Life skills teacher’s notes B2+ Unit

Taking notes 3a 30 Students should answer the questions using their

notes. When they have done as much as they can, show
SELF STUDY the lecture again.
If students are working alone, note that 1a, 2a, 2b, Answers
3b, 4a, 4b and the REFLECT ON IT box all have open 1 Ferdinand de Saussure
answers. If possible, give self-study students the
2 the science of meaning
opportunity to show you their work or to exchange
their work with other students. 3 semantics, syntactics and pragmatics
4 the signifier and the signified
5 in a dictionary
Before watching
6 what we associate with that word/a word’s different
WARMER meanings
Ask your students a number of questions. 3b This is where students reflect on how successful they
Do you take notes in class? Are your notes clear? were in completing 3a. After doing the exercise, do
Do you read your notes at home after the class? they feel there is room for improvement in their note-
Can you normally understand your notes when you taking? Hopefully this will be the case, and students will
read them later? be encouraged to develop this essential skill.
Now ask one final question:
Could you take better notes? After watching
Hopefully many students will recognise the need
4a This task further develops the life skill by getting
to improve their notes. Tell them that this is the
students to think about the pros and cons of different
objective of the following activities.
forms of note-taking. Sample answers are provided, but
students might have other ideas.
1a This exercise is important because it reviews three
main ways of taking notes. Students will return to these Sample answers
in 4b. Find out how many of your students use the Outline or linear notes
different methods. Pros: Produces well-organised, chronological notes.
Cons: Difficult to use in a fast lecture. Doesn’t clearly
1b This reviews some common abbreviations students
show the relationship between ideas. Hard to add to or
could use in their note-taking. Consider reviewing all
change later.
of those in 6 on page 127 of the Student’s Book. The
The Cornell method
message itself is aimed at the students, to encourage
them to try out new ways of taking notes. Pros: Good for reviewing notes later. Easy to see key
concepts. Makes you think about the key points.
Answers Cons: Doesn’t show the relationship between ideas.
Taking notes is very important. Good notes result in a Mind maps and spidergrams
better understanding of the information. Experiment Pros: Easy to see where you are at all times. Shows the
with different types and choose the best one for you. relationship between ideas clearly. Easy to add to later.
Cons: Hard to use if you don’t know the structure of the
While watching lecture in advance.
2a 30 VIDEO SKILLS Ask students to read through the 4b SKILLS 4 LIFE The idea here is for students to find out
video skills box before doing this exercise. The exercise more online about one note-taking method that they
makes students aware of just how hard it is to recall don’t currently use. They should read about it on at least
information about a new and complex topic if you don’t two different websites, make notes, and then come
take notes. After watching up to 04:14 of the lecture, back to class ready to use it. Now, play the video again
make sure students compare what they remembered to and have students take notes using the new method.
emphasise this point. Afterwards, reflect as a class on how the experiment
went. Does anybody feel that they want to adopt a new
VIDEO SKILLS: Following a lecture
note-taking method as their standard choice?
This prepares students for the lecture by picking up
on the signposting that the speaker uses to help her REFLECT ON IT
audience follow what she’s saying.
This question might be sensitive in that it
2b 30 Students now watch the whole lecture and take encourages students to be critical of their school,
notes. Make sure they think about how to organise but approach it from the point of view of schooling
their notes before they watch. Also make sure they in general, not specifically about your school. The
understand that they will need to use their notes to idea is that there is always room for improvement
answers questions about the lecture. in the way schools teach students, and that students
need the opportunity to give their feedback.

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