Strategic Note Taking for Middle-school Students with Learning Disabilities in Science Classes

While today's teachers use a variety of teaching methods in middle-school science classes, lectures and note-taking still comprise a major portion of students' class time. To be successful in these classes, middle-school students need effective listening and note-taking skills. Students with learning disabilities (LD) are poor note-takers, which negatively impacts their academic performance. This investigation sought to examine the effects of strategic note-taking on the recall and comprehension of middleschool students with LD. Forty students with LD were randomly assigned to either an experimental or a control group. Using strategic note-taking, students in the experimental group were taught to record notes independently while viewing a videotaped science lecture. Students who were taught strategic note-taking scored significantly higher on measures of immediate free recall/ long-term free recall, comprehension, and number of lecture points and words recorded in their notes than students in a control group who used conventional note-taking. The limitations of the research and implications of this technique for classroom application are discussed. JOSEPH R. BOYLE, Ph.D., Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey. Since the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) was amended in 1997, and subsequently in 2004, schools have been required to provide students with disabilities access to the general education curriculum and instruction in grade-level concepts from the content-area classes such as science, social studies, and math (Gersten, Baker, Smith-Johnson, Dimino, & Petersen, 2006). Access to the curriculum goes beyond mere placement with same-aged peers. In fact, IDEA mandates that students with disabilities are to be involved in and advance within the general education curriculum (Deshler et al., 2001; Soukup, Wehmeyer, Bashinski, & Bovaird, 2007). The belief is that meaningful access to the general education curriculum will allow students to learn core content and, in the process, pass state tests (Deshler, Schumaker, Bui, & Vernon, 2006). In order for this to occur, students with learning disabilities (LD) need to learn new strategies to become engaged with the content, particularly when teachers present content through traditional means, such as lectures and discussions. Learning through traditional teaching formats (e.g., lectures) in content areas such as science entails using effective listening and note-taking skills. A lack of these skills frequently means that students with LD miss out on important content (Scruggs, Mastropieri, Volume 33, Spring 2010 93 Berkeley, & Graetz, in press; Stringfellow & Miller, 2005). While today's teachers use a variety of teaching methods in content areas, lecture and note-taking still comprise a major portion of students' class time. For example, one recent investigation found that 79% of content-area teachers reported that they "regularly use" or "mostly use" lectures during their teaching (Vogler, 2006). Similarly, in a national survey of more than 500 middle-school science teachers, respondents reported that nearly two thirds of their science classes involved students listening to and taking notes during lectures (Fulp, 2002). Similar results have been found in mathematics, in that middle-school teachers report that lectures and note-taking occur in 80% of their math classes and that they take place, on average, 36% of the time in these classes (Hudson, McMahon, & Overstreet, 2002). In most science classes, teachers reiy on textbooks that are aligned with state standards to teach concepts, facts, and vocabulary (Huber & Moore, 2002; Scruggs, Mastropieri, & McDuffie, 2007). And it is from this textbook-driven curriculum, which is comprised of numerous science concepts, heaviiy iaden vocabulary, and related facts (Cawley, Hayden, Cade, & BakerKrooczynski, 2002; Scruggs et al., 2007; Scruggs, Mastropieri, & Oklo, 2008), that teachers develop daily class lectures and lessons (Harniss, Dickson, Kinder, & Hollenbeck, 2001). In turn, the content of lectures often forms the basis for teacher-made tests and quizzes. Putnam, Deshler, and Schumaker (1993) found that teachers' "lectures were the major source of information [upon] which test questions were based" (p. 340). In addition, teachers reported that in their secondary content classes almost half of a student's grade was derived from students' performance on these tests (Putnam et al., 1993). In order for students with LD to be successful in these classes, they must learn from lectures that move at a quick pace and are comprised of many facts and vocabulary (Scruggs et al., in press; Suritsky, 1992; Vaughn, Schumm, & Shay, 1994). Even though learning from lectures is difficult for students with LD (Boyle, 2009; Hughes & Suritsky, 1994; Stringfeilow & Miiler, 2005; Suritsky, 1992), gênerai education teachers have acknowledged that all students must be able to take notes and learn from lectures in order to do well in their classes (Suritsky & Hughes, 1996). Researchers (Knowlton, 1983; Schumaker & Deshler, 1984) have found that middleand high-school teachers have ranked note-taking and listening skills as some of the top skills that students should have in their classes, and others (Snyder & Bambara, 1997) have reported that similar survival skills are needed in today's secondary content area classrooms. Despite the importance of being able to record notes effectively in content-area classes, students with LD are poor note-takers. One recent study (Boyle, 2009) found that middle-school students with LD recorded only 13% of the total lectures points (TLP) for a science lecture, compared to students with no learning disabilities (NLD), who recorded 25% of the TLP. Furthermore, even when provided with cued lecture points (CLP) (i.e., emphasis and organizational cues) throughout the lecture, middle-school students with LD recorded only 18% of the CLP, compared to students with NLD, who recorded 43% of the CLP. This study additionaliy found that CLP was moderately correlated (.53) with students' test performance. Recording cued notes is important for students because teachers often use emphasis cues (e.g., "You should remember that ...") immediateiy preceding a salient lecture point (e.g., "... in Paraguay, burrowing toads form a cocoon around themselves to prevent water loss ...") to cail attention to its importance. Further, teachers expect that all students record this cued lecture point in their notes (Titsworth & Kiewra, 2004). A second type of cued lecture point, an organizational cue (e.g., "There are six adaptation strategies used by toads during the dry season."), helps students by pro^ viding a framework for organizing certain aspects of lecture content and assists students in discerning important from less important lecture content (Titsworth, 2001a, 2001b). Researchers believe that organizational cues help students process information more efficiently through a natural "chunking" process, thereby reducing the load on working memory (Cowan, 1995; Gathercole, Durling, Evans, Jeffcock, & Stone, 2007). Regardiess of the type of lecture cue, these cues increase the amount of notes that students record and, uitimately, increase their achievement on comprehension and recall measures (Titsworth, 2001a, 2001b; Titsworth & Kiewra, 2004). Hence, when these cues are presented in lectures, all students should record the cued lecture points in their notes. In studies on the problems that students with LD experience during class lectures, researchers have shown that students with LD demonstrate both poor listening skills and poor note-taking skills. For. example, Hughes and Suritsky (1994) found significant differences among college students with LD and NLD who recorded notes during a lecture. Their resuits showed that college students with LD who viewed a videotaped lecture while recording notes recorded fewer cued lecture points, fewer non-cued lecture points, and, overall, fewer total lecture points. Specifically, college students with LD recorded only 36% of cued lecture points, whereas students with NLD recorded 56% of the lecturer's notes. Further, students with LD recorded 50% of overall Learning Disability Quarterly 94 lecture information units compared to 60% for NLD students. In terms of listening during lectures, Ward-Lonergan, Lilies, and Anderson (1998, 1999) performed two studies that examined the effects of listening skills during lectures. Although student note-taking was not involved, these studies illustrate the learning problems that students with LD encounter during lectures. In the first study, Ward-Lonergan et al. (1998) compared the performance of middle-school students with language learning disabilities (LLD) with that of students with NLD who watched two 5-minute lectures (i.e., comparison versus causation) on social studies. Results showed that students with NLD performed significantly better than students with LLD on both types of lectures, regardless of the type of question (i.e., literal versus inferential questions). In a second study, similar to the first, Ward-Lonergan et al. (1999) again compared the performance of middle-school students with LLD and with NLD who viewed two 5-minute social studies lectures using a comparison or causation format, but with different content. In this study, students viewed two lectures and, after each lecture, verbally retold the content of the lecture while being audiotaped. Students' retells were assessed by counting T-units. Students with NLD recalled significantly more information than students with LLD on all of the measures in terms of linguistic productivity (number of T-units, number of subordinate clauses, and percentage of lecture points), syntactic complexity (number of subordinate clauses per T-unit), and efficiency (number of T-units per second, number of lecture components per T-unit, and number of lecture components per second). The ramifications of ineffective listening and notetaking skills are often detrimental to student learning and recall, particularly for students with LD. To succeed in middle-school science classes, these students must learn these essential skills (Cawley, Kahn, & Tedesco, 1989; Laidlaw, Skok, & McLaughlin, 1993; WardLonergan et al., 1998, 1999). Laidlaw et al. (1993) found that when students do not record notes, they perform more poorly on tests and quizzes (students' scores averaged 44%) than when they do record notes during lectures (students' scores increased to an average of 79%). Likewise, middleschool students with NLD who recorded "more notes" (i.e., ideas and words) outperformed students who recorded fewer notes on tests of recall and recognition (Risch & Kiewra, 1990). For students with LD who exhibit poor listening skills, note-taking has been suggested as one method to assist them during lectures that are auditory in nature (Ward-Lonergan et al., 1998, 1999). Of the note-taking techniques relevant for K-12 students with disabilities for use during lectures, only two research-based techniques are available in the literature: guided notes and strategic note-taking. Guided notes have been used for students with disabilities (Lazarus, 1991, 1993: Study 1; Patterson, 2005; Sweeney et al., 1999) in K-12 schoolsettings during lectures. The majority of these studies found that once K12 school students with mild disabilities were trained to use guided notes, they exhibited greater gains on tests (over baseline periods), and often the greatest gains were found when guided notes were used with a short review or study period. The second note-taking technique, strategic notetaking (Boyle & Weishaar, 2001), has been found to be effective for high-school students with mild disabilities. When these students were trained to use strategic note-taking to record notes of videotaped lectures, they outperformed control subjects who used conventional note-taking techniques on immediate free recall, long-term recall, quiz performance (i.e., comprehension), and total recorded notes (Boyle & Weishaar, 2001). To date, only two studies (Boyle & Weishaar, 2001; Patterson, 2005) have sought to examine the effects of a note-taking technique on student learning during science lectures. While guided notes are effective for students with disabilities, preparing guided notes by reviewing the content of the lecture and then transcribing it in guided-note form for students is very time intensive for teachers. Even though general education teachers expect students with LD to meet the same evaluative criteria as NLD students (Schumm et al., 1995), researchers found that general education science and social studies teachers were often reluctant to make changes in their teaching or presentation mode for students with mild disabilities (Mclntosh, Vaughn, Schumm, Haager, & Lee, 1993; Schumm & Vaughn, 1991, 1995) and were concerned that making adaptations in their classes for these students would come at the expense of students without disabilities (Vaughn, Schumm, & Kouzekanani, 1993). In fact, most general education teachers have to cover vast quantities of information at a relatively quick pace in order for students to pass end-of-the-year state tests and smoothly transition to more advanced courses (Deshler et al., 2006; Schumm et al., 1995), making it difficult to find the time to make and use adaptations for students with disabilities, such as guided notes. . A more efficient approach to note-taking would be to teach students with disabilities note-taking strategies and techniques that they could use independent of teacher assistance. One such independent approach, strategic note-taking, initially might be time intensive Volume 33, Spring 2010 95 to teach to students (typically two class sessions); however, in the long run, a technique such as this makes students more independent learners and may generalize to multiple settings, such as other general education content-area classes, making the initial time investment worthwhile. Furthermore, an independent approach would not require general education teachers to make many adjustments in their lecture style or content nor add preparation to their workload. Unlike guided notes, which must be prepared in advance of class, strategic note-taking offers a note-taking technique that can be used with different types of science content (earth science and life science) and with no teacher preparation. Finally, because note-taking skills are used in secondary, postsecondary, and even work environments, it is essential that students learn how to record notes and not have to rely on others to record notes for them. Strategic note-taking meets these goals by providing students with a basic set of skills that they can use in a variety of settings and with different types of lecture content. Given the paucity of literature on research-based note-taking techniques for school-age students with LD, the current study sought to extend the research by assessing the effects of strategic note-taking on the performance of middle-school students with LD. Specifically, the study sought to address the following four research questions: 1. Will students who used strategic note-taking record more notes overall? 2. Will students who used strategic note-taking perform better on recall measures and a comprehen-