Category: research

Book Review: How to Take Smart Notes

This review relates to the book ‘How to Take Smart Notes’ by Sonke Ahrens. It is available on Amazon here and you can also download the first chapter, free, here and learn more about the book.

Introduction

‘Imagine if we went through life learning only what we planned to learn or being explicitly taught. I doubt we would have even learned to speak. Each added a bit of information, filtered only by our interest, is a contribution to our future understanding, thinking and writing. And best ideas are usually the ones we haven’t anticipated anyway.

Ahrens

I can’t remember how I first fell across this book. No, actually I do. I was recommended Roam Research (I’ll come back to that in another post) on Twitter when I was asking for advice about note taking apps and then through trying to learn about Roam and how to best use it, I came across discussion of the Zettlekasten technique of note-taking. This book is an explanation of the Zettlekasten technique. That’s the name of the ‘one simple technique’ which is referred to on the front cover, that will ‘boost writing, learning and thinking – for students, academics and non-fiction writers’. And being of a curious mind, I bought the book.

Context

‘Studying does not prepare students for independent research, it is independent research’

‘Zettlekasten‘ is a note-taking technique devised by Niklaus Luhmann, a well -known sociologist in Germany who wrote vast numbers of papers. He used this method of note taking and storing and it has been debated ever since. This book explains the system that Luhmann used and refines some of the discussion around in as times have changed and notes are more likely to be digitised now.

The book doesn’t just describe a system though, it seeks to provide an understanding of what note taking is used for and how and particularly to challenge those who might (and I include myself here), underline vaguely interesting paragraphs while I was reading something and rarely return to it.

The idea of the Zettlekasten is that notes would all be linked to each other by topic so you create notes from everything you read/watch/discuss/learn around topics and draw links together in themes which you might not have seen, if you create ‘book’ or ‘lecture’ notes in a traditional way.

By not restricting notes to the book or the paper you are making notes about and linking by ideas, you might fall across links that the authors haven’t and find your own topics or see things you didn’t know you didn’t know, that you want to follow up.

Summary

The initial premise of the book is interesting to start with. It is that the skill of good note-taking has been left out of many study skills books. When we might have books about how to write essays or dissertations and how to think critically, there is little literature available and far less teaching, about how to take good notes. While, considering this, it is important to understand that writing and taking notes isn’t the ‘end-game’ for a writer (and we are all writers). But taking and storing notes well, means you don’t need to rely on memory, or scraps of post-its or chronological notes that don’t make sense in context so you can’t remember what it is you were trying to remember anyway.

In order to think, the premise goes, you need to write. That writing usually starts with notes. There are some simple guides the author ‘teaches’, which is about always having a pen or something to write with (it might be a smartphone app or a notebook) especially when you are reading.

You make three types of notes with this ‘system’. There are the fleeting notes, which are these notes you might make as you write. These are notes about initial thoughts and feelings and responses. You ‘decant’ these notes to your ‘literature notes’ which are the notes which are about particular texts or pieces that you might watch or listen to. The literature notes shouldn’t be verbatim, nor should they contain any quotations. They are about your recollection of the text and how you interpret it through writing about it.

Then from the literature notes, you develop permanent notes. This is where the ‘Zettlekasten’ sits, the repository of themes and ideas that have developed from the literature you read. You link these together as you understand them and it helps you to build connections or locate gaps more easily. Permanent notes should be notes you return to. They are the ‘memory’ you don’t need to retain, because, the idea is, you will come back to the permanent notes and have those connections and references all in place which will make writing about them, more useful.

Ahrens is very much focussed on moving away from too much planning when you are approaching texts and research and to find where you are going, by doing. Perhaps I’m not explaining it as clearly as he does but when I read it, it made a lot of sense.

“A truly wise person is not someone who knows everything but someone who is able to make sense of things by drawing from an extended resource of interpretation schemes’

Ahrens p119

Reflections

There were parts of this book that made a lot of sense to me, and made me cheer as if a curtain was being removed in my mind. Yes, I thought, why DIDN’T I think about being more flexible about note-taking, about adding my thoughts and commentary alongside the key ideas. Do I write too many notes that I will never return to? And particularly, summarising books or articles as I read them, in my own words so I will be able to come back to them. I also enjoy making links between articles and I use Roam to do that.

I am not sure I’m a purist though. My ‘permanent notes’ are as refined as I think they are ‘supposed’ to be, but the book has given me ways to think about note taking and using notes that I think will be useful. I see it as giving me tools and ideas, some of which I will use and some I will not.

Use in Practice

This book has changed some of my practices regarding making and considering notes as I have mentioned above. I’ve created ways of storing and taking notes which have adjusted on the basis of the writings even if there are parts I have discharged. I love making links between what I am reading and thinking though.

For example, this is my note about the book on Roam – you can see the blue links which take me to other pages – each hashtag is also a link and this is how my ideas are pulled together.

And some of the links I have made between these ideas look like this

In a work context, I have started using OneNote through Microsoft 365 for which I have a work account, to make ongoing daily notes as things happen and then link them to other things which are going on at work but also ideas I have as they pop up.

Conclusion

I have been really inspired by this book and even though I’m not following the Zettlekasten method religiously, it has helped me to understand how to gain a different perspective on studying and note-taking. Studying isn’t a means to an end, but can be an end in itself. The good thing about this book is that while it will ‘click’ with some people and won’t with others, the first chapter is available free (see link at the top of the page) and that will be more than enough to make a decision as to whether it’s a book you want to buy or not.

Learning about Learning

This week, on a day off from the full-time work, I took a day back at the university to attend a couple of workshops they set up for postgraduate students. I was wondering beforehand if this had been something of a luxury. Unlike my previous job, I don’t get any days off for study leave (welcome to the NHS!) anymore so all the leave I take is annual leave and I am a bit short on AL this year due to the changes in job where the dates didn’t quite line up.

So despite my reservations about whether it would be better use to sit in a library, I went to the workshops to learn with a mixed group of doctoral and post-doctoral students about learning techniques.

The first session was about speed reading, or as the tutor told us, repeatedly, better reading. He was right. Noone really teaches you how to read effectively after the first few years in primary school unless there is a specific reason or at least, that was my experience.

We started with some fun activities, testing our reading speed and the importance of understanding that memorising (as we did in reading comprehension tests at school) and understanding is vast.

In some ways, I expected a lot of what he said to be obvious, but it really wasn’t. I can say that I have a few more ideas about how I read (and have been reading) and how I can be more effective in reading through information more quickly but also making sure the notes I make about what I read are better (this might be counter intuitive about learning in a class about reading but it is what I took from it).

While I came away eager to practice new techniques, I thought that it was probably, for me, anyway more about reading efficiency than reading speed. How can I get the information I need from a text in the quickest way that ensures I remember and record (if necessary) what I have read. One of the key techniques that I want to practise is about extending my peripheral vision when I read so that I read more ‘at once’. This was something I hadn’t considered before learning about it.

The second half of the day was about mind-mapping. I probably wouldn’t have signed up for it if it hadn’t followed on from the morning because the speed reading was what I had been most interested in.

I’ve tried a bit of mind-mapping, particularly on software (iThoughts if anyone is interested – I’ve tried a few and that’s my favourite) and thought if there is a ‘way’ to mindmap, it might be useful to know. I used it when I wanted to gather my ideas in a different way.

Fortunately, this is how it was presented to us. This isn’t a panacea. It won’t make you cleverer or quicker or more imaginative, but it is a tool that can help with taking notes and recording information in a clearer way. I tend to doodle a lot and make notes with lots of arrows in them, so it could be the method I didn’t realise I wanted. I hadn’t thought of mindmapping to summarise or take notes.

Having attended the course, I’d say that learning from someone who knows, is useful. I have tried any number of mindmaps since the training. The next morning, at work, I arrived and drew my day’s to do list as a mindmap (which I then had to explain to a colleague who was intrigued), it took no longer but it was visually more pleasing – although that is not the point.

What has been more useful were my brief attempts, over the weekend, to link up the speed reading and mindmapping and creating a ‘mindmap’ notes of book chapters and articles. I’ve been able to jot mini-mindmaps after chapters of a book I am reading, (have been trying to speed read!) so I remember what the key points are. I’ve used post-its or pieces of printer paper which I have then popped into the book at the required chapter or scanned and saved with the paper on Mendeley entries. For the first few I’ve done, I’ve written some more conventional notes afterwards, using the mindmaps to test if I have learnt or remembered more or at least, noted down the key useful points and I think it may work as a technique when I need to remember things I have read.

I’m still at the early stages of this. I am mindmapping everything. As we were told though, it’s often about practise and getting better at it. It may not change the way I learn and think in the long run, but it was an enjoyable session that helped me think differently. And I think it helped when I went back to work as well because this isn’t just about helping my learning at university but also at work.

Even if I don’t persist with mind-mapping as a note-taking technique, at least I know a bit more about it and why I would reject it which is a better place to be. As for the speed-reading, I can’t see any situation that won’t be useful so I’m going to continue to practice and if I do get better, I might write up more about the specific techniques. It is good to have a day out from the usual though, particularly if we are able to challenge our own thinking.

Research in Social Work – January 2020 links (Open or Free Access papers)

When I started writing at the beginning of the year, I thought I’d compile a summary of links each month about news and research, but it became a bit too much to compile, and this is, fundamentally a hobby for me.

So, I’ve decided instead to highlight each month some open access papers that I’ve found useful, interesting or have bookmarked for later, that others might want to read because we all want accessible research information and the more we read, the more we understand what is worth reading. So here are a few for February – they aren’t always new, but they will be new to me!

This paper in Social Work Education (May 2019) looks at how critical reflection is taught in social work courses specifically in relation to working with older people.

This issue (2018) of the British Journal of Learning Disabilities is open access (most aren’t) so is worth browsing and includes (among other interesting ones) this article which is a study on what is it link to move house for people with learning disabilities.

This is a free access review of literature about trauma-informed care in inpatient mental health services (2013) from the International Journal of Mental Health Nursing which is a useful way to get a broader view of the topic at the moment.

On a slightly different tack, Critical Social Policy have an open access article from January 2019 on ‘Raising Critical Consciousness in the struggle against poverty’. Nice of them to make it free! Seriously though, we need to speak about poverty and the impact it has on our work at every level.

And Practice – Social Work in Action, has this article about decision-making of AMHPs which is a useful read from 2019.

Although this is not ‘my’ area of social work, this paper in Qualitative Social Work from December 2019 with birth mothers’ accounts of the impact of the removal of their children on their future lives has impact for all of us in the sector.

This 2017 paper on the role of trustworthiness in social work from Australian Social Work is definitely something I found helpful in my consideration of how we carry out ethical social work.

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