How to Write Better Essays

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15 Note-taking for criticism and evaluation

In this chapter you will learn:

• a four-step technique for criticising and evaluating arguments;


• how to take notes that allow you to record your own criticisms and
  evaluations of the passage;


• how to improve your concentration.

Obviously, our ability to discuss and criticise the implications of argu-

ments depends first on the skills needed to lay bare their structure: to

isolate clearly the points for and against, so that we can enter into the

discussion more confidently. But we also need a note-taking strategy

that will allow us to go one step further and record our own arguments

and criticisms in the body of the notes.

Unfortunately, many of us never get to the stage of being able to

criticise and evaluate an author ’s arguments, because we’re handi-

capped by note-taking skills which condemn us to many hours of

patient toil, taking irrelevant, verbatim notes. A large part of the reason

for this lies in our willingness to omit the interpretation stage, and the

pattern notes we should have made there in response to two questions:

• What issues does the question raise that need to be researched and
  examined in the essay?


• What do I know and think about the issues raised?

In effect, by ignoring these questions we’ve failed to preview any

passage we’re likely to read when we undertake our research. As a

result we’re going in blind. We have little idea of the important issues

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