<p>The topic says it all, what do people generally do, and what do you think is easier?</p>
<p>i like taking notes by hand bc that way i actually remember them more easily when it comes around time to study for prelims/finals. plus - if your class/subject somehow involves diagrams, graphs, charts, equations, etc, it’s very hard to do so/draw them on a computer.</p>
<p>in larger classes, you’ll find more people taking notes on laptops than usual (~30%-40%)?</p>
<p>laptops are fairly useless for science classes, too often you have to draw diagrams and such. scratch them for math as well, unless you want to take the pains of using the new Windows “Math Input Panel”. so I only see them coming in handy for history or english, and maybe bio where there are long lectures of factual information.</p>
<p>I like to take notes by hand, then re-type them later. It really helps with remembering and learning everything</p>
<p>There are always tablet laptops.</p>
<p>or you could use a LIVESCRIBE PULSE SMARTPEN
the kind we’re going to win 200 of in a couple days, apparently.</p>
<p>im definitely going to hand-write notes. unless someone has a good note-taking template for Word or something, using a computer will be less convenient for me than just writing whatever</p>
<p>The new versions of Office have something called Office One-Note too. It is so good and allows your notes to be layed out exactly how you want. You can make tabs for different days, click the mouse wherever you want on the page and type. super simple.</p>
<p>I’d say in a typical lecture, you’d see about 4 people writing by hand for every 1 person using a laptop.</p>
<p>But I’m in Arts and Sciences, and I’d imagine more people use laptops in Engineering…</p>
<p>Less people use laptops in engineering.</p>
<p>Probably 25 people writing by hand to 1 using laptops.</p>
<p>For those that take notes by hand, do most people use ballpoint pens, rollerball pens or pencils?</p>
<p>What is most comfortable for you is the better question.</p>
<p>Actually, most of those who take notes by hand make their own wet clay tablets before class. They use a wedge shaped reed to write their notes in Cuneiform. After all the classes for the day, we all lay them out to bake in the Arts Quad.</p>
<p>pretty popular in ILR. I’d say about 1/3 people use laptops in ILR classes.</p>
<p>@chendrix: AHAHAHAHA, wow…</p>
<p>I don’t take notes. I have a very good memory and it cuts down on studying time.</p>
<p>Yeah, I tried the not taking notes strategy through all of high school…needless to say, I think I need a change now :(.</p>
<p>Not taking notes really forces you to concentrate on what is being said and written. Too many people fall into the habit of mindlessly scribbling down everything that being said or written without paying attention to the actual knowledge itself. Not taking notes is “do or die”; if you do not remember or understand you are in jeopardy. This strategy is not for everyone but you will find that your powers of concentration get better (mind exercise) if you do it for a while. It also helps if you are well rested and are eating well (lots of omega 3’s) - these two factors alone rule “no notes” out for most students. I also try to do all the recommended readings and accompanying textbook material ahead of time to put the lecture material in context and perspective. Everyone should try it at least once; start with an easy course that you are interested in. If you are successful you will be amazed at how much more you are learning and how much time you save studying.</p>
<p>^ I’ve been doing that since high school for math, science, and language classes (history and english were mostly discussion rather than lectures for me)</p>
<p>Really depends on your classes. I used to be entirely handwritten, but I’m starting to make the transition to using a laptop for certain classes. If it’s a math or science class, handwritten is the way to go (unless you really like tablet computers). For classes without special notation, then laptops are probably easier. </p>
<p>I’ll lay out my current “plan” for next semester for you since I’m guessing the perspective from someone who uses both a laptop and handwritten notes is the most useful:</p>
<p>German - Bring a notebook since small classes lend themselves less to laptops and language classes are interactive so it’s much easier to have paper…plus in German there aren’t usually set notes you need to write. I find in past semesters my notes are just random thoughts during lecture of words/grammar I didn’t know.</p>
<p>2 Government classes - I will be using my laptop for these courses. I can type faster than I write and it’s easy to type as the professor is writing. Some students I know turn on their laptop’s record function during lecture, but that’s just too much for me. It depends on the TA/sections format whether or not I will use the laptops there. I’ve had discussion sections where half the class brought laptops and others where everyone just took notes. It really depends on how much discussion there is versus lecturing by the TA.</p>
<p>2 Econ courses - Handwritten notes since econ has graphs, special symbols, etc. Also, the amount of raw information in an econ course is not so overwhelming that you are constantly writing the entire lecture (generally speaking from my experience so far).</p>