easy to overlook the contents page of a book and just start working your way through the book looking for information. This is fine if you are reading a book for pleasure and want to know all about a topic. However, sometimes you’ve got a job to do and not much time to spare.

13. Finding information Sheila has to find out about some of the ups and downs of Shakespeare’s life. She is using William Shakespeare: The Extraordinary Life of the Most Successful Writer of All Time by Andrew Gurr. The contents page will tell her if the book can help and if so, how she can go directly to the section she needs.

14. Finding information Which chapter would you recommend Sheila to use? • Introduction • Stratford • The Lost Years • To London • Master of the Revels • A Man of Property • The King’s Men • Success and Disaster • Country Gentleman • Epilogue

15. Finding information Contents pages are very good for finding out general topics. Sometimes, though, you need some very specific information. Let’s imagine that Sheila has been asked to find out about the fire that destroyed The Globe theatre. The contents page tells her there is a chapter entitled Success and Disaster. She can now just read through the chapter until she comes to the section on the fire (if it is there). What’s the disadvantage of this approach?

16. Finding information Yes, it’s slow. She is reading an entire chapter when there may only be a few paragraphs on her subject. She canSKIMthrough the chapter. This is where you read very quickly and don’t try to understand everything you are reading just at the moment. Quicker still isSCANNING. This is where Sheila runs her eyes down the pages just looking for the words connected with her topic. E.g. Fire, Destruction, Furnace etc. She will also look out for any diagrams or pictures which will help her find the pages she needs. Can you think of any other strategies?

17. Finding information Another strategy is to use theIndex.. This is at the back of the book. Let’s look at the index to the book Sheila is reading. Fires 13, 16, 139, 146, At TheGlobe 139–42 Which pages would you recommend Sheila to begin with? The fire at The Globe was such a major event that it has a special section in the index under fire. This isn’t always the case. A tip is to look for where a number of pages in a row are identified. This indicates that the topic you are looking for appears frequently in this section.

18. Finding information If you were researching boy players, where would you begin? Boy players 76–7, 79, 81, 91–2, 116–7, 125, 132, 174, 180, 183 These are good places to begin because they each devote two pages to the topic. The other pages can be followed up afterwards. They may well only contain a brief reference to boy players.

19. Finding information If a subject has a lot of specialist terms, then these are often explained in a separate section called aglossary. For example, prologue the introduction to a play protagonist the main character in a play or story

20. Finding information OK, I’ve found the pages. So, now I just copy everything down. Not so fast… • You don’t want to do it like that! • You need to learn about notemaking.

21. Notemaking Copying everything out will take time and may mean you write things down that you don’t really understand. You need to select the information that you will need for the task you have been set. • There are two main ways you can organize notes: • you can keep them in a linear fashion • or you can keep them in a diagram form. Try keeping notes using both methods to see which suits you best.

22. Notes in a linear fashion Purposes of this presentation: Where and how to find info. Different ways of recording info. Practise synthesizing information. Main section Abbreviations help Sub-divide categories

23. Diagram form Notemaking presentation Aims Synthesizing Where Recording • Internet • Video • Library • Magazine • Teletext • Talk • Books • Linear notes • Use headings • Numbers and Roman numerals • Abbreviations Abbreviations Diagrams Bullet points Use lines Colour

24. Sources Sometimes you will feel that you really need to quote from a source. This is OK but make sure you acknowledge your source. Here’s an example:Schools must work closely with parents. By doing so they will build good relationships and there is more chance that younger brothers and sisters will join the school, ‘…the educational equivalent of repeat business’ (Farrell). Make sure you write a bibliography of your sources at the end. This should include the name of the book, the author and the date of publication. For example, Writer, The. A book. (2003)

25. Activity Think of somebody famous, living or dead. You need to choose somebody who has at least one biography written about them, If they have written an autobiography you may use that as well. You can use Internet sources to find information, too. Select material from the sources to produce a short account of their life and work. If you quote from a source you must use quotation marks. At the end write a bibliography.