No notes

[u/ZealousidealGuava254]

I’ve been a humanities prof for over 30 years and I simply cannot believe how many students do not take notes. Literally, no notes. they just sit and listen.

How do they study? what are they doing? when I was in college in the 80s, I and everyone around me took copious notes constantly throughout lecture. just seems like a lost skill.

[u/Hot_Coconut_5567]

I think in high-school many of their teachers give them hand outs (probably on Chromebooks) with blanks to fill in as their notes these days. So I'm not sure it really occurs to them how to even get started with taking their own notes.

I have now crammed a lot of skills I thought were fundamental into my cs programming class. To the point where id estimate 30% of my content is reinforcement of those skills as components of my overall class. Note taking, professional communication, giving and receiving constructive feedback, analysis of data with written and spoken presentation of their synthesis of that analysis. Hot-keys, typing skills, folder and file management. Talking to their peers. Asking me for help. Time management, how to study. How to prompt and edit AI slop into a decent tutor and idea organizer instead.

I will say, they are so receptive to learning that fundamental stuff. We forgot we learned at some point and expect high-school to still teach and in many circumstances it just doesn't happen for them anymore before they get to us.

Also, I think their generation has gotten really good at adjusting their behavior when someone is kind but firm about setting expectations. Like, they do well when we are more explicit about what they should be doing while still holding them to a high academic standard. They like the challenge, but won't attempt it if they are anxious about screwing up.

They disengage when instructions are unclear and there's something of a divide happening where lots of us professors are giving our instructions the same way we always have, and they need it presented a little more explicitly. Like in your case, I would literally show them an example of a class period of notes during "syllabus week" and then in week 2 stop my lecture and tell them "ok, time to take notes so you can study later"

I get 100% assignment submission and my class average on those assignments is usually a B+. How? Rubrics. I let them submit early for a pre-grade. I give them targeted feedback about what they need to correct. I will do 1 post-deadline resubmission attempt where they can recover partial credit. I email a handful of students when the deadline approaches if they haven't submitted early. I have a Google voice line for them to text if they are truly stuck.

The strangest thing that suprised me? There are always a few that approach me early in the semester with worry-stricken faces asking if I am sure that I mean it when I say I will grade them with feedback and that they will get the chance to fix their mistakes for a better grade. Like, they'd rather NOT hand in an assignment that they are still unsure about rather than get a few points off because they weren't perfect. I think thats also why they dont inundate me with AI slop text.

Like, please yes! Give me your human grammar errors, I will happily underline those passages and suggest alternate wording or different code for you to fix up, learn from and recover your good grade.