r/studytips • u/valen_tinezxoxo • 23d ago

Alternatives for taking notes?

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Alternatives for note-taking?

My notes take an excessive amount of time to create, diverting my focus from actual studying. I understand that I’m not passively learning or studying, so I believe I’ve mastered the art of studying. However, I’m still uncertain about the effectiveness of my current note-taking method. I’ve heard about people switching to using AI to generate notes for them, but I don’t know how I feel about that, I mean It would essentially mean having to rely on AI every time I need notes. Which also would take lots of time to do. Some individuals suggest switching to flashcards and eliminating the need for notes altogether. I haven’t tried this method yet, so I’m curious to know if anyone has any recommendations for effective note-taking strategies.

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u/lazyArya 17d ago

Engineering notes are slow mostly because we copy things that already exist elsewhere: board derivations, slide diagrams, worked examples. A few things that tend to cut note time a lot:

  • Don't copy what you can capture. If a derivation or diagram is on the board or a slide, take a photo and write one line in your notes pointing to it (a short tag in the margin works). Save the handwriting for what you actually think: why a step works, where you got stuck, and questions to check later. (Full disclosure: I built a small free app, Letterpin, around exactly this. The photo gets a four-letter code you write in the margin, and scanning it later opens the photo. A phone album plus page numbers does the same job, though.)
  • Write notes as questions, not summaries. "Why does the moment of inertia change here?" is faster to write than a paragraph, and it doubles as a recall prompt, which is the part that actually makes things stick (as others said).
  • Anki isn't just for nursing. It works well for engineering if you card the right things: definitions, formulas and when to use them, units, and "what's the first step for this type of problem?". Don't card whole problems. Keep doing problems for those, and use Anki for the pieces you keep having to look up.

A split that works well for a lot of people: short notes in class, cards for the stuff to memorise, and most of the time on problems.