Whatever the reasons for taking notes, whether fast, creative, or useful notes, there is always room for improvements. And spending some time learning and improving our note-taking may mean a big difference in the quality of notes or ideas.
5 Ways How To Improve Note-taking Skill And Quality With Exercises
- Understanding
- Comparisons
- Examples
- Reviews
- Structure
Good or excellent notes can be inspiring and may promote creativity and interest to be more progressively productive.
Understanding
Ask: Why this and not that? How did this happen? What next? What is the difference? How come?
The more you understand a point or topic in-depth and reflect upon its shortcomings and benefits, the better you may apply its concept and come out with new applications and usages.
Important note: It is imperative that hard work be invested in any endeavor for sustainable success, be it work or note-taking. In the case of note-taking, be sure to frequently contemplate to increase your understanding of the subject matter. This can be done while focusing in class or lectures, in your free time, or even when traveling on a bus or mart, except when engaging in activities that require your undivided attention or your relax time i.e. family or cat time.
Applications exercise:
1. Can you come out with applications of what you learned today? If what you learned is not applicable at all, perhaps it is time for reflection on the usefulness of your learning. Perhaps the benefit is long-term, then again when planning and aiming for years, contemplate how to ensure it will more likely than not favor in success given your personal disposition and temperament.
2. Take an orange for example, what uses and transformations can it take? Hint: Nutrition, recipes, and external application.
Note: How to use questions to take notes may be helpful for more information.
Comparisons
When doing comparisons and analogies, a table can provide viewing ease at a glance. This is also useful for quick reviews and short-term visual remembrance. Just a 3 columns table can compare between 2 entities as below.
| Product A | Product B | |
| Value | $$$ | $$ |
| Features | Good | Average |
| Support | Yes | Poor |
Comparisons help us to differentiate and understand from a reference of origin which provides a standard for measurements.
Comparison exercise:
In a table form, compare life between digital devices with social media and without.
Examples
Employ the power of examples for quick understanding. This is one of my favorite ways to save time and effort to get the essence of a point. And examples can come in many forms and lengths.
For instance, children learning about the beneficial uses of electricity can be given an example and quizzed for more. A good example can be light bulbs that provide lighting at night and dark places where visibility was not possible before.
Example exercise:
Give an example of the best quality in human nature.
Reviews
Add personal reviews based on your own understanding for each significant point to illustration and highlight the importance.
Reviews are similar to comparisons as information or comments are made based on existing knowledge or past experience. Reviews may be more human-readable and submitted to teachers or experts for correction, feedback, and evaluation. Forming a habit to write reviews can be a useful skill to develop but do take note not to hurt and harm others unnecessarily or intentionally.
Reviews exercise:
Give a review of your favorite movie or song.
Structure
Give your notes structure by implementing headings and bullets lists whenever suitable and necessary. And minimize superfluous or excessive words and distractive elements such as colors and decorations unless that helps your understanding directly or indirectly. A well-structured note can bring our attention to focus on what matters most quickly without the clutter. This is akin to a good site with minimal but focused elements for effectiveness. In other words, keep neat notes.
Note: Modern note apps may be innovative with how we can keep a good and creative note structure. Take for example Gingkoapp, it has a left-to-right structured expansion style to take dynamic and modern notes. Another example is the cross-platform note app Google Keep, where recent notes will appear at the top first, and note-takers can pin (color, label, or search) important or any notes for easy access and continuation. Take your pick as long as it enhances your productivity and understanding.
Structure exercise:
Create an organized document with short sentences examples starting with H1 and moving down to H5 or H6 headings, and include bullets lists, bolds, and quotes. A table content with links to headings may also be added. Optional: Add a citation.
An example to follow is the post you are reading now.
Bonus: Picture notes
Depending on the purpose, subject matter, and whether our understanding can be enhanced or not, it may be suitable to sketch, draw, or color notes. Pictures notes can be worth a thousand words. And done right they are certainly and immensely satisfyingly gratifying. The most captivating and beautiful notes can be those that are sketched skillfully or water colored with subtleties. Like writing flair, the creative aspect for hand-drawn picture notes is also boundless.
Here is an example of a simplistic perspective architectural building drawing for illustration purposes:
Painting miniature landscape with oil pastel.
— 9GAG (@9GAG) November 30, 2021
✍🏻 桃氣一零 pic.twitter.com/WhGKRKYR87
You may be interested in Breakthrough With 10+ Creative Note-taking Ideas as well.
Purpose and uses of your notes
1. Sharing with others
2. Monetize with it or its applications
If your purpose is to share your notes with others, Google docs links are listed on a shared document or website and Google slides may be created for presentation with ease. However, in terms of presentation quality, Keynote is the best recommendation. You may view here how to create a YouTube video with Keynote here. A Keynote presentation can also be uploaded or created in iCloud for sharing with non-Apple users.
Monetization is dependent on factors such as the applications of your notes, and how much is the demand or website traffic. Be creative and consistent with regular research, innovations, and implementations for potential success. Like any sustainable business, this is likely to require planning and hard work.
Popular apps for convenient cross-platform note-taking
- Google Keep
- Evernote
- OneNote
- Notion
Some thoughts
Right understanding is the imperative goal in any study and research. Examples, reviews, comparisons should help us to better understand a subject matter.
Structured notes are just a form to help us better organize and focus on the points.
Be kind and honest. Stay safe.
More Information
Which are the most popular free notes apps in the world and US (4 compared)?
The worldwide results from Google Trends for 5 free well-known note-taking apps with:
1. OneNote at the highest @ 32
2. Notion @ 18
3. Google Keep @ 11
4. Evernote @ 9
In the US from the world map, the highest shows Evernote @ 34, followed by OneNote @ 33.
Note:
1. Apple Notes is free only for Apple users, thus not included in the list ranking.
2. All these reputable or well-known note apps are cross-platforms except for Apple notes.
