5 ways to take notes digitally and still retain information
This post is all about digital note taking.
One of the biggest struggles of being a student is keeping up with the insane amount of information being thrown at you all the time. Technology can be a great tool, but at the same time, sometimes digital note taking makes it harder to retain information.
Plus, taking notes digitally is a skillset you have to learn!
As someone who loves digital note taking, I’ve got a few strategies in my back pocket that I learned through my years of high school, university, and now use in my professional life (which really goes to show you how important the skill of note taking actually is).
Let’s talk about some digital note taking strategies so that you can find methods of taking notes that work for you.
This post is all about digital note taking.
DIGITAL NOTE TAKING TIPS:
1. Standard Typed Notes
Obviously, one of the easiest ways to take notes digitally is to just type them out in bullet points. This probably doesn’t even need to be mentioned, but I figured it was worth bringing up anyways because there are so many different platforms you can use to type notes digitally and chances are, you haven’t tried all of them.
You can use a simple Google doc, pages, or a Word doc. Or, my personal favorite… OneNote.
I love OneNote because it allows you to organize all your notes from the semester in one digital notebook, so you don’t have either a thousand different documents to open, nor do you have one super long document.
Here’s an example…. As a student, I created a new Notebook in OneNote for each different class. Then, I was able to categorize my notes sequentially by class and date (the column on the left), and include different tabs for different topics and sections (the column on the right).
In my opinion, OneNote is the most convenient method of digital notetaking if you like typing!
2. Annotated PDF or Slides
Once you download it as a PDF, you can use a PDF editing software like Adobe to add your own notes to it. This comes in really handy if you need to be looking at lots of diagrams, charts, or images.
3. Notion
Using Notion as a student is so helpful because you can not only take notes, but also keep track of your deadlines, schedule, and basically your whole life on Notion.
It’s a bit of a learning curve, but if you buy a Notion template like this, it’s really easy to learn.
I created a Notion template that’s specifically designed for students and young professionals, so if that’s you, grab it here and you can use it as your primary platform to keep your notes, to-do list, schedule, and more all in one place!
4. Digital mind mapping
If you’re more of a visual person, mind mapping is a great way to capture notes, especially if you need to brainstorm or organize your ideas.
You can use platforms like Miro to mind map digitally and even collaborate with others as you do!
Which of these digital note taking strategies will you be using?
This post was all about digital note taking.
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