Taking Notes

note taking: Typing vs. Writing

It’s time for the note-taking showdown everyone has been waiting for. Today, we reveal the winner of the ultimate note-taking battle… pencil-and-paper vs the computer. This has been the hottest question on note-taking for the past few years, and we have an answer for you!

So, which is better?

The Research

Two professors (one from Princeton and one from UCLA) conducted a study by running three experiments. They had students take notes in a classroom setting. The study looked at students taking notes on a variety of things: bats, bread, algorithms, faith, and economics. After, the students were tested on:

Memory of factual detail
Conceptual understanding of the material
Ability to synthesize and generalize information

The study revealed that students who wrote their notes on paper learned more than those who typed their notes¹. Students who wrote their notes by hand were aware they wouldn’t catch every word. It forced them to focus on listening and digesting, then summarize in their own written words. The process made the brain work more efficiently; it also fosters comprehension and retention of the material.

The research shows that students who took notes on their laptop did take more notes. But, they retained much less. This is because students who use a laptop simply type a record of the lecture. They don’t use their brain to process what is being taught. Therefore, students are merely transcribing, not processing.

Effective, Yet Modern Approaches

There are two solutions for successful note-taking. I have personally put them both to the test.

Solution #1: Take notes the classic way, pencil in hand.

Whenever you can, write your notes by hand. Put your brain to the test. Listen, comprehend, and summarize in your notes. Besides the increased opportunity for higher retention, you won’t have the distractions that come with a computer.

Research shows that college students taking notes on a computer only spend 60% of class taking notes. They spend 40% of class time using the internet or other programs unrelated to the class. Plus, electronic devices introduce the opportunity for social media to interrupt your focus.

Unfortunately, I can personally attest to this statistic. I spent lots of time in class on Pinterest. Or working on other homework. Basically I did anything I could find to do besides taking notes during the lecture. (Sorry, Mom!)

That being said, I am not unreasonable. Being fresh out of college, I know how important it is to use laptops and other technology in school. No one can deny the speed at which you can take notes, compared to writing by hand.

At some point, you will encounter a class in which you truly can’t keep up with how fast the teacher is teaching. If you try hand-written notes and end up feeling completely overwhelmed or with short phrases that don’t make sense, pull out your laptop and try…

Solution #2: Type, then write!

When hand-written note-taking is overwhelming, you can then take notes on your computer. But, in order to successfully retain the information, you will need to follow three guidelines:

Turn off all distractions. Don’t connect to the Wi-Fi. Don’t do other homework. If you don’t have faith in self-control, there are even apps/programs that you can set up to block all distractions.
After class, transfer your notes from the computer to paper. Yes, rewrite them. It doesn’t take as long as you would think and it gives you the opportunity to cut useless things out from your notes. It also helps retention, counts as studying, and is also the perfect set-up for the SOAR^® “Take-Ten” strategy.
Take Ten!* “Taking Ten” is SOAR^®‘s study method that consists of: taking TWO minutes each day to clean out your book bag and organize papers, and EIGHT minutes to review all notes and handouts from the day. This review helps the brain process information much faster, dramatically reduces study time for tests, helps you work through the homework faster, and will ensure that assignments get turned in!
Turn your notes into test questions. The most effective and time-efficient way to learn your notes is to turn them into potential test questions. (Creating questions is far more engaging and effective than memorizing!)

Different Ways to Take Notes:

The Outline

This is for people who like simplicity. It’s one of the easiest ways to take notes, and comes pretty naturally to most people. When taking your outline notes, start by choosing four or five key points that will be covered in your lecture. Beneath those points write some more in-depth sub-points about each topic as the professor covers them. If you’re taking outline notes by hand, be sure to leave enough space on each page so that you have plenty of room for all your sub-points. Or, you can take them on a computer and simply rearrange as you go in your text document. This is a great, simple approach to take notes. It’ll help you follow along and pay attention during class, but it can be overwhelming to review these notes later. To aid in reviewing these kind of notes, try to read each main point and summarize it yourself without looking too much at your notes. Use your notes to test yourself on how much you actually know rather than simply rereading them over and over.

The Cornell Method

The Cornell Method is a pretty good way of dividing up your notes if you’re looking to get the most out of your review time. In this method, you divide your paper into three sections: notes, cues, and summary. Your notes section is for the notes you take during class. You can structure them however you like, but most people like to use the outline method. Write your cues section either during or directly after class. This section can be filled out with main points, people, or potential test questions. Use this section to give yourself cues to help you remember larger ideas. You can write your summary section directly after class, or later when you’re reviewing your notes. Use this section to summarize the entire lecture. Keep your cue and summary sections as simple as possible. However, feel free to fill up the notes section with doodles, diagrams, page references, and whatever else you need to properly represent the material presented in class.

The Mind Map

The mind map is a great way of taking notes for specific types of subjects. Class subjects like chemestry, history, and philosophy that have interlocking topics or complex, abstract ideas are perfect for this method.. Use the mind map to get a handle on how certain topics relate, or to go in depth with one particular idea. For instance, if you’re attending a lecture about the Fall of the Roman Empire, start with that concept in the center and then draw “nodes” of all the things that led to Rome’s fall as your professor lists them. Things like debt, irresponsible emperors, attacks from the surrounding barbarian tribes, and so on. Later, to review, go more in depth and add smaller sub-concepts onto each branch. Things like dates, formulas, supporting facts, and related concepts make for great branches. In the end, it might look something like this:

Flow Notes

This note-taking method is great for students looking to maximize their active learning within the classroom and minimize their review time later. The point of flow notes is to treat yourself like the student you are, and not a lecture-transcribing machine. Jot down topics, draw arrows, make little doodles and diagrams and graphs. Go crazy. Engage with the material. Try to actively learn as you’re writing. Perhaps you’re in history class and your professor is talking about the Battle of Hastings, and you remember that it happened in 1066 and that there were other things happening across the globe in the year 1066, too. Write those facts down and draw connections.
The sky’s the limit on this one. It’s great for people who hate rules.
Caution: while this method is great for learning in the moment, it can be difficult to review flow notes later. If you’re an auditory and visual learner and retain a lot of what you learn from your lectures, maybe that works fine for you. If not, try pairing your flow notes with the Cornell Method to make them easier to review for tests.

Writing on Slides

Let’s be honest, this is note-taking for lazy people…and there’s nothing wrong with that! It’s super effective, and it’s easy. If your professor is kind enough to provide you with the slides that they’re using in their lectures, go ahead and download the files and print them out at the computer lab. The slides give you a leg up on the outlining process. The professor already did the work for you! All you have to do is take notes and expand on key concepts already presented in the slides. It works great, too, because later you can look at the slide and more or less remember what the professor was talking about when they reached that slide. It’s like having a step-by-step walkthrough of the lecture, and you hardly had to do a thing to get it!

Bullet Journaling

This is my personal favorite. It’s the note-taking style I use most often, both in and out of the classroom. If you’re super into aesthetics, like to doodle, or are a particularly visual learner, this method might be best for you. When you write in your bullet journal, you turn a blank page into a beautiful representation of your thought process. Try using it to combine different aspects of other note-taking styles. You can have one page that’s dedicated to mind maps, another that’s dedicated to your flow notes, and even sneak in a class schedule or a doodle of Sonic the Hedgehog in somewhere. It’s your bullet journal. I don’t know, do what you want! It’s your journal! This method does have drawbacks. It can be difficult to take notes quickly. The goal of bullet journaling is to keep your journal organized and attractive, which can be hard when you’re scribbling down information as fast as you can. One way to combat this is to take notes during class in an outline or using some other method, and then organize them later in your bullet journal as a form of review. Need ideas for what your journal should look like? Just go on Pinterest or google ‘BuJo ideas’, or, specifically, ‘BuJo ideas for students’, and knock yourself out. There’s tons of stuff out there!

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