Lectures
Lectures play an important role in all Level One History modules. They are used to convey the main themes of the module, to introduce important topics, and to present information and arguments which will help you to explore the subject as a whole.
Lectures are timetabled in slots of 50 minutes. Listening and concentrating on a topic for that length of time is something that you may find hard at first. Lecturers often try to break up the time and some even include mini `breaks´ during a lecture. Most lecturers also use visual aids, projecting text or images on overheads or through PowerPoint slides. These are to help you understand the lecture, to illustrate points, or clarify names, dates and spellings. It can be tempting to concentrate on writing down everything that is displayed on the overheads, instead of focusing on listening to the lecture itself. But remember that the overheads themselves represent just one part of a lecture, so make sure you don´t concentrate on those at the expense of engaging with the arguments and discussion in the lecture as a whole. The text from overheads may sometimes be made available on MOLE after a lecture: your lecturer will advise you when this is the case, and may suggest that you don´t need to spend time copying down long quotations during the lecture if you will have an opportunity to look at them again later.
Even where material relating to a lecture is put on MOLE – whether in the form of a summary, or of the material used for overheads – this should not be regarded as a way to get the benefit from the lecture without needing to attend it. This material is there to support your learning from a lecture, not to replace it. For the same reason you should be cautious about assuming that you can simply catch up on a lecture by borrowing someone else´s notes. In cases where you were unable to attend a lecture for reasons of ill health, you may find it helpful to try to catch up by looking at a friend´s notes and talking to them about the lecture you missed. But you will find that everyone gets different things out of a lecture and you may need to discuss the missed lecture with several different students. More generally, you may find it useful to try talking to other students on the module about what you learned from a lecture you all attended. You will probably discover that everyone picked up slightly different things, and they may have responded quite differently to the arguments that were presented. This can prove a useful way to consolidate your learning from a lecture: talking to other people who also attended it, and reflecting on your own notes. Did your notes manage to capture the most significant arguments presented by the lecturer? Do the notes help to summarise the main themes and offer an overview of the topic, or did you get caught up in writing down all the details without giving any sense of why these are important? Did you note down the points you need to check, or other questions to think about later and explore in further reading?
| Learning from Lectures |
Listening to a lecture should not be a passive process. You should make notes during the lecture, or, as some people do, concentrate on listening during the lecture itself and then making notes on it immediately afterwards. In making notes you should do more than simply try to write down everything the lecturer said. Instead, by concentrating on listening to the lecture, you should think about what the lecturer is arguing, about the material being presented, how it relates to things you already know about, and what questions it raises.