[Phys-L] towards an explanation of note-taking as a learning tool

[John Denker <jsd@av8n.com>]

On 09/03/2014 01:30 PM, Paul Lulai wrote:

> I recently read an article that stated students learn more when they
> take notes using pen / pencil and paper.  The thought was that the
> student has to listen to everything and distill it down into the most
> important pieces.  The student has to think about what they are
> listening to.

Interesting!

So it's the triage and distillation step that matters, i.e. 
deciding what to write and what not?

> Students that type can blindly follow along typing things out.

So students who can write faster take better notes but
learn /less/?  Wow.

I'd like to see the article.  It would help to know what is 
their "null hypothesis" i.e. what is the basis for comparison.

 -- Taking notes (hypothesis a) 
     versus playing angry birds (hypothesis b)???
 -- Taking notes (hypothesis a)
     versus thinking about what is being said (hypothesis c)???

Also, were the students trained to take notes, so that
they were out of their element when not taking notes?
Or were they trained to think without writing, so that
they were out of their element when required to take
notes and think at the same time?

   In general, I am horrified by the preponderance
   of ill-controlled experiments in the psychology
   literature in general, and PER in particular.

In particular, let's pursue the hypothesis that the triage
step is what matters.  Let's assume that the average note-
taker can only write down about a third of what is presented.

Here's hypothesis d:  Let's train students to sit there and 
not take notes, just /pretend/ to take notes, including the 
step of deciding which 1/3rd of the material is important,
and which 2/3rds is ignorable.  Specifically, number each
of the thirty slides and ask the students to write down the 
numbers of the ten slides that are important.  This involves 
just as much triage, but dramatically less writing.

We can then compare hypothesis (a) to hypothesis (d) and 
see if the triage step is what really promotes learning.

If we do that and about a hundred other things we might
have some semblance of a well-controlled experiment.
Doing valid experiments is super-hard.  Doing easy
experiments is super-worthless.

==========

As previously mentioned, I don't understand the role 
of note-taking, and I would like to.  I've seen some 
unbelieeeevably smart people who use the technique.
They can't explain it.  The hypotheses considered 
above are by far the closest thing to an explanation
I've ever seen.

In the other pan of the balance, I remain open to the
possibility that there is something else going on, and
the visible note-taking is just a proxy that conceals 
some vastly more-important but less-visible process.

In other words, my guess is that there's a lot of chaff
mixed in with the wheat ... and I can't tell which is
which!  I would really like to figure it out.