Adapted from “Ideas about Note Taking and Citing Sources,” http://library.sasaustin.org/noteTaking.php, this Power Point reviews summarizing, paraphrasing, and quoting when taking notes for a middle school research project.

1. Note Taking Tips
Mrs. Amanda Ingalls
Stockbridge Valley CSD
LMS 7 / LMS 8

2. To take effective notes…



Do not record material unrelated to
your topic/thesis
Make sure summaries and
paraphrases accurately express
the ideas in your sources
Be accurate! Direct quotations
need to be copied word for word
(spelling, capitalization, etc)

3. Summarize

Summarizing means to read a
large section for overall meaning
then condensing the meaning into
1-2 sentences.

4. How to Summarize
Paragraph vs.
Article




Read the
paragraph twice.
Isolate the topic
sentence; if it
conveys reliably
the meaning of
the paragraph,
consider it your
summary.
Underline key
phrases and look
for any crucial
distinctions or
contrasts which
form the
framework of the
paragraph
Write your own
summarizing
sentence which
makes use of
those key phrases
or distinctions.





Compare the
opening and closing
paragraphs.
Read the entire
article more than
once, if necessary.
Underline key or
repeated words and
phrases.
Distinguish the
author's main idea
from details which
support that idea or
are repetitions and
variations on the
same theme.
Draft a severalsentence summary
which defines the
author's main idea
broadly enough to
account for most of
the supporting
material introduced.

5. Paraphrasing

Paraphrasing is putting the
information in your own words.
a
more detailed restatement than a
summary, which focuses concisely on a
single main idea.

6. Steps to an effective paraphrase





Read the original passage several times until you
understand its full meaning.
Pretend that you have to explain it to a younger
person, or someone your age who is just learning
English, who won't understand the original. What
would you say?
Set the original aside, and write your explanation
(paraphrase) on your note taking organizer.
Check your paraphrase with the original to make
sure that your version accurately expresses all the
important information in a new form.
Use quotation marks to identify any unique term or
words you have borrowed exactly from the source.

7. Quotations



Quotations are reserved for 1-2
sentence statements that prove a point or
reveal an attitude.
Don't use quotations to make your point,
just to back it up. They are especially
appropriate for primary sources such as
diaries, journals, speeches, interviews,
letters, memos, manuscripts, memoirs,
and autobiographies.
You need to use quotation marks and
footnotes.

8. Tip for avoiding plagiarism:


You will need to add quotes around
text that is extracted directly from
the source.
Summarized or paraphrased notes should
be "noted" so you remember to cite as
appropriate.

Do this so you won't forget whether or not it is a direct
quote or paraphrased when you are using the information
in a paper later on.

9. Sources

Adapted from “Ideas about Note
Taking and Citing Sources,”
http://library.sasaustin.org/noteTaking.

10. Sources

Adapted from “Ideas about Note
Taking and Citing Sources,”
http://library.sasaustin.org/noteTaking.