6 Ways to Prepare for Effective Note Taking

By Christine Ascher on May 27, 2017

The key to doing well in school starts with taking good course notes. Many students regard note taking as the simple task of writing down everything that their professor says as quickly and completely as they can. While this is not necessarily a bad technique, doing a little preparation ahead of time will allow you to take more organized and focused notes. In addition to helping you understand material more in class, taking effective notes will make it much easier for you to go back and study.

Improve your note taking by using these tips to prepare for class.

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Bring different colored pens

One of the easiest ways to organize your notes is by using different colors when taking them. Bring a variety of colored pens to class so that you’re able to switch back and forth while you’re taking notes. Decide on a system for what each color will mean beforehand; for instance, use blue for vocabulary words, purple for definitions, and red for concepts that you don’t understand and need to revisit.

Be consistent with your system so that when you’re reviewing, you don’t need to think about what each color stands for — you’ll know instinctively.

Develop your own system of abbreviations

In addition to having your own system for color-coding your notes, it’s also helpful to develop your own system of symbols and abbreviations. You’ll save time in class by not having to write out entire words, and will be able to focus more on what your professor is actually saying. When using abbreviations, however, it’s important to make sure that you’re consistent; if you make them up as you go along, you might look back on your notes later and realize that you have no idea what they mean.

You can also use symbols as you take notes to highlight any ideas that you need to go over again or don’t understand — for instance, placing a question mark next to a concept that confused you will make it stand out when you go to review and hopefully will remind you to ask your professor about it if you still don’t understand.

Check what you’ll be discussing before you get to class

In order to take organized notes while in class, it’s a good idea to check on what you’re going to be learning that day ahead of time. That way, you can go ahead and organize your notes into different subsections before you get to class. You’ll save time during class on organization and be able to focus solely on the material that you’re learning. Not only will your notes be more organized, it will also help you focus more during class.

Do your reading ahead of time and focus on what you don’t understand

Prepare for class by doing your reading assignments ahead of time so you know what you can expect your professor to go over. This will allow you to go into class already knowing what concepts you do and do not understand, and will therefore help you to focus your notes. Rather than feeling the need to write down everything that your professor says, you can listen for the ideas that you were confused about or needed some clarification on during class and focus on that.

You’ll be able to take more detailed notes as you won’t be scrambling to write down everything regardless of whether or not it will be helpful in the future. Instead, you can focus only on what will be helpful to you personally.

Make a list of questions after your reading

If you have reading before class, make sure you do it ahead of time and make a list of questions concerning the concepts that you don’t understand. As you’re taking notes, listen for those specific topics and pay extra attention to what your professor says. Try to answer them yourself as you go through class and, if by the end of class they still haven’t been answered, you can pose them to your professor.

Organize your notes by date and keep notes from each class together

Though it seems very simple, one of the most important ways to prepare for effective note-taking is by having a good organizational system. If you keep all of your notes for all of your classes scattered throughout the same notebook, it’ll be much more difficult for you to review them when studying. Rather than spending time studying, you’ll be spending time rifling through your notebook trying to find the notes that are relevant to your exam.

To avoid this, keep a different notebook or section of a notebook for each of your classes, so that you can keep all of the notes for them together. Then, give a title and a date for your notes for each class. It’ll be much easier to find what you need if you have a title at the beginning of each section letting you know the topics covered on that day. Plus, you’ll easily be able to separate what you need to review from what you’ve already been tested on when you’re studying for a non-cumulative exam.

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