Note-taking: pick a method for one class
A few questions about one upcoming class. What comes out is a method, a page setup, and a plan you can copy.
The short version
- Which method works depends on the material and the lecturer, not on what sort of person you are. Answer for one real class and you get Cornell, mapping, or outlining, with the exact page setup.
- Every recommendation comes with the same ten-minutes-after step, because that is the part that does the work, retrieval on material that is still warm.
- This returns nothing about you. It matches a method to the class you describe and hands the plan back to copy.
Almost nobody chooses a note-taking method. You arrive with whatever you were doing at sixteen and keep it for years, because there is never an obvious moment to stop and decide. So decide now, for one class. It takes a few minutes and it changes every session of that class afterwards.
Before you begin
Pick one specific class, the lecture or seminar you most want to stop improvising in. Answer for that one. Nothing you type is saved.
Questions
Question 1 of 5
Your method for this class
Copy the plan somewhere it will survive
Select the text below and copy it into whatever you already use. This page keeps nothing.
One thing worth doing this week
Use this method for every session of this class this week, and nothing else. One method used consistently beats three methods used carefully. If nothing improves after a few weeks, look at the input before the method, notes cannot rescue a lecture delivered at a pace nobody could follow, and that is a thing to raise rather than to write faster around.
Worth knowing. The retrieval step in Cornell and in the ten minutes afterwards rests on solid ground: Roediger and Karpicke, Psychological Science 17(3), 2006, found testing yourself on material beat restudying it, and Dunlosky and colleagues, Psychological Science in the Public Interest 14(1), 2013, rated practice testing high utility and highlighting and rereading low. Evidence note. The comparison between the three note-taking layouts themselves is not settled, no strong body of research ranks Cornell against mapping against outlining, and the recommendation here is a craft judgement about matching structure to material. You may also have heard that handwriting notes beats typing them. That comparison is less settled than it is usually presented, and nothing here depends on it.
Nothing here is saved or sent anywhere. What you type exists only while this page is open.
Written for Thought Club as general guidance, not medical advice. Free to read, print, and share.