Use these questions before an outside-of-class-experience to guide students to develop an organized structure for their notes. Students may answer these questions individually or in small groups, depending on the class and assignment, and then may discuss the different approaches they are planning to take.

Objective

To develop an organized, yet flexible structure for notes taken during the outside-of-class experience.

Key Terms

metacognition; experiential learning

Activity

  1. Consider what contexts are most relevant for your notes. Where, when, and for what purpose are you going where you’re going? What is the name of the place/site, speaker, event, performance, you will be experiencing? Where can you note this key initial information on your template?
  2. Once you have the more general information from question 1, develop a more precise understanding of further details related to the place and your presence in it. Will you be mostly stationary or will you be moving around? From what specific locations will you be observing?
  3. What are the factors that shape your sequence or manner of interactions with the place or event? (these factors may be related to the event itself, rules at the site, and/or directions from your instructor.) How can you design a template that can effectively organize your observations given these possibilities?
  4. After developing a more specific understanding of the place, consider how you can structure your template to prepare for the rhythms or intervals of time that will affect your experience, whether they are shaped by the place/event itself or directions you have received. How and when can you note clock time efficiently if necessary without taking yourself out of the experience?
  5. Thinking about what you know about the event/site, consider how your expectations might be met or challenged. In your template how will you create space for the unexpected? What strategies can you use to link observations as potential connections occur to you?