From note-taking tools to thinking framework: create a note-taking system that truly belongs to you

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This article is written by Wang Joan. Thank you for authorizing this site to reprint.

Let me talk a little about the Notes system. I think this is a mechanism that everyone must establish in work and life. It is also a mechanism that operates in the brain, not just the use of [Tools](https://www.notemaker.pro/search/label/Note-taking software).

First of all, you need to know that taking notes is not taking notes. There are many courses on how to take notes, but they have nothing to do with taking notes.

The note is written to [myself three years later](https://www.facebook.com/hashtag/%E4%B8%89%E5%B9%B4%E5%BE%8C%E7%9A%84%E8%87%AA%E5%B7%B1?__eep__=6&__cft__[0]=AZUjluwn2mj8A32A0p Vv0u7DnYb93v02y3eWxSw0NOrqMiBrBK2AYgLsX5U21UyeSZu0GdeLlSBKykdwF6RckSF6 uusIG2hWWEJKMA1c9iRfz0EXgnxuvpkI—WyNdFn_n4&tn=*NK-R) is not looking at yourself now or tomorrow.

Facing a pile of notes, if you can still understand and feel them three years later, that is the correct way to take notes.

The efficiency of my notes can be very fast or very slow. The specific difference lies in “Have I turned on the note-taking system mechanism?”

How the brain processes information

The so-called note-taking system mechanism is the way your brain processes and analyzes information. For example: when you see a report, how do you view and analyze it? If you don’t know what I’m talking about, ask yourself this:

1. Is this information true? Is there evidence to support/contradict your opinion?
2. Do others view this information the same way?
3. If 1 and 2 conflict, what is the problem?
4. Regarding the question raised in 3, are there any other possibilities?

This is a way of dialectical thinking, and to take good notes, the first thing you must develop is this ability of dialectical thinking.

In my handwritten notes, I will intersperse some blank spaces, even blank pages, as a dedicated area for [critical thinking](https://zh.wikipedia.org/zh-tw/critical thinking). Before the completion and continuous iteration of [Critical Thinking] (https://zh.wikipedia.org/zh-tw/critical thinking), the essence of this course is still the teacher’s, not my own. For the time being, I am just a fairly hard-working information porter.

Build a framework within the brain

Next, you need an executable framework in your brain. This framework is mainly used to help you categorize information.

This requires long-term practice before you can develop the ability to quickly classify information. Just like the desktop of your computer screen, how you allocate and organize folders is the mapping of the internal framework of your brain.

Let me tell you an interesting thing. Once I participated in a certain mind mapping course, and the result was projected onto the desktop on the screen. It was not a mess, but an amazing mess! There were almost no folders on it, and the desktop was full of scattered files. Of course, the speech was also shockingly bad.

The simplest brain framework can actually be classified by color. The most common and familiar colors for people are the seven rainbow colors of red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo and violet. If you add white, gray and black, you already have ten colors to work with, enough to classify and organize your brain framework.

Choose the tools you are comfortable with

By picking the right tools, I’m not talking about digital note-taking tools, a topic I won’t discuss in this article. If you are interested in note-taking software, you can see [here](https://www.notemaker.pro/search/label/note-taking software).

By tools, I mean systems that can match handwritten notes. You can also use the ten colors mentioned in the previous unit and memorize the purpose and meaning of each color. This will be of great help to you in the process of handwriting notes.

Black must be the main body of my text. My note titles and content text are almost all done in black.

Red is an eye-catching reminder, interspersed with black. This contrast is strong and beautiful. The combination of red and black really looks beautiful on paper.

Green is the AHA prompt, that is, when a piece of information or a sentence said by the lecturer makes you enlightened, that is the [AHA moment](https://zh.wikipedia.org/zh-tw/Eureka effect). This kind of content is written in green. In the future, when you want to quickly review the shock of class, you only need to look at green first.

Brown is the special color for jokes. Whenever I talk about jokes or jokes, I will write them in brown. Because jokes and jokes are time-sensitive, the notes are written for you to read three years later, and you may not be able to remember this kind of timeliness after three years! So give it an exclusive color. If you can’t remember it, at least you will know what it meant to search for it.

Blue is the color I use the least, mainly because blue easily competes with black. Furthermore, most blues are too violent and easily grab the visual focus, ignoring red or green, so I rarely use blue. I will use blue, so probably I picked up the wrong pen.

Purple is a special color for critical thinking. It is a purple that is not too purple and a light violet purple. This color is used to supplement your own thinking during after-school review. I like its light color, because in an environment with a bunch of black and red subjects, light purple can attract the eyes and make the note screen more beautiful.

Light pink is a special color for strengthening critical thinking. True pink is too spicy for the eyes, but light pink is just right. This color is used to supplement critical thinking. That is, when you review for the first time, use light purple to write your first-level supplementary thoughts and extended thoughts. The light pink color is used to write down more thoughts on the second level when reviewing the light purple content in a few days.

Light purple and light pink have a good visual continuity effect, which is equivalent to telling the brain: we are in the same group. It is a continuation of thoughts and a summary of the results of “slow thinking” in fast thinking and slow thinking.

Beauty is very important, not whether the font is beautiful or not, but the color matching. If the color matching is good, the same note will be read and thought about again and again.

Set the master-slave structure and title

That is, main title, subtitle and subtitle. Anyone who has used Microsoft Power Point will have this concept, and the same is true for notes. You need to clearly exist in your brain through the construction of main, secondary, and sub-headings, and be able to classify various information well.

Therefore, for most online courses, I will read them once at 1.5x to 2.0x speed, and concentrate on reading an entire chapter in a row, which may have seven or eight sections. At this time, I may capture some slide content that does not require handwriting. To capture images, I use shift+command+5 on Mac to capture images at a fixed position. I only need to press enter to continue capturing images, which is always fun.

I put all the screenshots in Word. The default paper size is A4, and the border is the width of the notebook minus two centimeters. This way, it will not get stuck or be too long when pasted.

Then, I open YouTube and watch dry movies, especially those that are funny, poignant, love, criminal investigation, or historical decryption. Anyway, it’s the kind of videos that have nothing to do with the course I just watched.

Why? Because I want to activate my brain’s “Metacognition”. Ten minutes ago, my brain was focused on the content of the online course. Suddenly, the spotlight was stolen by a YouTube video, which is what Teacher Wang talked about System 1.

At this time, “metacognition” was turned on. When I was immersed in the dopamine brought by the dry films, metacognition was working frantically to classify the course information. It did what it should do. Don’t disturb it! It takes about an hour, and if you are just starting out, it may take longer. Anyway, it only takes more than an hour to watch a time-travel drama at 2.0x speed, which is when the meta-cognitive work is completed.

Then you can watch the [online course] (https://hahow.in/cr/content-power) again. It is also a complete chapter, which contains seven or eight sections. At this time, you can use 1.5 to 1.2 times speed, and Word will adjust the size of the captured image simultaneously.

Metacognition will let you know which pictures can be deleted, which places need to be changed to handwritten notes, and even how to write, what color to use and what method to write.

Watch the captured image content repeatedly

Now let the metacognition concentrate on its work. Open YouTube and find a dry film about one hour long, and play it at 2.0 speed. This half hour is enough for you to print and crop the screenshots.

The only thing you have to do is to look at the content of the capture again every time you cut the frame, but your ears continue to listen to the love and love in the film.

What am I doing? In fact, it is to let your ears be occupied by YouTube, and then focus on the cut content with your hands, eyes and mind. At this time, your critical thinking will unconsciously start to be activated along with the process of the blade scratching, and the ideas that should be cut will also be cut.

You are not wasting time watching YouTube for entertainment, but putting yourself into another immersive experience mode, allowing yourself to think critically at least once in each class, and then develop this good habit.

Play the course at double speed

At this time, you can play the course at double speed. Similarly, this refers to reading an entire chapter, which means seven or eight sections. When you already have the cropped pictures, the framework derived from the first and second metacognition, and more than one critical thinking, you can start writing notes.

When writing notes, the first step is to follow the metacognitive framework. You can use color and font size to construct the framework and quickly write down what the teacher said. You need some space key pauses in the middle, because it still takes time to capture pictures with lipstick glue. During this time, the attention of your eyes and hands is occupied by the lipstick glue, and the brain accidentally activates metacognition.

The result is that before you post the picture, you have already thought about the notes you want to write down, but after posting the picture, you write down different content. The reason is simple. This is because metacognition helps you secretly think about it again.

Please note that you will be tempted to write critical thinking at this time, but don’t, don’t.

Because the critical thinking at this time is still very shallow and there is still a lot of room for expansion, please don’t write it! In this way, the brain knows that there is one thing that has not been done yet, and when you sleep, metacognition will help you finish these things.

Enter relaxing viewing mode

After doing the above things, let go, and you can really feel at ease to watch YouTube, watch mystery analysis, and watch “House” again. At this time, you need to get yourself into a truly relaxed state and give your metacognition a chance to quietly integrate.

The videos you watch on YouTube, or content on Netflix or Disney+, should have nothing to do with the course, the better! The reason is simple, because the more irrelevant it is, the stronger the stimulation to critical thinking will be, and the more jumping and creative the ideas inspired will be.

After getting up, you should be eager to write out all the critical thinking that is filling your head. This is a normal reaction.

But I still suggest you wait a moment and have a carbohydrate-rich breakfast first! A breakfast rich in carbohydrates will put you into a drowsy state. In addition to the ugly words, this time is actually very suitable for thinking and deep thinking. Take advantage of this time to write down your critical thinking with pens of different colors and add it to your original notes.

I will use light purple for the first day of reflection, and light peach for everything after the first day… This is my habit, you can also have your own favorite color. Of course, I may also think of some interesting things, and then I will write them in brown.

Get a better learning experience

Therefore, watching the same course chapter three times, at 2.0, 1.5 and 1.0 times speed, is indeed about twice as long as the time you originally watched it once, but you can get a better learning experience, your brain can regurgitate it many, many times, and you also learned some inexplicable knowledge points by watching YouTube.

In any case, it’s better than watching the course once and getting nothing from it!

At this time, you may also feel confused about some paragraphs in your mind. You can use a pencil to write down the seconds of the time stamp on the side. This will allow you to see the pencil writing and know that this part needs to be reviewed again. If once is not enough, do it twice.

Those places that make you feel foggy are actually your subconscious mind telling you that you can dig deeper here. Leave it a few days for it to dig slowly! All you have to do is mark the time, reheat it a few times, and let your brain figure it out.

Make good use of sticky notes

Post-it Notes, you absolutely need good Post-it Notes, and the only one I recommend is 3M! Other sticky notes are easy to fall off when you turn the page, which will make you cry to death!

Speaking of 3M sticky notes, I have a drawer of inventory in various sizes and colors, which is used to help me write down specific implementation plans.

The notes are used to write down the key points of the course for me three years later, and the sticky notes are for me to see how to implement them now. For example, when I think about how to apply the key points of this course at work, I will write it on a sticky note and stick it in the corresponding position. The folded back side of the sticky note can also record the results, which is equivalent to verifying the purpose of the field.

Tips for taking notes

• For photos with a dark background, I will draw a stripe on it with a strip and then write notes on it.
• For photos with a light background, I will directly use black or red and mark them.
• The correlation between pictures must be clearly marked with arrows. Everyone should know the meaning of single arrows and double arrows!

→ ↔︎ mutual derivation ⇒ It’s A and it’s B ⇌ Used to clarify the correlation between AB

• Application of symbols: You need to have your own symbol system, preferably one that everyone can understand, such as:

≠ is not equal to

≡ definition, absolute definition ∵ Because ∴ So ⊕ 异或（互斥或，exclusive OR），与一般的逻辑或不同，当两两数值相同时为否，而数值不同时为真

Postscript

Thanks to my Facebook friend Wang Joan for sharing her method of setting up a note-taking system with everyone. This article is indeed worth reading twice and taking action!

Note-taking is not only the recording of information, but also the process of in-depth thinking and classification of information. If you can establish an effective note-taking system, it will not only make you more efficient in the learning process, but also help you still feel the original inspiration when you look back many years later. Through methods such as color classification, dialectical thinking, and metacognition, we can make notes more organized and valuable.

Start re-examining your note-taking habits now and think about how to make notes not just records, but a source of wisdom that can continue to bring value in the future. Try using different colors to classify information and train yourself to think critically. Finally, you might as well try the method of metacognition and let your brain subconsciously help you organize and reflect on the knowledge you have learned.

When you see that your notes have become a wealth of wisdom that you still cherish three years later, you will feel the value and significance of all your efforts. Now, let’s take action and start optimizing our note-taking system!

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Further reading

• Use the card box note-taking method to create compound interest on knowledge
• Make good use of reflection memos and write excellent lecture notes
• Master three tips to take notes easily

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