This document summarizes a taxonomy of lecture note-taking skills and subskills proposed by Alaa M. Al-Musalli. The taxonomy is based on a similar list of listening comprehension skills, which in turn draws from taxonomies of reading comprehension skills. The proposed taxonomy aims to integrate the processes involved in listening with those in note-taking. It analyzes literature on note-taking and identifies listening and note-taking as integrated skills. The summary provides an overview of the key points and proposed taxonomy structure in under 3 sentences.

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Taxonomy of Lecture Note-Taking Skills
and Subskills
Alaa M. Al-Musalli
a
a
Department of Communications and Department of ESL, Okanagan
College
Published online: 23 Feb 2015.
To cite this article: Alaa M. Al-Musalli (2015): Taxonomy of Lecture Note-Taking Skills and Subskills,
International Journal of Listening, DOI: 10.1080/10904018.2015.1011643
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3. International Journal of Listening, 00: 1–14, 2015
Copyright © International Listening Association
ISSN: 1090-4018 print / 1932-586X online
DOI: 10.1080/10904018.2015.1011643
Taxonomy of Lecture Note-Taking Skills and Subskills
Alaa M. Al-Musalli
Department of Communications and Department of ESL
Okanagan College
Note taking (NT) in lectures is as active a skill as listening, which stimulates it, and as challenging
as writing, which is the end product. Literature on lecture NT misses an integration of the processes
involved in listening with those in NT. In this article, a taxonomy is proposed of lecture NT skills and
subskills based on a similar list developed for listening comprehension skills, which is in turn based
on a taxonomy of reading comprehension skills proposed by Ferguson (1973) and Gray (1960). The
proposed list can shed light on the complexity of the skill of NT in lectures and help teachers provide
systematic, brief, and controlled skills training for their students, especially L2 college or university
freshmen.
Note taking (NT) in lectures is commonly known as a useful study skill, yet it is not uncom-
mon to find it marginalized in college curricula, restricting it to a self-study skill. When learners
take full responsibility for developing their lecture NT skills, they indirectly assume that this
skill is secondary to learning and, therefore, should not take any of their class time. However,
when tracing the roots of “study skill,” one finds nothing secondary about it. Tabberer (1987)
cites Devine describing study skills as “those competencies associated with acquiring, recording,
organizing, synthesizing, remembering and using information and ideas” (pp. 4–5). Thus, lecture
NT is a complex skill since for the competencies it involves require the meticulous processing of
complex input. This, in addition to the challenges of lecture NT in L2 contexts, makes the study
of NT skills as crucial a prerequisite to academic learning as developing effective listening and
communication skills.
Most of the books that discuss NT are pedagogical in nature, providing students with advice
and practice in the art of NT. One of the early books that discusses NT is that written by Wright
and Wallwork (1962), who differentiate between the two terms of “note-taking” and “note-
making,” arguing that the former is done while listening and the latter is done while reading.
These two different terms, according to Wright and Wallwork, basically mean one and the same
activity: the activity which involves listing briefly, in an abbreviated form for purpose of speed,
the most crucial facts, arguments, or ideas found in a heard or written text. Therefore, “note-
making” is “a more leisurely process” than “note-taking” since the notes taken while reading are
done at a relaxed pace (pp. 44–45). Other scholars also differentiate between these two terms
Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to Alaa M. Al-Musalli, Department of Communications
and Department of ESL, Okanagan College, 1000 K.L.O. Road, Kelowna, British Columbia, Canada, V1Y 4X8. E-mail:
alaa_almusalli@yahoo.com
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4. 2 AL-MUSALLI
but in a different way; for example, Heaton (1975) reports that some study experts prefer the
term “note-making” because it “implies a more active and critical attitude to study” than “note-
taking” (p. 108). Marshall and Rowland (1998) explain that when listening to a lecture, one is
“making” notes rather than “taking” them for the notes represent a reduced and “consciously
selected version” of the lecture content; “note making” indicates that the learner is not making
a “passive record” of the material; rather, he is making notes through selecting and processing
only the useful information for his purpose (pp. 153–154). Despite these attempts to differentiate
between the two terms, some still confuse the use of the two. Chambers and Northedge (1997), for
example, connect “note-making” to noting from written texts, while “note-taking” is used when
talking about noting in lectures, yet they say “making notes during a lecture” in their discussion
(p. 84). This either shows they support the previous claims that notes need active work and thus
are “made” instead of “taken,” or that there really is no difference between the two terms. This is
why we use the term “Note Taking” in this study to stand for the skill of writing down the impor-
tant ideas from both aural and written texts. What we propose in this paper is a taxonomy of NT
skills and subskills which we base on a listening skills and subskills categorization developed by
(Al-Musalli, 2001).
NOTE TAKING IN LECTURES
Whether we are concerned with aural or written input, the decoding skills of listening and reading
are alike in many fundamental ways since both involve somewhat similar rules of perception and
processing. Literature has provided more information on the skill of reading than on listening;
hence, theories on the listening process were to some extent based on those developed for read-
ing. White (1981) argues that it is generally agreed in the literature that much of what applies
to reading applies to a great extent to listening (pp. 87–88). Howe and Godfrey (1978) found
that notes taken in lectures are “basically the same in form” as those made while reading; thus,
the two types of notes involve “very similar activities” (pp. 84–87). Therefore, it is not surpris-
ing that some of what is advised on NT while reading is also advisable for NT while listening.
To give a brief idea of what is said in this area, Chambers and Northedge (1997) advise a person
taking notes from a written text to “attempt to pick out the “bones of the text”; he should look
for the relevant points to his purpose of reading. Texts usually have a few central ideas which
constitute the bones of the text on which the writer puts flesh, such as examples and evidence
in order to talk the reader through the text and show him how the ideas work (pp. 55–57) (see
also Burns & Sinfield, 2003, p. 76). However, due to the emphasis of input speed in lecture,
NT in lectures poses a bigger challenge for learners than NT from written texts. Chambers and
Northedge (1997) argue that listening to lectures sets three challenging tasks for students: attend
and make sense of the argument, think about what is said, and make some kind of notes. Lectures
put students under pressure; they force students to make sense of what they listen to quickly thus
forcing them to “think on their feet.” The students may therefore miss some information, for
listening “intelligently” means that students make connections between the ideas they hear and
those already in their minds. This is why students must be selective in NT in order to take brief
notes; otherwise, NT would distract listening (pp. 84–85; see also Marshall & Rowland, 1998,
pp. 159–160).
Taking into consideration that there are a number of factors affecting effective listening, the
process of listening for the purpose of taking notes seems very challenging and complicated.
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5. TAXONOMY OF LECTURE NOTE-TAKING SKILLS AND SUBSKILLS 3
Therefore, it would seem safe to assume that it is hard to think of effective notes without effec-
tive listening as the basic step. This assumption appears to be reasonable at first sight, but it
also seems incomplete after a look at Carman and Adams’s (1972) interesting discussion of the
importance of listening. They contend that effective listening also depends on taking effective
notes which is a way of saying that NT enhances concentration. In their discussion of effective
listening, Carman and Adams argue that listening is a neglected skill, for students receive no
training in listening despite the fact that it is “the most used method of learning.” Research gives
the following facts about how people listen “effectively”: first, we are usually unaware of the fact
that as we listen, our attention drifts, so we “listen intently for 30 seconds or so, tune out for a
short time, and then return.” Second, “we hear what we expect to hear,” which means that our
past experiences, expectations, and even prejudices and beliefs determine what we hear; thus, we
tune out what we do not want to hear. Third, “we do not listen well when we are doing other
things.” Finally, “we listen better when we are actively involved in the process”; once there is a
purpose to be satisfied, listening becomes active and effective. Carman and Adams present stu-
dents with a set of rules for effective listening which they call “LISAN”—Lead, Ideas, Signals,
Active, and Notes. These mean that listeners should anticipate what would be said, find the main
ideas, watch for signals, be active, and take organized notes (p. 8). Howe (1986) stresses the
importance of active rather than passive listening to ensure meaningful notes in lectures. Active
listening involves the intellectual tasks of understanding what is being communicated, selecting
from this the most important points, and writing these down (p. 72; see also Marshall & Rowland,
1998, p. 150).
From the above, we understand that in order to be able to write a good set of notes, the person
taking notes should actively intend to listen effectively with the purpose of taking notes in mind.
We also understand that effective listening and NT are integrated; without the first, the second
will fail and vice versa. Hence, we can easily develop a taxonomy that combines both listening
skills and NT skills, which is what we propose in this article. In order to make the connection
between these two skills, we have to start with an examination of the major categorizations of
skills and sub-skills available in the literature for each of these skills.
Taxonomy of Listening Subskills
Decoding aural input involves a number of decisions which are closely related and complemen-
tary to one another; they relate to the listener’s ability to make certain judgments about the whole
input and reply to it. To make these decisions, the listener needs to possess lower-level decoding
skills (or subskills) which constitute lower (or deeper) level decisions under the main skill of
listening.
To specify the subskills of listening, we need to look at those specified for reading, for what
applies to reading applies to listening. Rost (1990) states that studies that emphasize cognitive
and meta-cognitive skills, which are those skills used to create “plausible expectations about the
text” and sense the type of inference needed to understand it, show that although listening and
reading are different decoding skills, that is, aural versus visual, there are cognitive strategies
common to both (p. 8). Chela-Flores (1993) agrees stating that much of the research in listening
and reading makes the assumption that “after a word is identified, the cognitive processes and the
mental representations elicited by these two modes of input are the same” (p. 24).
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6. 4 AL-MUSALLI
Given that the subskills for listening closely parallel those for reading, Field (1998, p. 112)
argues that breaking listening into subskills supports the same diagnostic approach as that adopted
for reading by Grellet and Nuttall, which regards efficient reading as dependent on a set of
subskills. (For more on specific reading subskills, see Ekwall & Shanker’s [1985, p. 16] review
of Davis’s subskills.) Thus, listening subskills specifications provide a checklist against which
many breakdowns in understanding can be amended. Irvine-Niakaris (1997) shows the connec-
tion between the levels and subskills involved in reading and listening in a categorization of
comprehension subskills, based on the communicative teaching proposals put forward by Canale
and Swain which they base on the conception of communicative competence offered by Hymes.
Communicative competence comprises linguistic competence (dealing with the knowledge of
form and basic grammatical structures), sociolinguistic competence (dealing with the ability to
use language appropriately in different contexts), discourse competence (dealing with cohesion
and coherence), and strategic competence (dealing with verbal and nonverbal strategies) (p. 17;
see also Munby’s taxonomy of common reading and listening subskills, 1978, pp. 126–129).
Despite the similarity between reading and listening, there are a number of differences between
the two skills; for example, listening requires more unbroken attention than reading; thus, the
reader has more control over the input which helps him dwell on whatever part of the text he
chooses. Also, in speaking, factors such as the physical presence of the speaker, variation in
pronunciation or dialect, pauses, false starts, etc., can affect listening either positively or nega-
tively (Goodwyn, 1995, p. 22; Lynch, 1998, p. 11; Rost, 1990, p. 9; Scovel, 2002, p. 51). Thus,
the difference in the processing modes between listening and reading is that readers recall more
information and in greater detail than listeners, while listeners recall proportionately more main
ideas and do more inference work (Lund, 1991, mentioned in Lynch, 1998, p. 11). These differ-
ences between reading and listening have brought about differences in the subskills of the two
skills, which has created specific lists of skills that apply to reading on the one hand and lists that
only apply to listening on the other. For example, Munby (1978, pp. 123–126) gives the following
set of skills specific for listening:
• discriminating sounds in isolated word forms and in connected speech;
• discriminating stress patterns within words and recognizing variation in and the use of stress
in connected speech;
• understanding intonation patterns: use of tone in respect of tone variances and interpreting
attitudinal meaning through variation of tone or nuclear shifts; and
• interpreting attitudinal meaning through pitch variance, pause, or tempo.
Another useful categorizations of listening skills (or subskills) is proposed by Rost (1990),
in which she offers the following three categories of skills: skills emphasizing perception,
skills emphasizing interpretation, and enacting skills, each of which includes further subcate-
gories. The first involve recognizing prominence within utterances, including the subskills of
perceiving and discriminating sounds in isolated word forms, discriminating strong and weak
forms, identifying uses of stress and pitch in connected speech, and adapting to speaker varia-
tion. The second skill involve: (a) formulating a propositional sense for a speaker’s utterances,
which includes the subskills of deducing the meaning of unfamiliar items and ideas; (b) for-
mulating a conceptual framework that links utterances together, which includes the subskills of
recognizing indicators of discourse, constructing a main idea in a stretch of discourse, distin-
guishing main points from supporting details, identifying elements in the discourse that help
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7. TAXONOMY OF LECTURE NOTE-TAKING SKILLS AND SUBSKILLS 5
form schematic organization, and selecting clues to complete schematic prediction; and (c) inter-
preting the speaker’s intention(s), which includes the subskills of recognizing changes in prosodic
gestures (e.g., pauses, tempo, pitch range), identifying the speaker’s contradictions, inadequate
information, and ambiguity, differentiating between fact and opinion, and identifying uses of
metaphor, irony, and so forth. The final skills, that is, enacting skills, involve utilizing repre-
sentations of discourse to make appropriate responses, which include the subskills of selecting
salient points, reducing the transcoded information from the spoken source to other forms (often
written forms such as dictation or note-taking), identifying needed clarifications, integrating
information from the text and other sources, and providing appropriate feedback to the speaker
(pp. 152–153).
Despite the systematic way in which the above categorizations of sub-skills are worked out,
they are not classified in detail, nor is there a full explication of what each subskill involves. There
are other lists of listening skills and subskills in the literature, yet most are not grouped as those
by Munby (1978) or Rost (1990). Al-Musalli (2001) proposes a comprehensive categorization
of listening subskills which she bases on the fact that listening shares many skills with reading,
as discussed above. This classification of listening skills is based on a categorization of reading
skills proposed by Gray (1960), which Al-Jubouri (1976) adopts and Ferguson (1973) adds to, in
which reading skills (sub-skills) are categorized in terms of levels that are hierarchically ordered
from basic to more complicated. Gray and Al-Jubouri specify three levels of skills:
• literal identification, which involves getting the direct meaning of a word, phrase, or
sentence as the lowest level in the hierarchy;
• interpretation, which involves drawing inferences from the context of the text, follow-
ing its structure, making generalizations and comparisons, reasoning motives, discovering
relationships, and predicting outcomes; and
• critical evaluation, which involves passing personal judgments on the quality of the
information in the text, recognizing the writer’s attitude and tone and techniques.
Ferguson’s (1973) model, suggests a fourth level, namely, creative responses, which goes beyond
the implications derived from the material to providing creative judgments and responses. The
following levels are Al-Musalli’s (2001, pp. 67–72) classification of listening skills and subskills,
upon which the lecture NT taxonomy proposed in this article is based. Al-Musalli adopted her
level categorization from Gray’s (1960), Ferguson’s (1973), and Al-Jubouri’s (1976) levels of
reading subskills discussed above:
The Literal Level
This involves three main types of skills:
• Phonological skills: These include two subskills: control of the phonological system to dis-
criminate the words that sound similar or words and phrases that differ in one phoneme
(Finocchiaro & Sako, 1983, p. 104; Sullivan & Zhong, 1989, p. 37; Wilson, 2003, p. 335),
and knowledge of the different intonation patterns and uses of word and sentence stress,
pitch, etc. (Goh, 1997, p. 366; Willis, 1981, in Yagang, 1993, p. 16).
• Syntactic skills: These include: recognition of basic grammatical structures and sentence
types (by identifying the clues to question forms, negation, coordination, or subordination)
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8. 6 AL-MUSALLI
(Foley, 1985, p. iii; Harrington, 2001, p. 99; Howe, 1995, p. 98; Irvine-Niakaris, 1997, p. 17;
Sullivan & Zhong, 1989, p. 34), and focusing on whole or parts of sentences and attending
to grammatical relationships (Baltaglia & Fisher, 1982, p. xi).
• Lexical skills: These skills involve getting the direct meaning of words, phrases, and sen-
tences, which requires concentrating on specific words and making appropriate choices to
what they mean by depending on context (Baltaglia & Fisher, 1982, p. xii; Boyle, 1993,
p. 37; Evans, 1984, p. 49; Finocchiaro & Sako, 1983, p. 104; Foley, 1984, p. iii; Goh, 1997,
p. 366; Howe, 1995, p. 98; Irvine-Niakaris, 1997, p. 17; McDowell & Hart, 1988, p. 4;
O’Dell, 1987, p. 156; Rivers, 1971, p. 131; Sullivan & Zhong, 1989, p. 37).
The Inferential Level
This level includes the following two skills:
• Inferential skills: These involve all the types of inferences that the listener makes to under-
stand the message. It includes the following two subskills: inferring the speaker’s attitudes,
intentions, implications, motivations, and purposes; and making expectations and predic-
tions about what he will say next (Baltaglia & Fisher, 1982, p. xii; Dunkel & Pialorsi, 1982,
p. viii; Evans, 1984, p. 49; Foley, 1985, p. iii; Hubbard & Sweetman, 1993, p. 40; McDowell
& Hart, 1988, p. 4; Rivers, 1971, p. 131; Wang, 1971, reported in Paulston & Bruder, 1976,
p. 128; Willis, 1981, reported in Yagang, 1993, p. 16), and inferring spatial, temporal, and
other logical relationships, as well as social and cultural settings (Hubbard & Sweetman,
1993, p. 41; Sullivan & Zhong, 1989, pp. 41–43).
• Textual skills: These involve grasping the development of the text, the recognition of main
ideas, details, cause and effect relationships, which require: connecting between the parts of
the text (Irvine-Niakaris, 1997, p. 17), recognizing cohesive devices (Willis (1981) reported
in Yagang, 1993, p. 16), handling variation of style, tone, and forms of speech according
to assessments of the situation, purpose, and topic (Howe, 1995, p. 95), concentrating on
details, depending on the purpose of listening (Foley, 1985, p. iii; Howe, 1995, p. 96; Irvine-
Niakaris, 1997, p. 17; McDowell & Hart, 1988, p. 4; Sullivan & Zhong, 1989, p. 4; Yagang,
1993, p. 16), comprehending the gist of what is said (Irvine-Niakaris, 1997, p. 17; O’Dell,
1987, p. 156; Rivers 1971, p. 132; Sullivan & Zhong, 1989, p. 34), and organizing and
sequencing ideas (Howe, 1995, p. 94).
The Critical Level
This level includes the following two subskills: making appropriate judgments about the message,
the speaker’s personality, topic, and so forth (Baltaglia & Fisher, 1982, p. xii; Dunkel & Pialorsi,
1982, p. x; Howe, 1995, p. 94; Hubbard & Sweetman, 1993, p. 40; Sullivan & Zhong, 1989,
p. 34), and judging how the purpose of the interaction is achieved (Hubbard & Sweetman, 1993,
p. 40; Rivers, 1971, p. 132).
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9. TAXONOMY OF LECTURE NOTE-TAKING SKILLS AND SUBSKILLS 7
The Creative Level
This includes handling verbal and nonverbal strategies and giving appropriate responses (Howe,
1995, p. 94; Irvine-Niakaris, 1997, p. 17).
LECTURE NOTE-TAKING SKILLS AND SUBSKILLS
Most of the study skills books that provide advice on how to develop NT do not outline
the subskills of NT in an explicit way which has surprisingly been the concern to only few
researchers. For example, Adkins and McKean (1983, pp. 8–10) give three activities (or skills)
to specify what a note taker does in order to takes notes from both lectures and books. These
activities are: accurate analysis, rapid note writing, and accurate and easy read-back. Accurate
analysis includes the subskills of identifying text topic and choosing a title for the notes taken
from it, identifying the main ideas of the text through underlining, ringing, highlighting, or any
combination of these, and deciding on the logic of the text which involved making connections
between main and supporting details. Rapid note writing includes the subskills of arranging the
points of the text depending on logic, using abbreviations and symbols for speed, using symbols,
numbers or letters to show the relationships between the ideas in the text, omitting redundant
information, and using page space to lay out the notes. As for accurate and easy read back, it
includes the subskills of using notes lay-out, numbers and letters to accurately interpret the notes,
using abbreviations and numbers for accurate recall of meaning, and using the notes for a new
purpose, such as writing or performing a task.
Whether one is taking notes from written or oral texts, the above clearly shows that NT
requires comprehension, selection, speed, and good writing skills, input comprehension being
the foundation upon which the other subskills are based. Language comprehension is the first
and most critical component of idea generation (McCutchen, 2012). Hence, no discussion of the
skills and sub-skills specific to NT in lectures can begin without a detailed synthesis of listening
comprehension skills.
Kennedy and Bolitho (1984) maintain that NT is fundamentally a three-part process: the suc-
cessful comprehension of the message that is received, the selection of what the note taker thinks
is relevant for his purpose of NT by discarding “superfluous material” and noting down only the
content, and the use of the notes for their “final purpose,” which might be a revision for an exam,
a preparation for a talk, the writing of an essay, and so forth (pp. 91–92). It is obvious that the
first two stages (or skills) may occur concurrently, and the third follows in a matter of seconds.
Therefore, cognitive processing involves two stages: understanding the lecture points and ideas
and connecting what is understood to the note taker’s existing knowledge, for the ideas that are
not connected to the existing knowledge are likely to be less useful. Suritsky and Hughes, reported
by Williams and Eggert (2002) reiterate the above, suggesting that NT in lectures involves four
skills: “listening, cognitive processing, recording lecture content in written form, and reviewing
noted information” (pp. 174–175). Gur, Dilci, Coskun, and Delican (2013) emphasize the com-
plexity of the kind of skills used in NT while listening by referring to them as “higher-order
cognitive skills” which involve decision making, interpretation, evaluation, and summarizing
(p. 94).
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10. 8 AL-MUSALLI
Some NT stages have been stressed by experts more than others as prerequisites for good or
effective notes. For instance, Palmer and Pope (1984) stress the importance of understanding the
material before noting it down arguing that “all notes that are not accompanied by solid under-
standing are useless” (pp. 76–77). Others call this stage a subskill; for example, Heaton (1975)
argues that in order to take effective notes, one must be familiar with the linguistic, conceptual,
and rhetorical features in the material. Thus, student must comprehend what is said, select the
main points said in the argument, and follow the way the points are developed all of which con-
stitute a difficult challenge for L2 learners in particular (p. 20). Wright and Wallwork (1962)
assert the importance of the ability to select the central point in the material as the “basis of good
note-making” (p. 48).
Drew and Bingham (2001) maintain that effective notes should have the following subskills:
they should be selective, that is, not inclusive of or covering everything; and easy to follow and
understand later, highlighting key points, summarizing main points, clarifying initial ideas, giving
enough details, and making the source of their notes clear so they can give references (p. 38).
Chambers and Northedge (1997) assert that “what you get out of lectures is determined not only
by what you do during them, but also by the work you put in beforehand and afterwards” (p. 86).
There is ample advice on what to do before, during and after taking notes from a lecture,
most of which sheds light on many lecture NT skills and subskill. Salimbene (1985) states that
an overview of lectures can help “develop expectations about the contents and organization of
the lecture” which will make the main sections and subsections clearer and the material easier
to note down (p. 91). Mcllroy (2003) adds that preparing for lectures helps students deal with
all lecturing styles, which is a crucial factor that affects NT (p. 30). As for what to note down
during the different parts of lectures; for example, Wright and Wallwork (1962) state that what
should be included in notes are the basic structure, the essential facts, ideas, and the consecutive
steps of the lectures (p. 49) (see also Burns & Sinfield, 2003, p. 131; Casey, 1993, p. 39; Lewis &
Reinders, 2003, p. 68). Heaton (1975, pp. 1–2) argues that content words, that is, nouns, adjec-
tives, verbs, and most adverbs, should not be omitted when taking notes since they carry the
content of what is being said. Form words, such as auxiliaries, determiners, and pronouns, how-
ever, can be omitted from notes since they only provide the pattern or framework of what is being
said and cannot affect meaning when omitted (see also Martin, McChesney, Whalley, & Devlin,
1977, pp. 205–206).
But capturing the main ideas and relating them in a systematic way are not easy tasks to
achieve since students would be thinking while listening and writing. Salimbene (1985) advises
listeners to make use of “thought speed,” or the “extra thinking time” that they have. She states
that while listeners think at around “400 words per minute,” lecturers speak at only around
“125 words a minute.” The students should also properly use their thought time to “think ahead”
during lectures by trying to predict what the lecturers would say next (p. 95). Marshall and
Rowland (1998) advise students to ask themselves questions while listening about “the purpose,
approach, content, structure, style and format of the lecture.” These questions are very useful
since they can form the basis for the notes (p. 153).
Research suggests that cognitive paradigms that activate the skills of NT and writing are sim-
ilar. Competencies such as comprehension, handwriting speed, spelling, and working memory
are common sub-skills for both (Kobayashi, 2005; Peverly et al., 2007). Handwriting speed is
particularly important for NT as it has a positive effect on the quantity and quality of different
writing outcomes including notes (Connelly, Campbell, MacLean, & Barnes, 2006; Olinghouse
& Graham, 2009; Olive, Alves, & Castro, 2009; Olive, Favart, Beauvais, & Beauvais, 2008;
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11. TAXONOMY OF LECTURE NOTE-TAKING SKILLS AND SUBSKILLS 9
Peverly & Sumowski, 2011). The importance of handwriting as a NT skill is stressed by Peverly
et al. (2013) who found that handwriting speed positively affects the quality of notes taken in
class (p. 121). This suggests that handwriting is a key NT skill (or subskill) that teachers could
focus on and develop in class. Students could be trained on the use and creation of symbols and
abbreviations in notes to stand for the ordinary words used in writing to make NT easier and,
therefore, faster (Casey, 1993, p. 42; Wallace, 1980, p. 62; Yorkey, 1982, pp. 185–186).
In addition, students are advised to listen for verbal clues and watch for visual clues, for
such cues are very important aspects for understanding lectures and subsequently writing good
notes. Students are advised to actively listen for these clues since they give a good picture of the
organization of lectures (Carman & Adams, 1972, p. 13; Casey, 1993, p. 39; Lewis & Reinders,
2003, p. 67; Martin et al., 1977, p. 206; Salimbene, 1985, p. 99). Students are also advised to
review their lecture notes “as soon as possible” after lectures while the information and ideas are
still fresh in the their minds (Barrass, 1984, p. 52; Casey, 1993, p. 39; Drew & Bingham, 2001,
p. 45; Heaton, 1975, p. 109; Langan, 1989, p. 248; Marshall & Rowland, 1998, p. 158; Mcllroy,
2003, p. 30). Reviewing notes helps improve them; whether this is done through further reading
and comparing, students are advised to clarify note by making a distinction between main and
sub-points, adding more information which they remember but did not write down during the
lecture, adding comments and examples, filling in details, or restating ideas (Carman & Adams,
1972, pp. 34–35; Casey, 1993, p. 39; Langan, 1989, p. 248; Martin et al., 1977, pp. 206–207).
As Carman and Adams (1972) put it, there are five steps to better NT: preview, select, question,
organize, and review (p. 18).
In order to activate lecture NT skills and use all the complex subskills they involve, the
practice of NT in lectures requires careful organization and discipline. Berry (2000) stresses the
above, arguing that “without a strict organization, the process can degenerate very easily into
chaos” (p. 44). Williams and Eggert (2002) add that the first challenge of NT is “to achieve a
balance between listening, processing, and notetaking”; to achieve this balance, efficiency in NT
is needed (p. 175).
Taxonomy of Skills and Subskills of Lecture Note Taking
The idea behind taking notes in lectures is to receive the information, process it, understand it,
select the main points and some supplementary details, and write these down. The person taking
notes must therefore be able to use the processing skills available to him to recognize and select
the essential parts of the lecture. Since the information is received via the aural medium, the
note taker is required to use his listening skills and sub-skills in order to take notes. The kind
of listening skills used in this task totally depend on the purpose of listening and the type of
material sought. This means that the relationship between listening and NT skills is strong, and
the achievement of the latter is to a great extent dependent on the proficiency of the former.
This suggests that a number of the skills used when processing speech, i.e. listening skills, are
common to NT.
In the literature, NT is dealt with as a study skill without taking into consideration that it
has shared skills and sub-skills with listening and writing. In fact, it can be considered even
more complex than both, for it involves both these dynamic skills. The literature also misses an
integration of the processing involved in listening with that in NT.
Since comprehension is the initial stage of NT, combining the abovementioned NT skills and
the NT advice provided by study-skills books with Al-Musalli’s (2001) hierarchy of listening
subskills can detail the interrelationship between the two skills and explain the complexity of
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12. 10 AL-MUSALLI
TABLE 1
Taxonomy of the Skills and Subskills Involved in Note Taking from Lectures
Literal Skills Inferential Skills Critical Skills Creative Skills
Phonological Skills:
Using knowledge of the
phonological system,
intonation, stress, etc., to
discriminate between the
sounds and make phonetic
decisions to select what to
listen to from the flow of
speech.
Syntactic Skills:
Using knowledge of the
grammatical structure to
perform parsing, focusing
on whole or parts of
sentences, and
recognizing specific
structures in particular
settings.
Lexical Skills:
Getting the direct
meaning of words,
phrases, and sentences
which requires: control of
word meaning(s),
inferring meaning of
words from context, and
knowledge of word
groupings.
Logical Skills:
Identifying and
recognizing main ideas,
details, sequences, and
cause and effect
relationships which
requires: concentrating on
specific information,
making up the gist of
what is said, identifying
relevant points and
rejecting irrelevant ones.
Textual Skills:
Grasping the development
of the text which requires:
making connections
between parts of the text,
recognizing discourse
markers and cohesive
devices, identifying the
linguistic function, and
handling different styles,
tones and figurative
language.
Judgement Skills:
Making appropriate
judgments about the
message, making
assumptions and
evaluations, drawing
conclusions, and judging
how the purpose of the
interaction is achieved.
Response Skills:
Handling verbal and
non-verbal
communicative strategies
and identifying hesitations
and prop words and
making appropriate
responses.
Outlining Skills:
Deciding on the layout or
pattern most suitable to
record the information
in a logical order and
readable fashion.
Writing Skills:
Writing quickly in
contracted form, using
abbreviations and
symbols, the
information considered
important, e.g.
examples, comparisons,
etc., maintaining the
relationship between
the main ideas and
supporting details.
Reviewing Skills:
Rewriting the notes,
adding more
information collected
while writing or found
in others’ notes, books
or further discussions.
Note: All skills are common to both Listening and Note Taking. Underlined skills are specific to Note Taking.
NT in lectures. Table 1 is a suggested taxonomy of NT skills and subskills integrated with Al-
Musalli’s listening skills. Most of the suggested skills specified in this table are specific to both
listening and NT, while others are specific to NT alone. The lecture NT taxonomy of skills and
subskills is therefore set in terms of the following four macro skills: Literal Skills, Inferential
Skills, Critical Skills, and Creative Skills. The Creative Skills in this taxonomy has the added
NT-specific subskills of Outlining Skills, Writing Skills, and Reviewing Skills.
Table 1 shows not only the direction the input is flowing but the complexity of the process
through which the input moves from the source to its written reproduction. This taxonomy gives
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13. TAXONOMY OF LECTURE NOTE-TAKING SKILLS AND SUBSKILLS 11
a list of decisions or subskills for each level through which the material is processed in lecture NT.
The Literal and Inferential Levels in the taxonomy help the person taking lecture notes to decode
the input through using his language processing skills, while the Critical and Creative Levels
assist in dealing with the information found in the input. An understanding of the complexity
of the skills and subskills involved in this taxonomy is highly beneficial for students, as it helps
them visualize the direction and steps the material they are processing goes through and helps
them improve their decoding and decision making skills when listening to lectures with the aim
of taking notes.
In a study of the effectiveness of a sample of L2 students’ lecture notes, Al-Musalli (2008)
presented a simplified version of Table 1 to an experimental group. The table was discussed
alongside different NT techniques that the students were encouraged to use. Findings indicate that
knowledge of NT skills and subskills has a positive effect on students’ notes (p. 191). (See also
Al-Musalli, 2009, and Lin, 2006, for the positive effect of knowledge of NT skills and students’
perceptions of NT on students’ notes.)
CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATIONS
An understanding of the journey that aural input takes from source to destination and the com-
plex levels of decisions that have to be made throughout the journey is a good starting point for
developing lecture NT skills; therefore, both teachers and students, especially in an L2 context,
need to discuss the integrated levels of skills involved in NT in lectures before expecting effective
notes. The taxonomy proposed in this article not only details the subskills common to listening
and NT but also stresses the importance of developing these two integrated skills together.
What happens during lectures is a complex operation that involves students in a number of
different challenging tasks. Students should therefore know exactly what to do during the actual
delivery of lectures in order to facilitate understanding and NT. Research on the positive effect
of NT on learning and information recall (Bonner & Holliday, 2006; Kiewra, 2002; Titsworth
& Kiewra, 2004) has drawn attention to the need for training in NT. Lecture NT training should
be provided to college and university freshmen, especially those receiving lectures delivered in a
language that is not their mother tongue. Learners must be trained to use both listening processing
skills and NT skills together rather than learn and develop these separately, as one builds on and
supports the other in the process of lecture comprehension. It must be made clear to students that
effective lecture notes are to a great extent dependent on proficiency in listening comprehension.
NT in lectures is not secondary to learning and should be given enough attention in the curric-
ula. Since lecture NT skills shares vital processing subskills with listening skills, as the taxonomy
in this paper presents, we recommend lecture NT skills being developed side by side with listen-
ing and writing skills, for competence in lecture NT is dependent on the mastery of both these
skills. We suggest this taxonomy be used by teachers as a starting block for their lecture NT
training programs, which they could tailor according to the needs of their students. L2 learners
undoubtedly need more support than students studying in the mother tongue, but both groups
would greatly benefit from understanding the intricate details of the type of decisions they need
to make in order to take effective lecture notes.
Future research in the field of listening and NT skills could examine the taxonomy suggested
in this paper in an empirical L1 and L2 context. Clinical research could be implemented to test
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14. 12 AL-MUSALLI
and expand our understanding of the hierarchy of levels used in speech perception for the purpose
of NT and information reproduction.
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