NotetakingUsing Note Cards for Your Research Paper

Definition Note taking is an indispensable part of

writing a research paper. Your notes record information from the sources that you will use in writing your paper.

Therefore, it is necessary to critically evaluate the texts or articles you are reading and to make reasonable choices about what will and will not be useful for your paper. Otherwise, you will overload yourself with information and spend too much time sifting through notes.

Why Note Cards? Helps you to organize material

Easier to identify sources

Information at your fingertips

Good study tool

Helps you to avoid plagiarism

Types of Note Cards

Cards for recording your sources

Cards for recording notes on your topic

Purpose of Source Cards

• First, it enables you to find the source again.

• Second, it enables you to prepare documentation for your paper.

• Third, it enables you to prepare the list of Works Cited that will appear at the end of your paper.

Every time you find a source that might be useful for your researchpaper, you need to prepare a Source Card (Bibliography Card)for it. All of your Source Cards, taken together, make up yourWorking Bibliography. A Source Card serves 3 purposes:

1. Author #12. Title of article, book, magazine, or other source3. Place of publication4. Name of publishing company5. Date of publication6. Any other information pertinent to that specific source being used

Source Card Essentials

Each time you use information from a source, write the following information on your source card…

Assign a number to each source used. Place it in the right-hand corner of your note card.

Bibliographic

entry

Kopel, David. “Arms and the Greeks.” Liberty. Aug. 1999. 4 Sept. 99. <http:www.libertysoft.com/liberty/features/ 76Kopel.html>.

Example of a Source Card

Taken from an article in a MAGAZINE

#6

Gathering Information

There are three basic types of notes

Summary

Paraphrase

Direct Quotation

Summaries or shortened versions of the material; includes lists also

Material is put into your own words

Record author’s material word for word

Making Summary Cards

• Contains the main points of the particular research in a nutshell

• Close your book and then write a summary

• No quotation marks (put in your own words)

• Use when the source runs too long to be quoted or paraphrased

Making Cards for Paraphrasing

• Writing the idea of another using your own words and sentence structure

• Your most common note form• Usually about the same length of the

original

Making Cards for Quotes

• Material is recorded exactly as it is taken from the source

• Anything that is quoted directly from the source must be enclosed within quotation marks

• Use when the source material is especially well-stated

Parts of a Note Card

5 Reason famous

“…he was and is an everlasting glory to the literature of his country.”

102

Describes the note’s information and keepsyou from having to read the entire note eachtime you want to know what the note says

Information

Page reference

Source card

Another example…

3 Family Background

middle-class family – father (John Chaucer) – a “vitner” (sold wines) Mother – Agnes – no last name known for her maiden name

98

Note Taking Tips• Keep your topic, controlling

purpose, and audience in mind at all times. Do not record material unrelated to your topic.

• Make sure that summaries or paraphrases correctly reflect the meaning of the original.

• Be accurate. Direct quotations are picked up word-for-word. Use quotation marks at the beginning and end of quotation.

• Always double-check page references. It’s easy to copy these incorrectly.

• Double-check statistics and facts.

• Nonessential parts of a quotation can be cut if the overall meaning of the quotation is not changed. Indicate omissions of nonessential material from a quotation by using ellipsis points, a series of 3 or 4 spaced dots. Use 3 dots (. . .) when cutting material within a single sentence; use 4 dots (. . . .) when cutting a full sentence, a paragraph, or more than a paragraph from a quotation.

Plagiarism One of the purposes of using a

Working Bibliography and note cards is to help you to avoid plagiarism. Plagiarism is the act of intentionally or unintentionally treating work done by someone else as though it were your own.

How to Avoid Plagiarism

Is this information, idea, or statement common

knowledge?

Did this information, idea, or statement come from a source outside myself, or did it come from my own experience or as a result of my own creative activity?

Here is a simple test to determine whether something is plagiarized: Ask yourself…

If the information, idea, or statement is NOT common knowledge, and if it came from an outside source, then you must credit that source. Failure to do so constitutes plagiarism.

Once you have written, sifted

through, and organized your note

cards, then you are ready to begin

writing your outline.