Take better notes, by hand

https://brianschrader.com/archive/take-better-notes-by-hand/

56•sonicrocketman•1h ago

Comments

avgDev•1h ago

I retain information better when taking notes by hand. However, being able to attach an image and search is absolutely required for me, hence why I use digital notes at work.

I can keep years of notes in a file which I can take and access anywhere whenever I want.

nathannaveen•43m ago

Personally I like Goodnotes since it is pretty good at searching handwriting.

warmcat•21m ago

Plus 1, Goodnotes is such a well developed product. I also have an iPad screen guard which gives a paper like feel when writing which makes my brain think I am writing on a book.

ModernMech•1h ago

This is all good advice but one thing it doesn't touch on is: which pen and notebook?

I like the pilot precision v5 pens because they come in a lot of different colors and the point is very fine.

For notebooks, I prefer the Leuchtturm 1917 series. They come with page numbers, a space for TOC, a pocket in the back for stuff, two book marks, and lots of different sizes and colors and page layouts.

That's important because the other important thing about hand notes for me is one book per topic, and keep them different colors because they will pile up and it helps with differentiating them.

sonicrocketman•46m ago

I've blogged about this before too!

https://brianschrader.com/archive/the-practicals-of-writing-...

But I'm in the process of upgrading my pen. I ordered a TWISB ECO.

JLO64•17m ago

What ink are you gonna pair with that? I’m not a lefty, but I’ve heard fast drying FP inks are best for writing with a left hand to prevent smudging.

sonicrocketman•13m ago

I'll def be looking around. I have some bottled ink already, but this is a huge concern. Hopefully the fine tip has decent portion control. That helps a lot.

JLO64•7m ago

I’ve used an ECO and while it’s not my favorite pen, I have nothing bad to say about the nib (I believe mine was a fine as well). The way FP’s write can vary dramatically between different inks though. I’d recommend first trying out the ink you have and seeing what about it you don’t like before researching other inks.

Just asking out of precaution, but are you sure this bottled ink of yours can be used with fountain pens? Even if it is, it’s best to be careful with a fine nib (I’ve learned the hard way).

wduquette•39m ago

I love the Leuchtterm 1917s. They've got everything you say, and they hold up under daily use without falling apart.

As for pens, I use the Uniball Jetstream 0.38 ballpoint--fine point, doesn't skip, and I prefer ballpoints. I used a Coleto Hitec C multi-pen for a while, but the refills are skinny and run out of ink quickly, and I like the feel of the Jetstream ballpoint better. (The refills for the regular Coleto Hitec are much thicker and last a lot longer...but skip horribly. Life is too short.)

pklausler•28m ago

If you like Leuchtterm, you'll love Quo Vadis Habana notebooks, if you can find them in stock.

stronglikedan•25m ago

A good 0.5mm gel pen, and a pad with blank 8.5x11 pages, no lines no nothing. About once a week, I consolidate whatever is still relevant onto a few sheets.

bee_rider•20m ago

I think pens and pencils are mostly just preference and habit. I have some draftmatic mechanical pencils, nothing special really, but I’ve been using them for decades.

I suspect the real advantage of handwritten notes (for those who benefit from them) is that writing them fulfills a learned ritual for putting the brain in learning-mode. So, might as well match the environment as closely as possible, and prioritize familiarity over some quality.

Anyway, I can write obnoxiously small with my draftmatics, so I don’t see how the process could be optimized by a fancier pencil or pen anyway.

squidbeak•8m ago

> This is all good advice but one thing it doesn't touch on is: which pen and notebook?

In what way could it possibly be relevant? Do you actually believe that the author could suggest a universally suitable pen and paper type? What if he'd had his best results with toilet paper, a sugar thermometer and a soot/diarrhea/lemon juice blend for the ink? Would his advice be any more complete?

The moment you lose sight of the habit and instead pay homage to paper and pens, its a fetish instead of a practical discipline.

coldcity_again•59m ago

I love taking notes by hand for better retention, but (my) longhand is just too slow. It's also an inconvenient format for representing a hierachy or graph of connections.

Anyone else into what my high school biology teacher loved referring to as "pseudo-arachnomorphic diagrams" (Mind Maps[1] / Spider Diagrams)?

They're still my primary paper-based realtime note taking method. They seemed to get a lot of attention a couple of decades ago, but I don't hear them mentioned much recently.

Lots of online/local Mind Map tools available, but I've never really gelled with them (though you do get self-organisation of the nodes!). Once in the digital realm I'm more likely to make notes in Markdown.

[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mind_map

cratermoon•50m ago

There are ways to write that are faster and more legible. I recommend looking into the Getty-Dubay style.

wduquette•44m ago

I keep notes in Obsidian...but when I'm genuinely studying a text I write out a precis as an outline in my bullet journal, and later transcribe it. That means that I engage with the material at least twice: once when I first read it, and once when I transcribe it. And yes, writing it by hand genuinely does help. And then, when I want to look at it later, my original notes are in my journal, and my transcription is available digitally.

railgunmerlin•34m ago

anyone try e-ink style tablets (like remarkable?) the form factor/ability to backup is attractive to me but the price tag is a bit nuts...

JohnFen•27m ago

I tried various ones out over the course of a few years, but in the end found they weren't for me and I went back to using paper notebooks.

I won't say they're bad solutions at all, but just that they brought no actual benefits for my use cases so there wasn't a reason to put up with their downsides. The downsides are relatively minor, though. For me, they are cost, the need to charge yet another device, and the inconvenience of the form factor (you can't tear pages out to hand to someone else, they rigid tablets instead of flexible paper, writing on them isn't the most pleasant thing, etc.)

stronglikedan•26m ago

My coworker got the reMarkable 2 about four years ago now, and was really into it when he got it. I had sort of forgotten about it until the other day when I was reconsidering whether I wanted to get one. When I asked him about it, he was just as enthusiastic as when I asked him years ago. It was sitting right next to him ready to go, with notes from that same day on the screen. Just an anecdote to consider.

complex1314•23m ago

I love it as a reader when travelling, and books too long to print. I do take notes when i bring it to conferences, but most of all just to keep engaged, though to keep all notes at one place is practical.

Though when at home/office nothing beats paper and the possibility to visually have multiple pages side by side. Any research article I want to work through I print out, and I buy more paper books now than before I bought the remarkable. Paradoxically, the remarkable helped me realize the incredible value of paper.

packetlost•22m ago

I had a ReMarkable2 for awhile and don't really recommend it. It's not the same as writing on pen & paper and I like the aspects of finding different papers, pencil lead, pens, etc. anyways.

To be more specific, the ReMarkable 2 had a wildly inaccurate pen tip, but only on like the bottom 1/2 to maybe 1/3 of the screen, which was enough to completely destroy my desire to use it at all. On top of that the software is pretty meh. It wasn't bad so much as it was minimal to the point of being harder to work with than real paper. The UI was clunky and slow. Any real advantage to digital nature (built-in OCR, sorta search) was so poorly implemented that it wasn't worth it.

h45x1•17m ago

There is also the question of real estate. I can have several paper notes side by side (when taking notes on loose sheets) but with iPads or ReMarkables that'll be rather decadent.

h45x1•22m ago

I have a dedicated couple of pages in a notebook, where I write down the note-taking conventions I use. When transitioning to a new notebook, I would copy those pages, possibly making a few improvements based on past usage. A most unhurried release cycle, if I can say so myself.

Regarding the space management, there are many solutions straight out of the programming world, of course: utilize both sides of the notebook, reserve a minimum number of pages per topic, keep an index with free pages, etc. But there are some hardware ones as well, I'm trying Atoma notebooks (https://atoma.be) these days.

sonicrocketman•19m ago

It's basically just designing a dictionary data type. I recall the Python devs talking about a lot of this stuff from the early days.

Everything is related.

cortesoft•20m ago

I am 43, and for my entire life I have hated writing by hand. I am sure a lot of it has to do with how I hold my pen/pencil but I have never been able to change my grip. My hand hurts and my writing is barely legible. I just hate it.

I have tried over the years to get into hand writing and note taking. It never works. I am so grateful for typing, it has saved my life for decades. I can type ridiculously fast, and it doesn't wear me out.

I have finally stopped apologizing for this, or thinking something is wrong with me. It just isn't for me

JLO64•12m ago

I hated writing by hand, but I got into fountain pens and that really helped change my note taking habits. I mostly write letters, but recently I’ve taken up writing notes during meetings. I loathe doing so, but my FP addiction really helps.

sonicrocketman•11m ago

Writing letters is so much fun. I have a blog post in the works about that too. Glad to hear you enjoy it.

Bridged7756•7m ago

Paper is just too inconvenient to use for long term storage and revisiting imo. It's better suited as a transitive storage medium, either for short lived stuff like tasks, checklists, or acting as a writing inbox that you later capture into a digital medium.

Even with the capture downside, I don't think that I can do away with paper and pen. There's something invigorating about using paper that no keyboard or screen could replicate. More in touch with your brain and with your own words, that your feelings flow better into the ink. It is something that makes me enjoy writing.

I've considered e-ink devices in the past but I don't see much value from them. They're a fancier way to draft things at best, in my case, and a worse PKMS/Todo list if anything compared to dedicated tools. I'm paying for an extra device that gives me a bunch of things I won't use, anyways.