As “Syllabus Week” comes to an end, we begin the overwhelming amount of lectures and readings. Studying can be difficult, and not knowing the best way to organize your notes can make the situation go from bad, to worse. But never fear, HCUWindsor is here with five different styles of note-taking to help you stay organized and make your notes #studyblr worthy.
The Cornell Method of note-taking is helpful for classes with a lot of new terminology and big themes that can be broken down. The Cornell Method is effective when trying to break down large concepts and terminology. Start by writing down big ideas and new terminology or phrases in the margins, and use the right side of the page to jot down definitions, examples, questions and connections. Later, when you’re studying for a test, you can cover the right side of the paper and answer as much as you can about the new terms in the margins!
Mind maps are useful for classes with a lot of ideas and concepts to connect. Mind maps are useful to connect ideas and concepts, cause and effect examination and sorting by category! This method is most helpful for visual learners. Use different colours to separate categories and ideas, and use arrows to connect ideas together!
Outlining is a method that you might recognize — many professors use this method when they post notes online. The title of the slide should be furthest to the left, with the definition and information indented slightly, and examples indented slightly more. This method is useful while taking notes quickly in class, as it doesn’t require a lot of prep and can be done quickly while following along with a lecture.
Use pictures (they don’t have to be pretty!) in your notes to help you remember key words and ideas. The pictures stick in your memory longer than just your notes (especially for visual learners), plus the act of drawing them out helps you remember the information better (especially for kinesthetic learners).
This is a Tumblr hack — use one sticky note for each paragraph in your textbook to sum up the information in your own words. Then, collect the sticky notes and arrange them in an order that makes sense to you. Once it’s in an order you like, you can copy the information into your notes using one of the above methods.
Let us know which methods work best for you, collegiettes!
Sources: http://www.sas.calpoly.edu/asc/ssl/notetakingsystems.html
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nP8JnuEnkK4http://gainesvillescene.com/2014/04/28/your-final-exams-jams/