Smarter Notes: 9 Steps to Highly Effective Study Notes
Does taking notes feel like herding cats?
It did to me.
I was THAT guy. You know the one. The guy frantically trying to write down every single little thing the professor said. I was absolutely
terrified of missing even the smallest thing.
What if it was on the test?
What if I needed it for a paper?
What if there was a pop quiz?
What if I was studying and couldn't remember something?
I was
that guy. And to me, every class period felt like a desperate attempt to write down everything I was hearing instead of anything even remotely close to learning.
I literally felt like I was a court reporter trying frantically to organize all the facts as they were being thrown at me 100mph. And it was very, very stressful (not to mention a great way to get early onset carpal tunnel syndrome).
It wasn€t until much later that I realized something:
I wasn€t taking notes. I was transcribing my classes.And let me tell you€¦ when you€re preparing for a test, having a great, organized set of notes is much, much more useful than having dozens of pages of transcribed lectures€"by an order of magnitude.
So, I set out to do what I did with every area of my study habits around that time:
develop a great system.And honestly, it wasn€t that easy. I knew how to write papers pretty well. And I could read okay. But taking notes was a totally different beast. There are just so many skills involved: listening, organizing mental information, memory, speed-writing, asking good question, and quite a few more.
So it took me a while. In the end, though, I landed on a set of techniques that helped me take ultra-efficient notes and drastically increase my grades.
Later, when I was actually TEACHING college classes, I passed these same techniques along to my students (which, by the way, was when I really figured out that taking notes was a major pain point for a lot of people).
So, I figured it€d be a good subject for a book, which is what you€re looking at now.
Here€s what you€ll learn€¦
- All about the Great Note-Taking Myth and why it€s a load of crap
- How to leverage the 5 most popular note-taking systems
- How to deploy memory hacks to your advantage
- How to tailor your notes to your specific learning style
- How to properly execute pre-note preparation strategies
- How to actually put that pen to paper and knock out some great notes
- How to review your notes and what exactly to look for when you do
- How to use your notes to ace exams
- How to use your notes to write killer papers
- And more!
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