What’s the Best Way to Organise Notes for University?

I’m looking for ways to organise my notes more effectively. Do you have any methods that help you stay on top of everything for lectures, revision, and assignments? Any apps or systems you’d recommend?

Reply 1

University of Kent

Official Rep

Original post

by maxwilliam85

Hi,
I hope you are well!😊
This is such a great question, and something I have thought about recently too!🙂
While sadly I don't have any cool apps to recommend, I use a bit more of a boring method when collating my notes, however, it might be useful!

I do Social Science, and have quite a lot of theory notes and information in my lectures. For my lectures, I either add extra notes to the powerpoint 'notes' section of the slide, or I use a word document and take extra notes on there. Not all of my modules have exams, so for some of my lectures, I just take notes, and then highlight the key points of the lecture if it is associated with one of my assignments.

More recently, I have been thinking about my exams, and how I'm going to prepare for these in the summer next year. So I have been giving myself an A4 sheet of paper, or A4 page on word, to summarise the key points from each lecture. Depending on the subject you take, you might have a lot of written notes, or diagrams etc, but having a one page resource for each lecture/topic that you can use for an exam might be a useful way to collect notes more effectively, and refer back to when the time comes to revise.

For my assignments, when collating my notes, I again use a word document. For each reading, I have the reference laid out correctly, and the notes I wish to use underneath. Once I have completed all of my readings, I use highlighters to colour code the information I want to use with my essay plan. So for example, any information, or a definition for example, for my introduction might be highlighted pink, and then information might be highlighted green which I will use for point one, and so on. I find this a nice way to structure my essays, and include wider readings.

I hope this helps! My note-taking is not very exciting, but is something I find useful, so I thought I'd share it, and hopefully start the conversation off for you😊

Best wishes,
Josie,
Uni of Kent Student Rep🎓️

(edited 11 months ago)

Reply 2

maxwilliam85

Original post

by University of Kent

Hi,
I hope you are well!😊
This is such a great question, and something I have thought about recently too!🙂
While sadly I don't have any cool apps to recommend, I use a bit more of a boring method when collating my notes, however, it might be useful!
I do Social Science, and have quite a lot of theory notes and information in my lectures. For my lectures, I either add extra notes to the powerpoint 'notes' section of the slide, or I use a word document and take extra notes on there. Not all of my modules have exams, so for some of my lectures, I just take notes, and then highlight the key points of the lecture if it is associated with one of my assignments.
More recently, I have been thinking about my exams, and how I'm going to prepare for these in the summer next year. So I have been giving myself an A4 sheet of paper, or A4 page on word, to summarise the key points from each lecture. Depending on the subject you take, you might have a lot of written notes, or diagrams etc, but having a one page resource for each lecture/topic that you can use for an exam might be a useful way to collect notes more effectively, and refer back to when the time comes to revise.
For my assignments, when collating my notes, I again use a word document. For each reading, I have the reference laid out correctly, and the notes I wish to use underneath. Once I have completed all of my readings, I use highlighters to colour code the information I want to use with my essay plan. So for example, any information, or a definition for example, for my introduction might be highlighted pink, and then information might be highlighted green which I will use for point one, and so on. I find this a nice way to structure my essays, and include wider readings.
I hope this helps! My note-taking is not very exciting, but is something I find useful, so I thought I'd share it, and hopefully start the conversation off for you😊
Best wishes,
Josie,
Uni of Kent Student Rep🎓️

Thanks

Reply 3

Anonymous #1

OneNote - you can access it on your laptop or phone or tablet, you can search, link to other sections within it, embed documents, add to do lists etc etc
If you copy content from a website it automatically add the source reference and most universities you get it free with microsoft365

Reply 4

BCU Student Rep

Official Rep

Original post

by maxwilliam85

Hi @maxwilliam85

After trying a few different methods during my first year, I now use OneNote. Before each lecture I will download the PowerPoint onto a OneNote page. I will then add notes of anything the lecturer says down the side of the page. I find this method really helpful because it allows me to focus on what the lecturer is saying and have all of my notes in one place for my assignment.
I use one notebook (on OneNote) for each module with sections for lecture notes, pre/post session work, reading and the assignment.

Sophie.
BCU Student Rep.

Reply 5

LancashireRep1

Official Rep

Original post

by maxwilliam85

Hey there,

Nice to meet you. My name is Siobhan and i'm a third year student at UCLAN. Here's some tips that I found useful for studying and assignments!!

•

Planning ahead: Look at the topics you will be doing in classes so that you're on board when you are with the lecturer and can ask any questions of things you didn't understand. It helped me so much as I was able to clearly see the areas I was struggling with and get help for it

•

Keep a diary: Have designated days to study certain topics or dedicate 30 mins after a lecture to recap what you have done and tie up some loose ends of things you were not too sure on that day. You can keep track of this on a physical diary or one on your phone which helps you see what times and days you have free. On top of this, you can also have a do to list so you can tick of those small achievements you've made!

•

One note: If you like taking notes digitally then one note is a great way to do this! You can separate your notes into different folders, copy and paste things into it from PowerPoints and add images so that all your notes are in one place. If you have an ipad/tablet then you can write on one note and they translate it into text once your done too. This has really helped me over the 3 years so I would deffo recommend it!

•

Cornell notes: In terms of note taking on paper, I have found that Cornell is a really goo way of doing this! You divide the page into 3 sections, one thin on the left, one big one on the right columns and one section at the bottom. Then you put all the detailed notes in the right column, fill the left with keywords after class and then do a brief summary at the bottom. There's great evidence for this being effective! I will put a link to this at the bottom if this interests you.

•

Highlighted mind maps: What really works for me in terms of revision is creating a mind map with separated topics and writing all the stuff I can remember well in green/highlight green. Then if I need a reminder it goes in orange and if after I do this, I go back and fill in all the gaps in red so I can clearly see what I am struggling with.

Hope this helps at all and please let me know if you have any more questions!

Siobhan (student ambassador at uclan)

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