#note taking method

One part that sucks about school is being torn between trying to get all the information you need down as fast as the instructor is going and trying to make it so it looks like an actual language and not some weird mix between Ancient Egyptian Hieroglyphs, English, and Cantonese. The best solution I’ve found for this has also helped improve my grades. In class you have a notebook for the lecture/take notes on your device (if you have one) and then have a notebook where you rewrite your notes so that they look nice and are legible after class. By doing this you are able to cement most of the information in your brain and you’re making it so you don’t have to try and decipher the jargon you wrote during lecture right before you take the test/quiz. 

Also before the lecture, try and read up on what your teacher/professor will be lecturing on. While you’re reading sticky note/highlight/take a note of the parts that look important or have questions on. Make a list of your questions and try to figure out the answers during your lecture or make sure you ask your teacher/professor about them. 

I know some people struggle with notes and some people don’t always talk about them or give examples. This method may not work for you but its something to try :). Not to mention that there are plenty of YouTube videos that are out there with different examples/ recommendations so if this method doesn’t work for you check out some of those or make a mish mash of a couple different methods to find one that works for you! 

Welcome to my note taking guide! Here I will share with you examples of how I used to take my notes and how I take them now/my senior year of college once I developed a style of note-taking that I like!

I receive questions about how I manage to take nice notes during lectures without re-writing them afterwards, so I hope my tips help you to improve your own! 

OLD NOTES

I used to write out the topic in ALL CAPS in a coloured fine liner that I chose for that topic. If I chose the colour pink, then the subtopics would also be written out in pink and important key points, definitions, examples would be highlighted in pink. If I had time, I would take notes before the lecture and then add additional information during the lectures with a pencil. Additional graphs, illustrations, etc. I would also draw out at home. This is a bullet point note taking method! If you would like to see photos of my old notes, click HERE for a photo post (example)! 

NEW NOTES

I still use the bullet point note taking method. However, I don’t use different colours for different topics anymore. For example, for my Cognitive Psychology lecture I used different fonts to letter the topic but the topic heading and subtopics were written in black and the notes were taken with a blue ball point pen. For my Emotion and Motivation lecture, I used the ‘Shorelines’ font HERE for topic headers. The topic headers and subtopics were written out in black, the notes were taken with a black ball point pen and accents, etc. were pink (to add an accent colour). This note taking method still works for me but using less colours saves me time and if I need to highlight something important, I can do it by using highlighters. 

If you would like to see examples of my notes, check out my Instagram. 

Materials I use: - THIS website for fonts - THESE Pentel ball point pens in black - THESE Zebra ball point pens in blue - THESE Kuretake Zig Art & Graphic Twin brush pens - THESE Bic pencils - THESE Kuretake Zig fine liners - THESE notebooks (similar to what I use)

I hope this post helps get an idea of how I take my notes! I also hope that the graphics included in the post help visualize my note taking method better! 

Note-taking method that just helped me understand Brane Cosmology Theory (and you may use for anything you find wildly complicated).

Ok, guys. 
Here it is: the first thing you need is good bibliography on your subject and theme of study. Refer to the alphabetical index and look for those pages that contain the topic you need. Mark those pages in the book with sticky flags or something. Then, pick a book. 
Read the book carefully, this method is for UNDERSTANDING the situation. 
Every time you encounter something of which you don’t know the meaning, place a post it on your notebook and write the word. Highlight if necessary. Look for the definition of the word, your book may have a glossary and that is the best source, because it will be the meaning used in text. A dictionary will sufice on the contrary. 
Read a paragraph and carefully write down the main idea. A diagram can help. 
IMPORTANT: do not move on to the next paragraph until you’ve understood the first one. (You may think you’ll get it later but it usually just gets fuzzier every paragraph) 
Every time you find a new important sub-topic, switch colors.
(This is so that you can clearly see which info relates, and once you’ve read every book on the subject, you’ll know what to write to complement your info, and what to leave out because it’s already there) 
As you can see, mine are organized like this:


Soft blue is for branes

Darker blue is for M-theory


Piggy pink is for explanations


Other undisclosed pink is for Randall-Sundrum model


Gray is for dark forces and WIMPS


Neon-ish pink is for Holography


Small pink stickies express relationship between one and another post it.