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A Learning Secret: Don't Take Notes with a Laptop (2014)

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Re: A Learning Secret: Don't Take Notes with a Laptop (2014)

#191

Post by seventhtiger »

WhompingWindows wrote: post #176
seventhtiger wrote: post #116

I tended to be in the top of the classes I was in and as far as I've seen my method was somewhat different. I also only take notes on paper, but more importantly, I throw all my notes out as soon as I finish writing them. For me studying is the act of writing the notes. The purpose of notes was never to read them later. That's why writing on paper is important to me. It's not about the qualities and convenience of th…

Throwing notes away, that's a nice luxury. I had professors who would lift questions word-for-word from their lecture, throwing away my notes would've been throwing away points.

I've been burned a few times by tidbits of information that were mentioned in the lecture once and no where else.

I still think digging through the notes is a waste of time. Mastery of the source material trumps all and has gotten me great grades.

Is it more common for the lecturer to mention something critical that's not in the textbook, or just pass over something more important in the textbook? I think the latter is more common.

Re: A Learning Secret: Don't Take Notes with a Laptop (2014)

#192

Post by _0w8t »

The article mentioned that one of the problems is too verbatim taking of notes on laptops. A friend who works as a translator mentioned that when she translated a conversation, she could not remember any details of what she translated afterwards. Yet after translating an article or technical documents, she learned a lot on the subject. The difference for her is that translating a conversation is mechanical verbatim process, translating an article requires conscious efforts.

Re: A Learning Secret: Don't Take Notes with a Laptop (2014)

#193

Post by Maskawanian »

veddox wrote: post #170
seanmcdirmid wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why can’t you just take a picture of the diagram? I actually never learned or benefited from note taking, so I’m pretty clueless. I still got through university and grad school with good grades, but I wonder if I was missing something. Professionally I draw a blank whenever someone at a meeting asks me to take notes, kind of embarrassing.

> Why can’t you just take a picture of the diagram? Because the learning effect is zero. (Also, not every professor allows it, and you don't always sit in a location from which you can take a decent picture. But that's beside the point.) The best teacher I ever had in school never got tired of reminding us that we learn in four different ways: hearing, writing, speaking, drawing. Taken individually, hearing is the wo…

I dislike the reductive reasoning here.

I personally learn the best from listening intently to what the lecturer is saying. That is why in college I would always sit at the front with an audio recorder, and then listen to that until I memorized most of the content.

Re: A Learning Secret: Don't Take Notes with a Laptop (2014)

#194

Post by Aromasin »

mud_dauber wrote: post #184
Aromasin wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I do something similar. My method is always to try and fit everything I need for an exam on a single A5 sheet of paper, as if I could take it into the exam with me. The first 5 or so drafts I'd never be able to fit enough on, so with each iteration I make the writing smaller, or work out a pictorial code, or condense my explanation of a method to squeeze on as much as I could. By the time I've finally managed to fit…

This was my study mode throughout HS & (somewhat) through college. It really does work, even though I had no idea why I started that way. And my final editions were just as indecipherable to the outside world.

I started when one of my teachers allowed us to take said A5 sheet of paper into my A-Level mock exams. All the class did well, as we had this lifeline. Next exam we were given the same instruction but this time, unbeknownst to us until we walked in, our paper was taken away from us at the door. We were absolutely furious; until the teacher later showed us that not only were our marks all but identical to that of the exam where we had the paper, they were significantly higher than the exams we had before the whole cheat sheet debacle. Basically he tricked us into revising effectively. It's a technique that's stayed with me to this day.

Re: A Learning Secret: Don't Take Notes with a Laptop (2014)

#195

Post by rc_hadoken »

seventhtiger wrote: post #116

I tended to be in the top of the classes I was in and as far as I've seen my method was somewhat different. I also only take notes on paper, but more importantly, I throw all my notes out as soon as I finish writing them. For me studying is the act of writing the notes. The purpose of notes was never to read them later. That's why writing on paper is important to me. It's not about the qualities and convenience of th…

Ditto. Liberal arts grad (Political Science) and work in InfoSec now. This is how I went through uni and taught myself classes I didn't attend. It has also workd in infosec and getting some entry level certs.

Re: A Learning Secret: Don't Take Notes with a Laptop (2014)

#196

Post by bytematic »

seventhtiger wrote: post #116

I tended to be in the top of the classes I was in and as far as I've seen my method was somewhat different. I also only take notes on paper, but more importantly, I throw all my notes out as soon as I finish writing them. For me studying is the act of writing the notes. The purpose of notes was never to read them later. That's why writing on paper is important to me. It's not about the qualities and convenience of th…

Exactly what I did. I tried to write notes in a way that was different than just copying as well, I tried to make them make sense to me.

Re: A Learning Secret: Don't Take Notes with a Laptop (2014)

#197

Post by scarecrowbob »

pbhjpbhj wrote: post #109
scarecrowbob wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most skills are things that you can get better at. I bought a nice fountain pen (well, a $14 pilot) and overhauled my cursive writing. It took about 6 weeks and I write pretty legibly in cursive. I'm more legible in various print scripts (that I have also worked on as an adult), but cursive is faster. Admittedly, that is just an anecdote. But if you're curious, try and get better... you'll likely improve if you activ…

> but cursive is faster Have you tested? I recall - maybe a decade ago - seeing a study suggesting that in fact printing individual letters could be faster; I still write in cursive when I need to handwrite though (basically never). Edit: http://nautil.us/issue/40/learning/cursive-handwriting-and-o... is a good summary; first 2 paras of last section are the TL;DR.

No, I haven't actually tested it. Maybe it just feels that way. But it does feel that way.

Re: A Learning Secret: Don't Take Notes with a Laptop (2014)

#198

Post by cultofmetatron »

seventhtiger wrote: post #116

I tended to be in the top of the classes I was in and as far as I've seen my method was somewhat different. I also only take notes on paper, but more importantly, I throw all my notes out as soon as I finish writing them. For me studying is the act of writing the notes. The purpose of notes was never to read them later. That's why writing on paper is important to me. It's not about the qualities and convenience of th…

wow, I'm not the only one!!

incidentally, it drove me nuts using so much paper that only gets used once. I recently got a rocketbook and its prolly saved a couple of trees by now. Its the paper experience and I can wipe it clean with a damp cloth.

Re: A Learning Secret: Don't Take Notes with a Laptop (2014)

#199

Post by flavor8 »

sprash wrote: post #38

For me the best way to take notes in lectures is/was a Boogie Board Sync which is sadly not available any more. It is the best of both worlds. You basically have a zero latency touchscreen that can save your notes to PDF. Even the best Tablets today have latency, most are designed more as touchscreen. Writing gets tiring and distracting really quick. I wonder why the Boogie Board Sync was discontinued.

Yeah I have one of those too. They recently added sync (through your phone) to dropbox/evernote, which makes it even more useful. It's a great device - zero distraction digital notetaking.

According to one of their support agents, their sales numbers were low. Personally I think their marketing sucked - they seemed to be targeting kids rather than students/business users. Their styling reflected this identity crisis too.

They have a product coming later in the year which will "address some of the same needs", TBD though how thoroughly it'll be a fill-in for it. In the meantime I bought a protective folio case for mine and am babying it.

Re: A Learning Secret: Don't Take Notes with a Laptop (2014)

#200

Post by JimBrimble35 »

cultofmetatron wrote: post #198
seventhtiger wrote: post #116

I tended to be in the top of the classes I was in and as far as I've seen my method was somewhat different. I also only take notes on paper, but more importantly, I throw all my notes out as soon as I finish writing them. For me studying is the act of writing the notes. The purpose of notes was never to read them later. That's why writing on paper is important to me. It's not about the qualities and convenience of th…

wow, I'm not the only one!! incidentally, it drove me nuts using so much paper that only gets used once. I recently got a rocketbook and its prolly saved a couple of trees by now. Its the paper experience and I can wipe it clean with a damp cloth.

rocketbook is an amazing tool.
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