Generative Learning - Cornell Notes

Cornell Notes is a structured way of curating notes that was first devised at Cornell University in the 1940s. Devised by education professor Walter Pauk, the approach enables synthesis through Summary. A generative activity as students SELECT along the way, not just copying the whole PowerPoint or video subtitles. A Generative activity as children pose questions during the lesson to find answers to later. An engaging activity (it requires constant thinking) and can be done at length. I have had my Year 6 class focused on note taking with this method for an hour at a time. And no, they are not a perfect class of little angels nor is it full of HPAP students.

How to lay out Cornell Notes

Firstly, you need a title box at the top. For speed in lessons I usually pre-populate this if using a Cornell Notes template worksheet (handy in the beginning or with younger children). If not, the title/LO: at the top of the page will suffice.

Next, count 5 lines up from the bottom of the page and draw a line. This will become your Summary box for children to complete at the end of the lesson (or for early morning work the next day - a great way to build in Retrieval Practice into your day).

Finally, divide the remain section unequally so 1/3 of the space on the left can be used for collecting key words and the 2/3 on the right can be used for general notes.

There are lots of Word templates that can be downloaded and edited. I recommend inserting lines for children to write on in the Notes and Summary sections.

Planning for Cornell Notes in a lesson

The first time you use Cornell Notes in a lesson, the class will need a little training. My class picked it up in a few minutes and found having a worksheet with the layout already constructed helpful. Having used worksheets in 3 lessons, I now encourage children to construct their own Notes pages in their books with copies of the worksheet on hand for those who wish to use one.

In my first trial I gave the children free-reign over how many lines of notes they made per slide. I gave a rough guide of 2-3 lines per slide and this worked OK. Children mostly produced the same number of lines, with the HPAP doing slightly more and the LPAP slightly lesson. A Year 4 colleague tried Cornell Notes with her class and gave the children a specific number of lines per slide. This works better as children have a goal to aim for and it improves the learning. The HPAP are constrained so have to think more and therefore learn more.

In future lessons I put a note on each slide as to how much children should write. This allows the teacher to vary the challenge for each slide and adjust pacing if children get tired towards the end of a session. This can also be done for videos. Let the children watch the video all the way through once so they know what to expect and reduces the cognitive load for note taking during the second viewing. During the second viewing, pause the video at your pre-planned stopping points so children can make notes. As everyone is writing 1/2/3 lines of notes, the pacing can be kept constant and you don’t get wails of “WAAAIIIITTT I’m not ready yet”.

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Using Cornell Notes in a lesson

With the class primed on how to use the sheet and your guidance in place, it is time to get teaching. I’ve tried a few different approaches but this routine has worked the best.

1. Click to the new slide. Read out the slide or allow children to read it for themselves. I alternate as needed, reading longer slides and letting children read shorter slides for themselves.

2. Children write the summary sentences in the given number of lines in Main Notes section. Allow 1min per line.

3. Children then read the lines they have written and note a keyword or question in the left-hand column. This acts as a visual waypoint for re-reading and summarising their notes later. It also generates more learning as children are summarising their summary notes.

4. Work through your slides until the lesson is over. Pupils will remain engaged for longer than you may expect as they are constantly thinking about main notes sentences, thinking about that keyword and then have a new page to read and write summary sentences for. If pupils fill a sheet with main notes, give them a new sheet. I usually give out 1 each for a lesson and scatter a few extra sheets per table/row too.

5. Finally, allow time to re-read main notes and keyword/questions. Children should then summarise the whole page in 5 lines in the Summary space at the bottom of the page. This generates more learning as children have to review and select what is the most important learning to them from the sheet. I allow time at the end of the lesson for Summary writing as children may have more than one sheet to summarise. It is also a great early morning activity and aids learning as children have had time to assimilate the learning into their long term memories.

Reflection

Cornell Notes is an excellent tool for knowledge rich lessons. I have used it in Geography, History and Religion & Worldviews lessons to great effect. Children are engaged for significantly longer and have far higher retention of learning. When notes are used to produce a follow-up piece of work, their is a great consistency in the learning produced as the quality of notes is significantly higher between HPAP and LPAP children compared to free note taking.

Children have asked to use the notes in lessons without being prompted and I now keep a stack of the worksheets in my classroom. This form of note taking is popular with the class as they feel it aids their learning whilst reducing the amount of writing they have to produce. And it reduces the teacher’s marking pile too. A win-win for all concerned!

With younger year groups or children who struggle significantly with writing, I would make the space between note lines larger or you could try leaving the Main Notes sections blank so children could draw pictures and write in key words only. For this approach I would let the drawing and keywords happen simultaneously rather than the Notes-then-Words sequence outlined above.

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Summarising (0.5)

Retell, abbreviate, tweet. Taking a larger body of text or information and condensing it down. The act of thinking and reducing generates thinking, engagement and focus on word choice. The process of reorganising fosters engagements and generation of links. Examples of this approach include: Read a paragraph; summarise as a sentence.; summarise all learning from a lesson in 5 take-away sentences (also, reduces marking!); writing longer summarise, less often in a lesson.