notes.jpgNote taking is practically mandatory if you want to be successful in college and, unfortunately, most professors expect that students learned how to take notes in high school. However, in reality, very few freshman are effective note takers. The skill is simply not emphasized enough at the high school level. As a result, many college students use voice recorders to capture their instructor’s lectures, but depending on playback alone is a recipe for disaster. It’s too easy to let your mind wander when you listen to the playback, and one technological malfunction could erase the whole lecture.

Rather than passively listening, the act of physically taking notes helps to cement facts in your mind. Educational studies prove that students who see, hear and write their material are far more likely to retain the majority of important facts. Still for most students, knowing they need to take notes and actually having an efficient — and effective — system in place to do so are two very different things.

Knowing What to Write Down
Class notes are not for capturing a complete record of everything your professor says. You must cultivate the skill of thinking while you’re writing. This can’t be done if you’re in a mad dash to record every word your teacher utters. Notes do not need to contain everything, just the important things.

So, the question begs to be asked: How do I know what the important things are? Lifehack.org, in their article “Taking Notes that Work,” recommends you ask yourself two questions. What is new to me and what is relevant?  There’s no need to write information you already know. For example, your American history instructor may say that Columbus discovered the Americas in 1492. If you already knew that fact, don’t waste time writing it down. Focus only on facts you did not already know or were barely familiar with.

Second, decide what is relevant. During an hour-and-a-half lecture, your professor will say a lot. Some things will be relevant facts, some will be opinions and some will be observations or supporting details. If you have read your assignment before class, which you will do if you’re wise, then it will be easy to pick out the relevant facts as you hear them. Pay special attention to:

  • Dates of events
  • Names of people
  • Theories
  • Definitions
  • Main ideas and any critiques or debates about those ideas
  • Images, examples and exercises
  • Almost anything your professor writes on the board. (A good rule of thumb is if the professor takes time to write it down, so should you.)

Organizing Your Information
Organizing the relevant information from a lecture so that you can quickly access it later is the second half to successful note taking. Through trial and error, you may tweak a system to make it work best for you, but if you aren’t comfortable with note taking already, it’s best to stick to the basics.

Because most students have had to use simple outlining skills for research paper assignments in high school, this type of note taking tends to be easiest. And like all organizational systems, the easier it is, the more likely you are to use it. A traditional Roman numeral format works best for keeping information sorted in an hierarchical manner. For example, if you’re taking art history for a fine art credit, and your instructor is lecturing on the life of Picasso, you might begin your notes with Romany numeral I as The Early Years. Next you would switch to capital A for his birth. Under that, you would go to ordinal numbers for relevant details, as in the following example:
I. The Early Years of Picasso

A. Birth and Parents

1. Born Oct. 25, 1881

2. Born in Malaga, Spain

3. Son of an art and drawing teacher

B. Education

1. Brilliant student

2. Passed exam for Barcelona School of Fine Arts

a. Age 14

b. Took only one day to pass exam

c. Was allowed to skip first two classes

Although your professor will undoubtedly fill in with other details, interesting stories or legends, in this outline you have captured the most pertinent details of Picasso’s beginning. These are the things you’re most likely to see on an exam. No matter what you’re majoring in, you’ll be able to use this system in most of your classes. It keeps your material succinct, organized and accessible.

Work on developing a personal shorthand to make your notes even more efficient. For example, use common abbreviations: fed for federal, pres for president, etc. Another idea is to leave vowels out of words when possible: Ths wll hlp u bcz ur mnd wll read the mssng lettrs autmtclly.  Or use uncommon abbreviations, like thru for through, nite for night, u for you, ur for your, etc.

Finally, review your notes the same day you take them to make sure you understood all the concepts. If you have any questions, make note of them in the margin so you can ask your professor during the next class. Following these suggestions will make studying for those dreaded mid-terms and finals easier, and the pay off will be a higher GPA.

(Portions of this post are excerpted from Taking Charge: Your Education, Your Career, Your Life, by Karen Mitchell Smith (Texas State Technical College Publishing). For more information on this book, contact Mark Long at TSTC Waco. www.publishing.tstc.edu)