R I R I . S T U D I E S

[riristudies]

Another change I’ve made in the past years is that I’ve transitioned everything I do (creative work and studying) to digital… So today I want to share with you MY TOP 10 PROS OF DIGITAL NOTE TAKING ✏✏✏ 

1) Way less chaos: all of those handouts, study notes and printed lecture slides are GONE (well not completely 😂 but they are filed digitally, so they are not flying around IRL 🙌) 2) No more paper & printing needed —> ecologically friendly; at least if you’re not planning to buy a new tablet / notebook each year 🤪 3) The notes can be restructured / rearranged in more helpful ways without having to rewrite everything  (this might be my favourite reason, since it makes studying SO much more effective)👌 4) It’s so easy to insert high quality graphics and pictures – since I am a VERY visual person / visual learner, this helps me SO MUCH!! 5) Also the notes can be more beautiful; depending on your time, effort and talent tho 😅 —> more fun revising, yay! 6) You won’t lose your notes anymore – if that has ever happened to you, too 🙈 7) Note sharing gets so much easier and who doesn’t like that person in class that has really organised lecture notes 😇 8) You can file away all of your notes with minimum space requirements and that way access all of the knowledge even years later. And even if I decide to print some of my notes to help me study for really tough exams, I can throw away the physical copies of my notes and am still left with a digital one 🙌 9) Digital notes are searchable, which is just an amazing feature 10) Carrying an iPad / light laptop is generally lighter than carrying a few different books, notepads and various pens and markers.

So yeah, I just wish I went digital earlier in my life 😂 Would have made a lot of things easier. How about you, are you more a digital or an analogue person? And is there something that you like better about analogue note taking?

[riristudies]

»Focus hurts. If focus isn't hurting, you probably aren't focused enough« – Jony Ive

[riristudies]

Even though my last post has been quite a while ago, I didn't forget that I wanted to update you on my study notes & learning system, and since I just took my first master’s exam (you guessed it, statistics duuh!) I feel like I can now report on the whole cycle: From taking notes and organising lecture documents to studying for the final exam: I created a really awesome system that serves its purpose in helping me to study more effectively.

What I do first of all, right after I enrolled for the courses I want to take that semester: I design / draw covers for each lecture in Procreate. This might not be the most important step (and also I can imagine that under time pressure this was the first thing I’d stop doing), but as long as I have time to do it, it is something that I look forward to, that gets me in the mood of a new semester and makes me excited to look at my notebooks 🤩. I usually do this in Procreate and afterwards import the files into GoodNotes as covers of the new notebooks (one notebook for each course).

To benefit optimally during the lectures, I then import the lecture slides (if available at the time) into GoodNotes. I REALLY love that GoodNotes syncs between devices and that there’s a desktop (macOS) version. Makes copy-pasting documents so much easier and faster! When I’m done, I can then just jot down my notes next to the slides, which later helps a lot with understanding the topic.

When studying for the final exam I almost always rewrite me notes, this helps me so much with making sense of everything and joining the dots, as well as with memorising the facts. I really try to work in all the information I have (eg from my own notes, lecture slides, books,…) and combine them with documents like graphics or pictures for easier comprehension. And even though in the end I am left with an encompassing script, it doesn’t take a lot of space (wheter physically nor digitally) so I can conveniently file it away to review the notes at a later date. And how magical that with GoodNotes you can search your own handwriting; this makes finding keywords so much easier!!

I am quite a haptical person, so for exams that are especially hard like oral exams, where I really need to know my stuff, I like to print my notes after I’m done writing / summarising them. I then bind them with the ARC dicbounding system (which is an AMAZING system that I will tell you in another post!!), and use that final textbook-like script for studying. Gladly I didn’t have too many exams so far, where I really had to learn something by heart, but when I have to do that, I really like flash cards to accelerate that process. I konw there are good revision-apps as well, but I’m no pro (yet) when it comes to those. Feel free to recommend me your favourites tho :) 

So thats basically it! I’d really like to know wheter it’s just me, or if you guys benefit from rewriting everything in the end as well. Please tellll meeeee. And apart from that I hope this might help someone who is still trying to figure out a studying system that works for them ☺️😊 Save for later via IG (@riri.studies) or share with somebody who might benefit 💛