More ideas from other books and just basic suggestions:
TRANSCRIBE YOUR NOTES.
Several years ago we made an attempt to study
one of the early English methods of stenography
without the aid of a teacher. We progressed finely,
could take rapid notes, and every Sunday endeav-
ored to report our minister's sermon. We "fol-
lowed" him some way behind, but we got it down
somehow. After church, however, came the ordeal
to transcribe it. Only a word here and there could
be read and the rest was unintelligible. There was
nothing to do but to begin the study of shorthand
again, and with another system, for being young
and foolish, we conceived the idea that it was the
system that was at fault. The next time we had
a teacher who insisted upon our reading every short-
hand character we wrote, and then all difficulties
of reading vanished. Take warning by our ex-
perience.
If you wish to be successful with shorthand, read
f 11 your notes, or better still, transcribe them on the
typewriter. You will learn more by transcribing
shorthand than by writing- it. Once the shorthand
outlines are photographed upon the brain, as they
are in transcribing, they will be instantly recalled
whenever the word is heard. You will then write
them without hesitation, and when you can write
shorthand without hesitation you will have the
longed-for speed.
Do not think this time spent in properly learning
the principles of shorthand and typewriting is
wasted. It is nothing of the kind it is time saved.
Just realize for one moment what your position will
be when you take your first step into the business
world. Your employer will dictate to you a number
of letters, perhaps four, and maybe forty. You take
them down as best you can. Occasionally an un-
familiar word will disturb, or perhaps completely dis-
concert you. You make a supreme effort at an out-
line, and struggle along, wishing you had your
teacher at your elbow to refer to. At length he
finishes and curtly says, "The machine is in the
corner; the paper's in the drawer; just get those
letters out for me by the time I return."
Then you are left alone to work out your own
salvation as a stenographer. This is the crucial
test, where you will prove whether you have studied
properly. You go to the machine and set about
your work. Your employer returns in due course
and asks for his letters. Suppose you haven't been
able to read your notes. The letters will never catch
that night's mail and your employer will probably
look for another stenographer who is competent to
take his dictation. And would he not be justified
in discharging you? Inability to transcribe their
notes is the great failing of the majority of stenog-
raphers. Don't be one of that class. Transcribe
every line of shorthand you write during your study
of shorthand, and you will not go through such an
experience as that outlined above.
"Practical pointers for shorthand students"
archive.org/stream/practicalpointer00ruthiala/practicalpointer00ruthiala_djvu.txt 
