Note Cards

Gathering and Organizing Information Using Note Cards

The advantage of using note cards is that you can group the final stack of cards any way you want, putting all the information you have on one topic together.

Here is one way to take notes using note cards:

Tips

• Summarize or paraphrase main ideas instead of copying whole sentences or paragraphs. (If you are recording a quote, write it down word for word and put it in quotation marks.)
  
  
• All the notes on a single note card are from the same source and on the same topic.

• Keep a list of all the sources you use. If the list is numbered, record the source number on your note card.

• Keep track of your sources so you can use Citation Maker to make your bibliography, works cited or reference list.

• Ultimately, you can devise any system for identifying the note cards that you want. You just need to be sure of the following:
  • You can tell which topic the information refers to
  • You can identify the source and the page for each piece of information

If you produce your final product from your own notes and credit your sources, you should be able to avoid plagiarism.

Activity: Use this template to create your own note cards.