Lectures, Seminars and Tutorials

Consider the style and format of your notemaking. Work out the reasons for the following:

• What aspects went well?
• What aspects did you find difficult?
• If your lecture, seminar or tutorial was online, did you spend too much time notemaking? Do you need to be quicker and produce more concise notes?

Next steps - What might you do in the future? 

• Experiment with different formats for your notes. This can help refine and improve your notemaking. 
• Prepare by reading. Reading core texts can give an overview of the subject before the lecture or seminar and can improve your understanding and engagement. 
• Contribute to discussion. This can be difficult for some. Prepare by reading and thinking about possible questions you might ask before the lecture, seminar or tutorial.  
• Engage with others. Engagement can help improve understanding and learning. Engage with your coursemates and peers through online ELE forums and study groups, or with the lecturer through their office hour appointments. ​

• Review your notes and add any further detail you can remember. 
• Think about what you learned and what parts of the lecture you found difficult. 
• Be proactive about filling in the gaps in your knowledge and do some follow up reading. 
• Talk to other students, schedule an appointment to speak to your tutor or attend a Study Skills drop-in.

What can you remember from the lecture? Give yourself 10-15 minutes and write a short summary or create a concept map of what you remember. This will identify what you have learned and indicate possible gaps or areas of difficulty, which you can start to address through further reading or engagement with others. 

• Organise your lecture material into labelled files for easy access for revision and assignments.  
• Use ELE to indicate possible labels, for example, the module code or name, week or topic.   
• Include the relevant reading in the same file or add a link in your electronic notes if it's an online resource. 

Research shows that repeated exposure to material helps you to retain it. This approach is called spaced repetition and can be applied to the revision of lecture material by revisiting lecture notes and encouraging information retrieval through questions or quizzes. Simply work out a schedule to ensure you revisit your lecture notes regularly throughout the term. The benefit of this is that you will be well prepared at the beginning of a revision period, usually at the end of each term, and you will have more time to focus on more complex aspects of the course and practice exam questions. It can also help with confidence.