Note-Taking Methods: Eight Systems, a Method Finder and Free Templates

There’s no single best method. The right one depends on the class, how fast it moves, and what you’ll do with the notes later.

Answer five quick questions and the finder suggests two methods to try, with the reasons. It runs in your browser and saves nothing. You can also skip it and read about all eight below.

Many college learning centers teach five classic methods: Cornell, outline, charting, mapping and sentence. Three newer ones (boxing, flow notes and sketchnotes) round out the list.

A page split into three parts: a wide column for notes during class, a narrow column for cue words and questions added afterward, and a strip at the bottom for a summary.

Walter Pauk developed the system at Cornell University and described it in How to Study in College.¹ Its strength is what happens after class: cover the notes column, answer the questions in the cue column from memory, and you’ve turned your notes into a self-quiz.

1. During class, write main ideas and examples in the notes column. Phrases, not sentences.
2. Soon after, pull key words and questions into the cue column.
3. Cover the notes column and answer each cue out loud. Check, and fix what you missed.
4. Write two or three sentences in the summary strip, from memory.

Our Study Skills Library covers Cornell notes in more depth, with a lecture listening checklist.

Main points at the left margin. Supporting details indented under them. Examples indented further still. The indentation does the organizing.

1. Start each new main topic at the margin. Use the instructor’s headings or slide titles when there are some.
2. Indent one step for each detail that supports it.
3. Indent again for examples, dates, formulas and the like.
4. Leave space between main topics, so you can add things you missed.
5. After class, turn each main topic into a question and quiz yourself on the details underneath it.

Numbers and letters (I, A, 1, a) are optional. Bullets and dashes work. On a laptop, the Tab key does the indenting for you.

A table. The things you’re comparing go across the top; the features you’re comparing them on go down the side. Facts land in the cells.

A history class comparing four revolutions might have columns for each revolution and rows for causes, leaders, dates and outcomes. A pharmacology class might compare drugs on use, dose and side effects.

1. Set up the columns before class if you know the topics from the syllabus or reading.
2. Add rows as the categories become clear. It’s fine to add a row halfway through.
3. Fill cells with short phrases. Leave a cell empty rather than guessing; it shows you what to look up.
4. Read across a row afterward to spot patterns: which items share a feature, which one is the odd one out.

The main topic goes in the middle of the page. Related ideas branch out from it, and their details branch out from them. The page becomes a picture of how ideas connect.

There are two main kinds, and the difference matters:

• Mind maps radiate from one central idea, with single words or short phrases on each branch. Tony Buzan popularized them in his 1974 book Use Your Head.³
• Concept maps can have several starting points, and each connecting line carries a linking phrase that says how two ideas relate (“causes,” “is part of,” “is opposed by”). Joseph Novak’s research group at Cornell developed them in the 1970s.⁴

1. Turn the page sideways and write the topic in the center.
2. Add a branch for each main idea as it comes up.
3. Hang details off the branch they belong to.
4. Draw cross-links between branches when two ideas connect, and label the link.

Every new fact or idea gets its own numbered line. That’s the whole method, and it’s why it works when a lecture is fast.

1. Number each new point and write it as a short sentence or phrase.
2. Skip a line when the topic changes.
3. Mark key points in the margin with a star as you go.
4. Within a day, regroup the lines: add headings, or rewrite the page as an outline or a chart.

Notes on one topic go inside one box. When the topic changes, start a new box. The page ends up as a set of separate, labeled chunks.

1. Take notes as usual, leaving room around each topic.
2. When a topic ends, draw a box around its notes and give the box a short label.
3. To review, cover one box at a time and say what’s in it.

The method suits tablets, where you can draw, resize and move boxes. On paper, many people take linear notes in class and draw the boxes afterward.

Boxing is a newer method that spread through study blogs and social media. We know of no research that has tested it. Treat it as a way of organizing, not a proven technique.

Write ideas in your own words, anywhere on the page, and draw arrows to show how they connect. When something links back to an earlier point, draw an arrow back to it.

The aim is understanding in the moment rather than a complete record. It’s closer to thinking on paper than to transcribing.

1. Write each idea briefly, in your words, wherever there’s room near related ideas.
2. Connect with arrows and a word or two on the arrow when the link isn’t obvious.
3. Note your own questions and reactions alongside. They’re part of the notes.
4. After class, add any facts you’ll need for a test in a separate list, because flow notes skip a lot of detail.

We know of no study that tests flow notes as a named method. They do push you to paraphrase instead of copying, which is the common thread in the research on paper and laptop notes.

Words plus simple drawings: boxes, arrows, stick figures, icons, a big title. Designer Mike Rohde made the approach widely known with The Sketchnote Handbook, and he’s clear that it’s about ideas, not art.⁶

1. Start with a title banner: the topic, the speaker, the date.
2. Write key ideas in short phrases and put a box or circle around the important ones.
3. Draw quick icons for things that recur: a lightbulb for an insight, a question mark for a question.
4. Use arrows to show sequence and cause.
5. Keep drawings fast. Sketch lightly during the talk; add detail and color afterward.

Nobody can write down everything a fast speaker says, and trying to is the most common reason notes fall apart. Write less, but write the right things.

• Listen for signals. “The key point is,” “there are four reasons,” anything repeated or put on a slide.
• Drop small words. “Photosynthesis → glucose + O₂” says as much as the full sentence.
• Leave a gap and a question mark when you miss something, then keep going. Fill it from the slides, the reading or a classmate the same day.
• Use a consistent set of abbreviations. A few common ones:

Taking notes helps a little. Using them afterward helps a lot more.

A meta-analysis of studies that compared taking notes with just listening found only a small boost on later tests from taking notes alone.⁷ A follow-up meta-analysis by the same researcher found that reviewing notes added to the benefit, and that interventions such as giving students the instructor’s notes helped further.⁸

How you review matters too. Students who tested themselves on material remembered more of it days later than students who restudied it, even though restudying felt more effective at the time.⁹ A major review of study techniques rated self-testing as high utility and rereading as low.¹⁰

A 10-minute review, the same day

1. Fill the gaps marked with question marks, from slides, the reading or a classmate.
2. Write questions next to the main points: in a Cornell cue column, as box labels, or as row headings in a chart.
3. Cover your notes and answer the questions out loud. Check, and fix what you missed.
4. Write a two-sentence summary at the bottom, from memory.

Then come back to the questions a few days later, and again before the test. Our Study Skills Library explains why spacing reviews out works better than cramming.

The research leans slightly toward handwriting, but the reason is more useful than the verdict.

A widely shared 2014 study found that students who took notes by hand did better on conceptual questions than laptop users, apparently because laptop users tended to copy lectures word for word.¹¹ A 2019 replication by another team didn’t find a clear advantage either way.¹²

A 2024 meta-analysis pooled 24 studies of college students. Typing produced more notes. Handwriting was linked to modestly higher achievement when students took and then reviewed their notes.¹³

Guided notes are a handout of the lecture’s outline with blanks where the key facts, terms and examples go. Students fill them in during class.

A review of eight studies, five with school-age students and three with college students, found that guided notes made students’ notes more accurate and improved their quiz scores, with the clearest evidence for school-age students.¹⁴ They’re a common accommodation, and they help everyone else in the room too.

Making a guided notes handout

1. Start from your slides or lecture outline.
2. Remove the key terms, numbers and examples, leaving a line for each. Keep the headings and structure.
3. Don’t blank out too much. Students should be able to keep up while still listening.
4. Leave one open box per section for students’ own questions or examples.
5. Post the completed version afterward, or go over the answers at the end of class.