The Student News Site of Walt Whitman High School

The Black and White

The Student News Site of Walt Whitman High School

The Black and White

The Student News Site of Walt Whitman High School

The Black and White

The “not milk” generation: How Gen Z prompted milk’s rebrand
A piece of our history: A look into the Montgomery Farm Women’s Co-operative Market
LIVE: Baseball takes on Richard Montgomery in home opener
Coach Manon achieves 200 wins and state championship in a thrilling wrestling season
Overtime Elite: A new wave of professional basketball
Proposed bill will guarantee top 10% of Maryland students to 12 Maryland universities

Proposed bill will guarantee top 10% of Maryland students to 12 Maryland universities

March 21, 2024

Typed notecards more efficient, accessible than handwritten ones

English teachers, listen up: it’s time for tedious hand-written note cards to go. English teachers should allow students to type note cards to make research projects more efficient.

Graphic by Billy Lenkin.

With so many online resources available for research, written note cards are an unnecessary hassle. It’s illogical to write quotes by hand when students can easily copy and paste them into an essay. Note cards are a relic from the times of handwritten essays and books-only research, but they should be abandoned in the digital age.

Typing is neater, and note cards are backed up on the computer, so there’s no chance of losing any work. Copy-pasting quotes also eliminates the risk of incorrectly transcribed quotes or spelling errors. Plus, most teachers require students to use pen for their note cards, so if students accidently leave out a phrase or skip a line of text, they have to start on a new card. Students can fix mistakes far faster and easier on the computer.

Note cards waste space because students can write only one idea per note card, often resulting in several half-blank note cards. An electronic collection of note cards is more environmentally friendly since students could fit multiple ideas on one page and only need to print the cards they want to turn in.

Story continues below advertisement

Some teachers argue against online resources like Noodle Tools, citing their inaccuracy. Although some online resources like Noodle Tools automatically format note cards incorrectly, students can easily format the header and citation correctly on a Word document just as they do for written note cards.

English teacher Michelle Quackenbush gave her students the option of using Noodle Tools for source cards and note cards for a research project this year, and only 10 students opted to hand-write their cards. The typed note cards make for a nice printout, and it’s easy to correct the incorrect Noodle Tools heading, Quackenbush said. Quackenbush also found that typing note cards was much less time-consuming and that there was less socializing during research time than in past years.

Opponents of typed note cards argue that students don’t comprehend the material by copy-pasting straight from online sources. But blind copying isn’t any better than copy-pasting, and students still have to understand the information later when they incorporate it into their papers.

English teacher Danielle Fus admitted that written note cards slow down the research process, but said it’s important for younger students to write out note cards to help keep them organized and learn what information is important to record. Yet students can organize their note cards more effectively on the computer, since all of the cards are together, with no chance of losing any. Fus also said that students should have the opportunity to learn both print and online methods, and then choose which they prefer. However, Quackenbush’s 10 students are the exception, as most students prefer typed note cards. Written note cards are becoming outdated, and English teachers should teach students how to effectively use electronic note cards instead.

 

View Comments (4)
More to Discover

Comments (4)

In order to make the Black & White online a safe and secure public forum for members of the community to express their opinions, we read all comments before publishing them. No comments with personal attacks, advertisements, nonsense, defamatory or derogatory rhetoric, excessive obscenities, libel or slander will be published. Comments are meant to spur discussion about the content and/or topic of an article. Please use your real name when commenting.
Comments are Closed.
All The Black and White Picks Reader Picks Sort: Newest
  • I

    iggyDec 18, 2011 at 6:48 pm

    I agree with this article. Can you identify who is preventing this change from happening? Principal? Group of English teachers? MCPS policy?

  • T

    Tupac (!)Dec 10, 2011 at 9:51 am

    The English department should leave the stone age. Any English teacher who claims that being able to handwrite note cards is important for college is full of it. We are the 99%! Occupy the English office!

  • A

    An AlumDec 7, 2011 at 1:18 pm

    Having spent 4 years writing research papers in the Whitman way, I can say that while Whitman’s English department prepared me really well for college, the research paper writing process could greatly be improved. The notecard process is a huge unnecessary time suck. There’s no reason why students should be forced to write in pen, and copy down dozens of sentences that we’ll just have to type later. It would be much more effective to have the option to type them, because then you can easily copy and paste the quote and citations into your paper. I found that even though I’m not a slow worker by any means, I never had quite enough time to do adequate research and was always scrambling to finish my notecards on time (especially because the first day in the library was always spent sitting at a table while one of the library aids explains to us exactly how to use the same databases we’ve been using for years). Also, while I understand the value of categorizing notecards, at that stage in the paper process I never really knew exactly how I was going to structure my paper, so I ended up making up categories that I changed numerous times later. As a senior, my AP English teacher told us that notecards were optional, and it saved me lots of time. I certainly didn’t have a worse paper for it. I think that a lot of procedures at Whitman are unnecessarily rigid and unhelpful, especially in the English department.

  • T

    thegirlbehindthescreenDec 6, 2011 at 7:44 pm

    agreed…but actually you are so right and your article was backed with superb examples!