Can You Get Your Computer to Read to You
Heading off to college is kind of like leveling upwards in a video game. In high school, the tests and courses were smaller bosses that you could have down with depression-level equipment. Now that you're in college, you're going to need to upgrade some of those items you're taking with you if you desire to succeed. This is a whole new adventure, my dude.
I of the tools you have at your disposal is your notes. Peradventure in loftier school you lot were pretty proficient at taking notes, and now yous just need to upgrade them a footling bit. Maybe yous're feeling like I did in college, and you lot've realized yous've never properly learned how to take notes.
Never fear! Your guide to taking crawly, constructive notes is finally here. Your days of looking back at what yous scribbled downward in class and trying to decipher useful data from them before a examination are over.
In this guide, we'll talk near how to fix yourself to take proficient notes in class, introduce some pop techniques for taking notes, and cover the best ways to get the most out of your notes afterwards form.
Prepare Well Before You Get to Grade
"The most important unmarried cistron influencing learning is what the learner already knows" – David Ausubel
Before you even remember nigh heading to class, make certain that you've read (or at least skimmed) all pre-assigned reading from your professor. Even if yous don't have assigned reading, try and familiarize yourself with the topic earlier you go to grade so you know what to expect.
A 2004 study by Spies and Wilkin establish that the law students who were responsible for reading a legal case before they got to form displayed a greater understanding of the learning materials than students who were not expected to prepare before class.
Also, don't forget to pack all the things you need to learn finer. Brand sure you have multiple pencils (or some backup pb), a notebook, pens, highlighters, sticky notes, your textbook, and your laptop.
Don't forget water! Information technology's tempting to bring java or some other class of caffeine to class. Endeavor to stick to h2o and consume caffeine intelligently. While coffee doesn't dehydrate you lot, and coffee in moderation certainly helps you focus and stay alert, caffeine dependency interferes with your quality of sleep and impairs mental part, ultimately impacting your ability to pay attending during class.
Lastly, grab a snack before y'all head out the door for class. Avert high-salt or loftier-sugar options, and aim for a "consummate snack" that includes fatty, protein, and carbs.
Apples and peanut butter, crackers and cheese, or fifty-fifty sure power confined are adept options. These snacks volition leave yous feeling full for longer, ensuring that y'all won't be distracted by how much you want a burrito in the eye of your professor'southward lecture virtually the structure of a cell.
The Annotation-Taking Mindset
The other matter y'all should go in order before coming to class is your brain. I know that when I'm in a good mood and have a positive mental attitude, I'yard mode more likely to acquire.
I hate math. I suck at math. I'thou like, the worst math student ever. I failed my high-school algebra courses three times. That'south how bad at math I am!
When I got to college, my college-level algebra course was the one matter holding me back from actually finishing my associate's degree. I decided that I was going to pass the class.
So, I showed upwardly every day with a (more or less) positive attitude, fabricated an effort to make friends with a classmate I could study with, and paid attending to the lecture, working out issues myself equally we went along.
In the terminate, I may non have gotten an A in the class, but I did get a B…which was the highest math score I had gotten since elementary schoolhouse.
Moral of the story? Attitude is everything.
Quick tip: If you notice during class that your professor has mentioned the same fact twice or more, or has repeated a fact that was talked about in the previous lecture, brand a note to yourself. Circle it, underline it, something to tell your encephalon to pay attention. It's definitely going to be important later. Go on an eye out for repetition.
The half-dozen All-time Annotation-Taking Systems
Now that y'all're ready to take notes, let's talk about some pop note-taking techniques. Anybody has a slightly different way that they learn, and certain subjects lend themselves to different styles.
Don't be afraid to experiment with different techniques to observe one that'south correct for you!
Structured: The Outline
This is for people who like simplicity. Information technology's one of the easiest ways to have notes, and it comes pretty naturally to well-nigh people.
When taking your outline notes, start by choosing four or five key points that volition be covered in your lecture. Beneath those points write some more than in-depth sub-points about each topic as the professor covers them.
If you're taking outline notes by hand, be certain to get out enough space on each page so that yous have plenty of room for all your sub-points. Or, you can have them on a computer and merely rearrange them as you get in your text document.
This is a peachy, simple approach to taking notes. It'll help you follow along and pay attention during class, merely information technology can be overwhelming to review these notes later on.
To aid in reviewing these kinds of notes, try to read each main point and summarize it yourself without looking too much at your notes. Utilise your notes to exam yourself on how much you really know rather than simply rereading them over and over.
For Review: The Cornell Method
The Cornell Method is a pretty skilful style of dividing up your notes if you're looking to go the most out of your review fourth dimension.
In this method, you divide your newspaper into three sections: notes, cues, and summary.
Your notes section is for the notes you take during class. You can structure them however yous similar, merely 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 principal points, people, or potential test questions. Use this section to give yourself cues to help you remember larger ideas.
Yous tin write your summary section directly after class, or afterward when you're reviewing your notes. Utilize this section to summarize the entire lecture.
Keep your cue and summary sections equally simple as possible. Withal, feel gratis to fill upward the notes department with doodles, diagrams, page references, and any else you need to properly represent the material presented in class.
In-Depth: The Mind Map
The heed map is a smashing way of taking notes for specific types of subjects. Class subjects like chemical science, history, and philosophy that have interlocking topics or circuitous, abstract ideas are perfect for this method. Utilize 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 attention a lecture most the Autumn of the Roman Empire, start with that concept in the centre and and so describe "nodes" of all the things that led to Rome'south fall every bit your professor lists them. Things similar debt, irresponsible emperors, attacks from the surrounding barbarian tribes, and then on.
Later, to review, become more than in-depth and add smaller sub-concepts onto each branch. Things like dates, formulas, supporting facts, and related concepts make for swell branches. In the end, it might await something like this:
Holistic: Menstruation Notes
This note-taking method is great for students looking to maximize their active learning inside the classroom and minimize their review time after. The indicate of flow notes is to care for yourself like the student you are, and not a lecture-transcribing machine.
Jot down topics, draw arrows, make little doodles and diagrams and graphs. Become crazy. Engage with the fabric. Endeavor to actively learn as you're writing.
Mayhap you're in history class and your professor is talking almost the Boxing of Hastings, and y'all 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 i. It'southward great for people who hate rules.
Caution: while this method is corking for learning in the moment, it can exist difficult to review catamenia notes after. If you're an auditory and visual learner and retain a lot of what you larn from your lectures, maybe that works fine for y'all. If non, effort pairing your menstruum notes with the Cornell Method to make them easier to review for tests.
Easy: Writing on Slides
Let'southward be honest, this is note-taking for lazy people…and there'southward nothing wrong with that!
It's super effective, and it'southward 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 calculator lab. The slides give you a leg upwardly on the outlining process. The professor already did the work for you! All y'all have to exercise is take notes and aggrandize on fundamental concepts already presented in the slides.
It works great, also, because later on yous can wait 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-stride walkthrough of the lecture, and yous hardly had to do a thing to get it!
Visual: Bullet Journaling
This is my personal favorite. It'south the annotation-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 lot.
When you write in your bullet periodical, you turn a blank folio into a beautiful representation of your idea process. Attempt using it to combine different aspects of other note-taking styles.
Y'all can take one folio that'south dedicated to mind maps, another that'south dedicated to your flow notes, and even sneak in a class schedule or a doodle of Sonic the Hedgehog in somewhere. It'southward your bullet periodical. I don't know, do what you desire! It's your journal!
This method does have drawbacks. Information technology tin can be difficult to accept notes chop-chop. The goal of bullet journaling is to keep your periodical organized and attractive, which can be difficult when yous're scribbling downwards data as fast as you can.
1 manner to gainsay this is to take notes during class in an outline or using another method, then organize them later in your bullet periodical as a form of review.
Need ideas for what your journal should await similar? Simply get on Pinterest or google 'BuJo ideas', or, specifically, 'BuJo ideas for students', and knock yourself out. There's tons of stuff out there!
Should Y'all Employ Your Reckoner to Take Notes?
And then, should you lot utilise your laptop to take notes, or write them longhand? Students, scientists, and teachers take been debating this always since laptops were allowed into classrooms. The short answer? No.
The longer answer is a bit more complicated.
In a written report published in 2014, students who took notes on a laptop were more than likely to but copy down what their professor said verbatim.
This really impaired their learning because their brains were processing the information shallowly, instead of taking larger concepts and condensing them into annotation-form. These students performed poorly on conceptual tests compared to others who took notes longhand.
Not merely that, just another report published in 2010 showed that about students who take their laptops to class are only working on class-related textile about 58% of the time.
The other 42% is taken up by going online, working on different assignments, or playing Infinite Invaders. These students were more probable to fall off chore and were less satisfied with their education when asked nearly it.
The studies agree: using laptops to take notes in form might not be the best selection.
How You Use Your Estimator Matters!
Of form, it all depends on how you use your calculator. If you're a self-disciplined person, y'all might benefit from having your laptop to take verbatim notes yous tin study extensively later.
One history class I took in higher was actually better considering nosotros had access to our laptops, and could quickly check facts for our professor. They were put to skilful use during discussion times, since students could exercise a tiny fleck of googling before they contributed their thoughts.
In short: information technology'due south upwardly to you lot what tool you use to accept notes. You're responsible for your education. But make sure that the tool you're using is a tool, and non a distraction. If you discover yourself nipping out of your note-taking document to play Sims iii or curlicue through your Facebook feed, perchance switch to taking longhand notes.
Looking for a great app to accept and organize your notes? We recommend Notion:
Notion - All-in-1 Workspace
Notion is ane of the most flexible and powerful apps I've ever used. It tin can exist a annotation-taking app, but there'south as well a database feature with multiple views (including Trello-style kanban boards and calendars) the ability to make anything into a template, and smashing collaboration features. At CIG, we use information technology for all of our team documentation, and I as well manage every YouTube video I brand with it.
We earn a commission if you click this link and brand a purchase at no additional cost to you.
The Best of Both Worlds
Adopt writing by hand, but all the same want to exist able to access your notes on your calculator and are tired of buying notebooks just so y'all can throw them away after? At that place's a solution for that.
Rocketbooks are a super cool piece of new annotation-taking technology. The notebook is completely reusable. Simply have your notes, browse them using your telephone and the Rocketbook app, and so, depending on which notebook you lot have, wipe it clean with a damp cloth to re-use it nearly indefinitely.
If you're using the Rocketbook Wave, you can just throw information technology in the microwave and nuke it up to iii times. Voila! Yous've got a reusable notebook, and digital notes that you didn't take to take using a tablet and stylus or type out on your laptop.
Want to learn more virtually the Rocketbook? Bank check out our full review.
I'd never heard of these before researching this commodity, and allow me tell you, they audio like a bang-up choice for students looking to lighten their backpack load. They're good for the environment, and they'll save you some coin and space since you're non buying a new notebook every single term.
Demand help keeping your notes (and life) organized? Check out our guide to staying organized in college.
Get the Nearly Out of Your Notes
Phew! How are you doing? Good? That was a lot. Here'south one last thing:
At present that you've got your notes and class is over, how do y'all get the near out of them? At that place are three great ways to maximize your notes:
- Review, review, review. Make sure that yous review your notes within the first 24 hours after your lecture. This cements everything you heard and learned in your brain so information technology won't fall out of your head after.
- Review a small portion of your notes every solar day. Don't try to cram earlier your test. Reviewing over a long period time ensures that what you lot've learned will stick, and improve your remember.
- Equally you're doing assigned reading or research, accept your notes on paw and notice repetition. If your professor covered it in grade and information technology's in your assigned reading, in that location's a good chance information technology'll be on the exam.
Ultimately, we could talk about notes and note-taking techniques all day. Only the near important affair to understand is that annotation-taking is a skill. Everyone'south encephalon works a petty differently, and what might work for me won't necessarily work for you. Take notes often, experiment, and find out what y'all like.
You made it to the cease! Now, it's up to yous. Commit to the procedure, pay attention in form, and don't forget to review. You lot've got this, dude.
Want to have notes by hand without sacrificing the convenience of digital organization? Check out our guide to the best annotation-taking apps for iPad.
Image Credits: woman taking notes, girl walking, educatee writing, layout of hat and pens, typing, distracted on telephone, studying in library
Source: https://collegeinfogeek.com/how-to-take-notes-in-college/
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