Part of the challenge of the TOEFL is that every part of the test relies on good note-taking — reading, writing, speaking and listening. You have to take notes quickly and accurately, and keep them organized so you can find things in a hurry. If any one of those three things fails, your answer will not be very good.
Your book has a good method for taking fast, organized notes. Divide your paper with three lines: one across the top, one down the center and one more across the bottom. When you’re done, it should look like a great big 工.
When you take notes, the first thing you can add to the page is a main idea — a topic, a title, or even a date or class name. Put that at the top of the page, above the 工. Now when you look for a page of notes later, you can find it easily. The topic is at the top of the page.
Now when you take notes, you can write main points — major ideas — in the left half of the 工. Save details, examples and definitions for the right half of the 工. And your ideas — thing you didn’t hear in the lecture but are interesting to you — can go at the bottom, since they’re not facts. They’re just for you, and this keeps them separate from information you heard or read.
Does it matter if you get it wrong? No. There’s no right way to take notes. Notes are for you. Nobody will look at your notes. So if they’re messy or things are in the wrong place, nobody will care. You’re the only person who will see them.
So why is this a good method? Because it makes things easy to find later, and keeps most things organized too. It’s very simple too, and doesn’t need a lot of work to start. You just draw 工 and get started.
You should have a 工 for every lecture, conversation, passage or text you read or listen to on the test. Why not mix them? Because you will get your sources confused. If the question wants you to explain the lecture, but you give facts from the reading, you’ll get a poor mark on the question.
This method is simple, but powerful. You can change it if you want — use a T instead of a 工, or you can use a totally different shape if you want — use 糸, I don’t care. Your notes are for you only, so if it works better, use that.
Your book does a better job explaining the 工, and has pictures and examples. Try it in class or just as practice. You’ll have a much better time taking notes if you can use it.
