RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

The questionnaire the students responded to enumerated 33 note-taking strat-egies. Its form and the evaluation scale was adapted from the questionnaire de-signed by CARRELL (2007) in order to examine note-taking strategies accompanying listening to lectures, yet many categories used for the present study were modified to suit the reading condition and a number of new catego-ries associated with processing written texts were added. The students used the following 1 to 5 scale to describe the frequency of use of the particular strategies:

1 — very infrequently, never, 2 — occasionally, 3 — sometimes, 4 — frequently and 5 — very frequently. As for the evaluation of their helpfulness the following categories were used: 1 — very unhelpful, 2 — not helpful, 3 — neither helpful nor unhelpful, 4 — helpful and 5 — very helpful. However, the students who re-ported that they did not use a particular strategy (chose 1 on the frequency scale) were not required to indicate its helpfulness. The students took as much time as they needed to reflect on the questions and respond to them. The table below summarizes the descriptive statistics for all the students’ responses.

It is interesting to note that the strategies with the highest mean scores among the students participating in the study were: (11) paying special attention to the elements of the text highlighted by the author, (7) using key words con-tained in each paragraph, (9) noting down some important definitions and new terms, (4) writing down all the main points while reading (means 4.17—4.75, standard deviations 0.45—1.10). All of those strategies were also placed high on the scale of helpfulness between the categories of helpful and very helpful strat-egies with the tendency of going upwards towards the highest point on the scale (means from 4.50 to 4.63 with rather low standard deviations for them 0.58, 0.60, 0.59, 0.58), showing the students strong belief in their efficiency.

Reading to learn and note-taking at academic level... 121

T a b l e 1 Descriptive statistics for the questionnaire results

No Note-taking strategies 1. I read the whole text for general

comprehen-sion before I started taking down the notes

24 2.46 1.47 15 3.60 1.06

2. I followed the titles of chapters and paragraphs in trying to fully understand the passage and take down notes efficiently

24 3.88 1.04 24 4.17 0.80

3. I wrote down all the main points while reading 24 4.17 1.10 23 4.52 0.60 4. I wrote down important details about each

main point

24 3.63 1.18 22 3.95 0.59

5. I studied carefully the examples/tables provi-ded by the author to understand the main ideas better

24 2.75 0.96 22 3.64 0.97

6. I identified the most important ideas in each paragraph to put them into my notes

24 3.96 1.20 23 4.30 0.70

7. I used some key words/phrases each paragraph contained

24 4.29 0.96 24 4.50 0.59

8. I turned special attention to new pieces of in-formation provided by the author

24 3.67 1.22 23 3.77 0.91

9. I noted down some important definitions and new terms

24 4.25 0.96 24 4.54 0.59

10. I wrote down phrases appropriate to deal with the issue I considered

24 3.17 1.05 21 3.86 0.73

11. I paid special attention to the elements of the text highlighted by the author (italicized, bol-ded)

24 4.75 0.45 24 4.63 0.58

12. I wrote complete sentences closely related to those in the original

24 3.38 1.23 22 3.77 0.72

13. I drew on paraphrasing the text to put down my own notes

24 3.29 0.88 23 3.48 0.85

14. I excluded unimportant information from my notes

24 3.83 1.27 22 4.18 0.77

15. I avoided writing too long and complex sen-tences

24 3.50 1.24 23 3.78 0.77

16. I used shorter or easier words than those used in the original text

24 3.75 0.92 23 4.00 0.84

17. I tried to order notes in a logical way showing links between particular parts

24 3.08 1.31 19 4.21 0.51

18. I separated different ideas from each other 24 3.67 1.11 23 4.17 0.71

The students have reached considerable agreement as to a high utility of the strategy defined as paying attention to the elements of the text highlighted by the author (mean 4.75 and SD 0.45), claiming that they used it very frequently (18 students) or frequently (the remaining 6 students). As to its helpfulness 16 students elected a 5, 7 students — a 4, while only one person indicated a 3 (neither helpful nor unhelpful). A very high mean score and low standard devi-ation here (4.63 and 0.48 respectively) clearly point to the importance of the way in which the writers themselves direct readers attention to the most signifi-cant elements in the text to ensure its comprehension.

Another strategy valued by the students was (2) following the titles of chap-ters and paragraphs in trying to fully understand the passage and take down notes efficiently (frequency: mean 3.88, SD 1.04; helpfulness: 4.17, SD 0.80).

The students also took advantage of (6) identifying the most important ideas in each paragraph to put them into their notes (frequency: mean 3.96, SD 1.20;

helpfulness: 4.30, SD 0.70). Together with taking care to include the most

im-Reading to learn and note-taking at academic level... 123

19. I divided notes into sections 24 3.63 1.27 21 4.24 0.52

20. I used outlining 24 2.92 1.37 18 3.83 0.75

21. I enumerated selected items by using numbers or bullet points

24 3.92 1.29 22 4.55 0.75

22. I used diagrams, pictures or tables to take down some notes

24 1.83 0.83 13 3.38 0.98

23. I used content words (nouns, adjectives) and omitted function words (of, the).

24 2.21 1.21 15 3.00 0.93

24. I used abbreviations for some words 24 3.08 1.26 21 3.76 1.11 25. I used special symbols for some words 24 1.63 0.95 9 3.33 1.13 26. I organized my notes visually on the page 24 2.42 1.30 15 3.80 0.83 27. I used arrows to show how the material is

lin-ked

24 2.17 1.33 14 4.00 1.19

28. I used ways to highlight particularly important information (e.g. circles, underlining).

24 3.58 1.34 22 4.32 0.72

29. I used neat handwriting to make my writing legible

24 2.75 1.32 19 4.00 0.80

30. I made sure I could learn from my notes 24 3.17 1.08 21 3.90 0.93 31. After completing my notes I looked at the text

again to make sure I have not missed some-thing important

24 2.75 1.32 19 3.74 0.88

32. I reviewed my notes before writing a summary 24 3.79 1.32 22 4.45 0.60 33. I used my notes extensively while writing

a summary

24 4.50 0.73 23 4.48 0.74 con. tab. 1

portant ideas in their notes, the students seemed to be aware of the fact that it was imperative that they should simultaneously (14) exclude unimportant infor-mation (frequency: mean 3.83, SD 1.27; helpfulness: mean 4.18, SD 0.77).

As to the form of their writing output the students reported that they relied on two strategies, namely (20) enumerating selected items by using numbers or bullet points (frequency: mean 3.92, SD 1.29; helpfulness: mean 4.55, SD 0.75) and (16) using shorter or easier words than those used in the original text (fre-quency: mean 3.83, SD 1.27; helpfulness: mean 4.00, SD 0.84). The statistics of the data shows that for all the note-taking strategies mentioned so far but one, standard deviations for helpfulness are much lower than those for frequency, which points to a lower variation of the students’ perceptions about the worthi-ness of employing particular note-taking strategies. It seems that once the stu-dents decide to employ a given note-taking strategy it is because they are confident that it is profitable for them and most often they get the confirmation that this is so.

There are several strategies that stand out from others with regard to the criterion of their helpfulness as there have been a number of respondents who refrained from their evaluation due to the fact that they either used them very infrequently or did not use them at all. They are two global strategies concern-ing the whole readconcern-ing task, that is (1) readconcern-ing the whole text for general com-prehension before taking down notes — found helpful by 15 students (frequency: mean 2.46, SD 1.47; helpfulness: mean 3.60, SD 1.06) and (31) looking at the text after completing one’s notes in order to check if one has not missed something important — found helpful by 19 students (frequency:

mean 2.76, SD 1.32; helpfulness: mean 3.74, SD 0.88). Whereas these two strategies can undoubtedly facilitate the processing of the text with the goal of taking down notes, using them is definitely time-consuming. And this can be the reason why some of the subjects did not incorporate them into their reper-toire.

The data collected for the study has revealed that some note-taking strate-gies of more technical nature were not reported to be utilized frequently enough by the majority of the students. The fewest number of the students (9 out of 24) claimed to (25) use special symbols for some words (the lowest frequency mean 1.63, SD 0.95). Thirteen students reported (22) using diagrams, pictures or ta-bles (frequency 1.85, SD 0.83). The strategies such as (25) using special sym-bols for some words, (27) arrows showing how the material is linked, and (26) organizing the notes visually on the page were assessed in terms of their help-fulness by only 14—15 students who claimed to have used them (frequency:

mean 1.63—2.42, SD 0.95—1.39). Exploiting this type of strategies only by ap-proximately between a third up to two thirds of the subjects seems to give evi-dence to that fact that these are the strategies that might require formal instruction and raising the students’ awareness of the utility of their use.

It is worth noting that there are two strategies on the list appreciated by the participants of the study specifically due to the task of writing summaries set for them. They were: (32) reviewing the notes before writing a summary and (33) using their notes extensively while writing summaries (frequency mean 3.79 and 4.50; SD: 1.32 and 0.73; helpfulness: 4.45 and 4.48; SD 0.60 and 0.74 respectively). It was actually how the role of note-taking was to be perceived:

the students’ retention of the most important ideas to be included in their sum-maries was to be facilitated by the good quality notes.

Some interesting observation could also be made by calculating particular types of the students’ responses provided when estimating the usefulness of the use of the target strategies. When the students were to evaluate the strategies they tended to use fairly frequently they indicated the highest values on the scale of helpfulness; at the same time no answers were provided at all in the case of 14.9% strategies as they were not used by the students. The percentages of the selected answers were as follows: 1 — very unhelpful (0.7%), 2 — not helpful (3.4%), 3 — neither helpful nor unhelpful (16.4%), 4 — helpful (35.8%) and 5 — very helpful (28.7%). Such a distribution of the students’ an-swers seems to suggest a tendency for adopting by the students well-known strategies, already found effective, rather than experimenting with procedures at a risk of failure. This may also indicate the students’ high adaptability in strat-egy use — selecting the best suited strategies for learning conditions they have found themselves in.

4. CONCLUSIONS AND SUGGESTIONS