Six months ago I reverted to carrying and using a notebook. Prior to that I’d been using OneNote on my phone, with some success. The main reasons I began using a notebook again are: 1) when thinking about a particular problem I like to attempt describe its features in words, with a graph, and with math, where possible; 2) I find that I think slightly more clearly when I have to use a pen, and tend to be able to recall it better—not sure why this is.
I use a notebook that is about one third wider, slighter longer, and around three times thicker than my phone. It’s pocket-able in most scenarios. The note books I use have a hard cover, an elastic band attached (which I use to keep a bullet space pen attached horizontally along the top of the book for a perfect fit) and is 250 lined pages.
I begin using it from the front for general notes, and record quotes or specific segments of text from the back. Collecting quotes together makes them much easier to find when the pad begins to fill up. I also underline each use of the general notes so that topics are clearly demarcated, making each easier to find later on.
Another related habbit I’ve gotten into over this period is using a single document notepad in the form of a Google Docs file. I have headings for books and book chapters, journal articles, blog posts, other articles, quotes, theory snippets/examples. If I have had cause to read a journal article, for example, I’ll take a few minutes to write up a summary and the full reference for later use, even if I had no intention at the time to use it later. This has been a tough habit to form, but has proven to be very beneficial over the few months that I’ve been doing it. Of course, if a blog post or newspaper article was semi interesting, but useful only as a consumption good, I’ll usually not record it.
Between these two forms of general not taking I’ve found that most of my needs are covered. I lost the ability to attach photos when switching back to a pen, but I haven’t missed it much. I still take the pictures, it just adds and extra step to collate them, but it is something I rarely do. Before putting a full notepad to rest on the bookcase, I’ll go through it and add relevant entries to my general notes Google doc (I’ve usually already done this) or add them in expanded form to specific topic documents.
A drawback is the potential to lose the notebook at any given time, and this is where digital connected versions are vastly superior. When I can draw and write by hand on a widely used phone as easily as I can with a notebook, I’ll switch. My solution to the words, graphs and maths note taking on the phone was to record the words by typing them into OneNote, then finding a pen and paper, drawing and writing the pictures and symbols, then taking pictures and adding them to the note. This was fine when a pen and paper were readily available, but they often weren’t.
Six months ago I reverted to carrying and using a notebook. Prior to that I’d been using OneNote on my phone, with some success. The main reasons I began using a notebook again are: 1) when thinking about a particular problem I like to attempt describe its features in words, with a graph, and with math, where possible; 2) I find that I think slightly more clearly when I have to use a pen, and tend to be able to recall it better—not sure why this is.
I use a notebook that is about one third wider, slighter longer, and around three times thicker than my phone. It’s pocket-able in most scenarios. The note books I use have a hard cover, an elastic band attached (which I use to keep a bullet space pen attached horizontally along the top of the book for a perfect fit) and is 250 lined pages.
I begin using it from the front for general notes, and record quotes or specific segments of text from the back. Collecting quotes together makes them much easier to find when the pad begins to fill up. I also underline each use of the general notes so that topics are clearly demarcated, making each easier to find later on.
Another related habbit I’ve gotten into over this period is using a single document notepad in the form of a Google Docs file. I have headings for books and book chapters, journal articles, blog posts, other articles, quotes, theory snippets/examples. If I have had cause to read a journal article, for example, I’ll take a few minutes to write up a summary and the full reference for later use, even if I had no intention at the time to use it later. This has been a tough habit to form, but has proven to be very beneficial over the few months that I’ve been doing it. Of course, if a blog post or newspaper article was semi interesting, but useful only as a consumption good, I’ll usually not record it.
Between these two forms of general not taking I’ve found that most of my needs are covered. I lost the ability to attach photos when switching back to a pen, but I haven’t missed it much. I still take the pictures, it just adds and extra step to collate them, but it is something I rarely do. Before putting a full notepad to rest on the bookcase, I’ll go through it and add relevant entries to my general notes Google doc (I’ve usually already done this) or add them in expanded form to specific topic documents.
A drawback is the potential to lose the notebook at any given time, and this is where digital connected versions are vastly superior. When I can draw and write by hand on a widely used phone as easily as I can with a notebook, I’ll switch. My solution to the words, graphs and maths note taking on the phone was to record the words by typing them into OneNote, then finding a pen and paper, drawing and writing the pictures and symbols, then taking pictures and adding them to the note. This was fine when a pen and paper were readily available, but they often weren’t.