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LISTENING: SESSION THREE
UNIVERSITY LECTURES: Listening and notetaking
PART ONE
What is a university lecture?
What are the objectives of a lecture?
What makes lectures difficult to follow?
What is the role of a student during a lecture?
What additional problems might arise when listening to a lecture that is not in your native
language?
Lecture Note-Taking
Notes provide a record of the lecture content. Effective notes should help you to
learn and remember the ideas and facts presented.
For each class you will need a different note-taking system. Here are some of the
most commonly used methods.
I. The Outline:
1) reflects the structure of the lecture.
2) major points farthest to the left.
3) each more specific point to the right.
4) levels of importance will be indicated by distance away from the major point. .
Example
Extrasensory perception
definition: means of perceiving without use of sense organs.
three kinds:
telepathy: sending messages
clairvoyance: forecasting the future
psycho-kinesis: perceiving events external to situation
current status:
no current research to support or refute
few psychologists say impossible
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II. The Mapping Method:
1) a graphic representation of the content of a lecture
2) relates each fact or idea to every other fact or idea
Example –
III. The Charting Method
1) a table with columns and headings
2) info is added in the relevant column
Example – Chart format for a history class:
Which of these systems do you usually adopt?
For which types of lecture?
Do you have other methods?
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Note-taking Practice: Omission, abbreviations and symbols
When taking notes, we omit many of the unessential words, and use abbreviations and
symbols.
What parts of speech are usually omitted? Why?
What do these abbreviations stand for:
e.g
i.e.
govt
asap
mos.
hr
info
etc
wt
ht
b/c
re
esp
max
yr
c
What do these symbols mean?
&

<
%

w/
>
$
~
@
=
x
/
°
?
The History of Desegregation
In the 1950s, school segregation was widely accepted throughout the United States and
was a requirement of law in most southern states.
In the table below, the text on the left reports how de-segregation came about. It is
written in discursive style with full sentences.
How are the notes on the right different? What elements have been omitted? What
symbols and abbreviations are used? Now you take notes on the rest of the text.
Original
In 1955 Rosa Parks, a 43 year old black
seamstress, was arrested in
Montgomery, Alabama, for refusing to
give up her bus seat to a white man. Civil
Rights leaders, Dr. Martin Luther King,
organized the Montgomery Bus Boycott.
Eight months later, the Supreme Court
ruled, based on the school segregation
cases, that bus segregation violated the
constitution.
Note-form
1955- Rosa Parks, 43, black seamstress,
arrested Montgomery AL, b/c refused seat
to white man
MLK organized Mont Bus Boycott
8 mos >, Supreme Court ruling: school
segregation violated constitution
In 1957 Little Rock Central High School 1957in Arkansas was to begin desegregation,
and black and white students were
supposed to attend the same school. On
September 3 when nine black students
tried to enter the school, they were
prevented from doing so by National
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Guardsmen acting on the orders of the
Arkansas state governor.
On September 20, judge Davies granted
an injunction against Governor Faubus
and three days later the group of nine
students returned to Central High School
but were prevented from attending
school by a mob of 1,000 townspeople.
Finally, President Eisenhower ordered
1,000 paratroopers and 10,000 National
Guardsmen to Little Rock, and on
September 25, Central High School was
desegregated.
Imagine you have to give a brief oral summary of the major events leading up to
desegregation.
Which column would you find most helpful during your summary?
Practice:
Give a brief oral summary of this text to your partner. Remember to fill in the missing
elements as you speak.
Then listen to your partner’s summary
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