If you're taking classes with me, you already know - or will soon learn - that I am not keen on releasing PowerPoint slides. Although I may release some slides after the lectures, I prefer using a guided notes package. This is not an arbitrary preference, and I will use this blog post to explain what makes guided notes a better system.
Before we ask what these notes are, we need to ask what we want notes to do. It is a more interesting question than you might imagine, and one where we have a lot of good, recent research to think on. Most of the design behind these guided notes come from Make it Stick: The Science of Successful Learning by Peter C. Brown, Henry L. Roediger III, and Mark A. McDaniel.
I won’t get into the most effective format for taking notes - I go into that, with relevant resources, in another post . We need to get more fundamental - how does learning really happen, and where do notes fit in?
Traditionally, most educators and education specialists have viewed notes as a useful end unto themselves. It is a reasonable way of going about studying. By compiling good information from multiple sources, then reviewing that information, surely, we can imprint that information into our minds.
Information > Notes > Brain > Test
Educators like this way of looking at note-taking, I reckon, because it is a pretty simple way to design lectures. Most lecturers release their powerpoint slides in advance, and benevolently-minded instructors might even decide to release their lecture notes. This kind of approach to note taking appeals to students because by taking good notes, they can assert some control over new material.
Here’s the problem - this is about the least effective way you can engage with the material. This method is ineffective because it treats brains like electronic storage devices, where the goal is to optimize encoding, storage, and retrieval. Our brains, however, are not built like electronic storage devices, with clearly-marked compartments of information. Our brains work relationally. The best way to understand this idea is to imagine explaining something new to a young child - like, say, describing a raccoon. A five year old does not understand Linnaean taxonomy or the metric system, so it’s pretty pointless to describe a raccoon as a “mammal of the Procyon genius weighing on average six kilograms; largely, tree-dwelling, known for their distinctive face colouring and dousing behaviour.” I wouldn’t try that with an adult I wanted to be on good terms with either.
A much more sensible way to describe a raccoon would be to ask your pupil to tell them about the animals they knew from their neighbourhood. Let’s say they tell you about squirrels, which they see in their backyard, their family dog, and their neighbour’s cat. You could then describe a raccoon in relation to these animals - climbs and lives in trees like a squirrel, a hunter like a cat, about twice the weight of the neighbour's cat but smaller than the family dog. You might even tap into the learner’s personal experience - “you know how your parents insist that you wash your hands before a meal? Well raccoons wash their food with their front paws….”
This applies equally to adults. If you, as a Canadian, had to explain to an American how the Canadian political system worked, you probably would not come out of the gate with “Canada is a federal constitutional monarchy with a Westminster-style bicameral legislature with an appointed upper house, elected lower house, and an executive elected from, and responsible to, parliament.” No, you’d probably start with similarities - like the rep-by-pop election of the House of Representatives or the independent levels and responsibilities of state and federal governments, and work your way towards differences, like the difference between a directly-elected executive and Westminster-style responsible government, and so on.
Okay, this makes sense. But if you know that simply reciting large blocks of information to others is a bad idea, then why on Earth would you want to use that method on yourself? Probably because it feels simpler in the moment. Studying by note-copying is simple and low-intensity. Making good notes, reformatting them, and compelling information is, for me anyways, genuinely pleasurable, and so it seems intuitive. Better still, you get something to show for it at the end of everything. Here is where we run into another problem - feeling good during an activity is not a great indicator that you are growing from it. Think of it like physical training. All but a select few people don’t enjoy windsprints or deep squats precisely because your body is giving you strong physiological and psychological feedback that you’re straining your system and wasting energy - the lactic acid burning, the fatigue coming on, and so forth. But this kind of short-term discomfort produces results, which brings long-term satisfaction.
The same goes for studying and note-taking. Skimming over lots of information repeatedly won’t really achieve much, but straining to recall information you already know and then combine it with what you’re hearing is very hard work - but it is effective. For notes to be useful in this process, then, we need to understand them not as products in themselves but as useful tools for the hard work of recall, assimilation, and synthesis. So let’s have a look at how these notes are formatted and how they can help you. At a glance, the process will look a bit like this, where the red line represent information from previous classes and the blue lines represent new information:
Part 1 - Preparation
The work begins before the lecture begins - ideally, at least a day before, so you have a chance to let the information settle. The top section will include some prompts from previous lectures as well as some points to think on when going through your readings.
Try and fill in the section on the bottom without reference to previous notes.
Note: the blue dot section is copied from printablepaper.net . The notes are a .docx format, so you can type in your thoughts or use whatever kind of paper formatting you’d like.
Once you have your general ideas, then you should go back and fill in from previous notes.
Resist the urge to Google everything. Working with the knowledge you have, instead of immediately gratifying the discomfort of not remembering something, is the key to learning.
As you go through your guided notes, you will notice some sections where you will be, well, guided, on to specific points in the readings. I encourage you to read, then write instead of just straight copying. Aim to keep your pre-class notes short and to the point - aim for finding a few key data points to hang your understanding on.
During the Class
Sitting through a lecture should be an active, not a passive activity - even if you don’t like asking questions out loud. If it is permitted to bring a computer to class and you choose to do so, it is vital you resist the urge to look things up or type too much. During class, you really should be looking at your prompts, your key pieces of information, and then relating the lecture material to that.
Remember - the more time you spend recording the less time you’re spending doing actual learning.
Pro tip: Print your notes single-sided and write on the back. Also consider using one colour of pen for pre-class notes and a second for post-class notes.
After the Class
If you’re very keen, a quick look through your notes a day or two after the lecture will help you cement what you’ve learned deeper into your memory - especially if your notes aren’t big blocks of text. One thing I did for my comprehensives was to make videos as part of my studying routine, with only my notes to reference. Even if you keep the videos just for yourself, these can be very helpful when you’re studying for a test that involves information you may not have worked through in awhile. By changing the format in which you’re expressing the information, you’re also encoding it further.
If you’re not as keen, keep your notes for your next round of class preparation. Before starting on a week’s lecture, go back through last week's notes and think of areas where the two could be connected.
At the end of all this, your notes will probably look a lot messier than you might like. But they will have been part of a useful, active process of learning. Instead of mere mechanical repetition, you’ll have experienced different layers of summarisation (in yellow) and synthesis (in green). This approach will be a lot harder in the moment. In the long run, however, it will be a lot easier. Remember - notes are not an end in themselves, but should be a by-product of the learning process. Information that has really been learned - as opposed to data that has been memorised - will be of more use to you on the exam - and much more importantly - in understanding the world around you.
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