How do your high schoolers take notes from a textbook?

[Shawn On the Border]

Ds 14 was taught at home to outline each chapter. He is now in private school where the teachers each have their own way of taking notes. Both Biology and World History teachers want them to use the summary information in the front of the chapter. Mostly, the student ends up with a list of terms/definitions. They don't have an outline of any type to show the relationships of different concepts to each other. Although ds14's grades are pretty good overall, his test scores are highly variable. Of course, he doesn't want to do any more work than he is already doing. How do your teen take notes?

[DebbS]

I have my teen do a chapter outline and list the terms/definitions either as part of the outline or as a separate section. Either way works for me because the notes are for his use, not mine.

[regentrude]

DD 13 takes notes in physics and history. She does not follow the formal outlining format. She writes down key points but does not use complete sentences (which I find a useful skill to practice because taking notes from a lecture would not allow enough time for complete sentences either).

Her notes are structured, important facts underlined, she uses bullets and indents.

I can make perfect sense of her notes when I read over them - and apparently so can she.