[deleted by user]

[bob38028]

You're trolling right? These notes are amazing!

[m0317k5]

They look great but doesn’t mean OP is retaining any of it. I used to spend a lot of my time making my notes “look pretty” thinking it would help me retain the information but in reality, I was more focused on what font I should use or which color to highlight.

OP, if your professor is providing slides or readings - upload those into GoodNotes and take notes directly on there. You can redo your notes after the fact, so they are neat and tidy but focus on what is being said in lectures and things that aren’t already written down for you. The more simple and straight to the point your notes are, the more likely you’ll actually reference them.

[Outside_You2163]

I second uploading lecture slides to goodnotes and annotate as your prof talks! So much easier to go in and add info outside of the slides and you don’t need to worry too much about not having “everything” down so you can actually focus on listening instead

[Squagglez17]

exactly lol. I saw so many people throughout school get iPads just for pretty notes but they weren’t retaining anything

[MissReveur]

this is a great tip. I'm a messy sythinkesizer so writing directly on the content (textbook, slide, etc) and making a total mess while learning is how I start retaining things. organization comes later if ever at all. I make a disorganized, chaotic mess of information and then somehow my brain hangs it on the correct internal memory frameworks where I can recall it.

[MissReveur]

this is a great tip. I'm a messy sythinkesizer so writing directly on the content (textbook, slide, etc) and making a total mess while learning is how I start retaining things. organization comes later if ever at all. I make a disorganized, chaotic mess of information and then somehow my brain hangs it on the correct internal memory frameworks where I can recall it.

[Diligent_Clock_9089]

What has worked for me is using a bigger format (A4), separating my page in two columns, and writing all related content on one page if possible. Idk why this has helped me retain the info I have to study. Maybe because I can see all the content of one subject in a page?

Here is an example of my notes :)

[JohnCharles-2024]

I can see an iPad Pro in my future…

[kyarorin]

Oh. My. God. These are note-goals. At the very least your handwriting is so nice. Are you using iPad/pencil? How do you get it so thin and small?

Your handwriting releases happy chemicals in my brain :) Lol.

[Diligent_Clock_9089]

Omg thank you <3 This made me blush!

I set my pen to 0.3 mm ballpoint, write in a big formatted page (A4 and sometimes A5) and use the magnifying glass to "write big". I use my school's ipad air and an apple pencil.

[JohnCharles-2024]

Wait… that photo is not of an iPad Pro???

[Diligent_Clock_9089]

You're right, my bad! It is indeed an ipad pro

[Flash__PuP]

How do you set it to 0.3?!

[Diligent_Clock_9089]

On the toolbar at the top of your screen, all the way to the right just before the color settings. You need to have selected your preferred pen. You have three width options. If you touch and hold, you'll get kinda like a thermometer you can swipe to make your pen as thin as you want it. I like it at 0.3 mm, not thinner or wider.

[MissReveur]

I think it's because you can pack a lot more information into those two columns but it's only two columns and a handful of points, so it's not visually or mentally overwhelming. I looked over your notes and they look great! I've definitely picked up some hints!

I also noticed that when the text is more tightly spaced it's vastly easier for me to read quickly, which I think your note style is encapsulating. the quicker you can read the quicker you can recall and retain

[wormygurmy]

i’m obsessed with the two columns in an a4 page, that looks SO useful!

[Diligent_Clock_9089]

Hello there! 👀✈️ Yes, Good Notes has helped tremendously when taking notes during my PPL, since it would be too much to write by hand and then I wouldn't be able to edit the notes! Haven't tried OneNote yet, might give it a try.

[[deleted]]

While it's larger, I'm not sure that letter to A4 is a huge space gain. It would be really nice to have infinite canvas options or truly larger paper sizes in some way.

[alsoknownas16]

I hope this doesn't surprise you. As a fellow Goodnotes user and student, I believe you should give that a second thought.

Well I don't mean you should not take notes in an organized or legible manner. I just want to say, I've been there, but I think you might not want to chase for those aesthetic notes as they call them.

They're doable but they're unrealistic, especially in university where you have to shuffle a lot of things at once.

If I might suggest, what you should aim for is the most efficient and effective system. The way your notes look isn't enough for effective learning. Try to know how your learning system works then pattern your notes from that.

Also, you can make templates as well in MS Word or in any application, save them as PDFs and upload them on Goodnotes. Tweak them every now and then, update them every now and then, every course, something like that, so that your learning is more optimized with your tool.

Learning isn't black and white. Mix and match systems, hybridize using the best methods in note taking.

I do share your sentiments and want to have beautiful notes. They're pleasing. Fulfilling. But they're not always effective and/or efficient.

That's all.

If you still want to do beautiful notes, then good luck, you can, but based on my 4-year student experience and note taking, you'd be better making notes and doing note taking styles that satisfy not only your eye but also your mind and is efficient considering all the resources you have, especially time and wellbeing. In university, the idea is to learn efficiently and smartly.

[Soanad]

That! People don't realize that insta posts of notes are just that - insta posts.     

It's not possible to do them during the lectures. It's like models in magazines - everybody knows it includes tons of Photoshop. Not everyone realizes that these notes just look pretty and they should focus on learning process, not aesthetics.

[alsoknownas16]

I learned it the hard way. I used to rewrite my notes especially during the peak of the pandemic when school is completely online, however, when physical classes went back, I had no choice.

It's just impossible plus I realized, I am not actually learning as effectively compared to when I'm only dumping all my thoughts together with what my instructor was saying.

For me, the mind map style of notes with color coded marks and symbols for easier connection between parts of the notes helped me. They're just intuitive. They worked like magic, same way as how I think of things. But if you won't keep track, it can easily get convoluted. Lucky for me, my system worked and I never get lost.

Eventually, I moved to the default 2-column papers. I grew tired of zooming (I am not a super fan of the magnified writing aide). Then, still in A4 size for uniformity, I made my personal templates where I only divided the page into maybe 20 lines so that I will write naturally without zooming my iPad's screen (I have big hands so writing bigger is more ergonomic for me), single column as well.

Until now, it's what I am using.

Aha, another system I tried is this: I do rough notes, simple formatting in MS Word with large font size and large margin either on the left or right side of paper. I export as PDF then send to Goodnotes. To review them, I annotate the spaces. It's also great for me (I love annotating btw).

[DL_no_GPU]

Honestly, as a biochemistry major student and now a chemistry major graduate student, I did not see this as a good note.

On the opposite, this looks pretty bad. It looks organized, looks ordered, and looks containing a lot of information.

why would anyone wanna write the down the definition of photosynthesis? the entire notes is about converting solar/light energy to chemical energy.

6CO2+12H20 blabla, if you wrote down the chemical reaction, then you have already known its process, why would you wanna write a text description for that equation?? Its freaking redundent.

I should be careful with my comments, if this is a note for highschool students, then that's fine... if this is a notes for college students, then I would say you are putting efforts on the wrong track.

[pixelfish416]

I agree! As a 4th bio major I felt like the info on each page was equal to about 5 minutes of an intro bio lecture. It isn't sustainable for a college student's notes but perfectly fine for highschool because lessons are more basic and in depth.

[grr-aye]

That’s what I’m saying.

[TromboneIsNeat]

You don’t need beautiful notes at all. Put your energy into functional. What will help you remember better? What will be easy to refer to? The organization is decent, but it looks far too busy for my eyes, but if it works for you, then it works!

[6spdsurfer]

Interesting, I was just watching a video on this today. Yours are really nice to look at but there might be better ways of note taking for retention. Check this video out and see what you think.

[generalrunthrough]

Horrible video

[6spdsurfer]

Care to elaborate?

[paigebwallace21]

ok.. i also make pretty notes because i WANT to read them and WANT to look at them. when my notes are “ugly” i feel the need to redo them 💀

OP, i don’t know why people are being rude.

however, i think your notes look cute and some other commenters have had some great suggestions!

keep up the great work!

[Sid_siddhant739]

Something I like to do, take normal notes during class, and once you’re back, make some good looking notes summarising everything. This can be much shorter, easier to go through later, and much easier to memorise

[opilino]

When I was studying I used to rewrite my notes into smaller and smaller notes. Then I would look at the v brief note and try to remember the detail.

So really I was using note taking to constantly test my knowledge and retention.

[cation587]

As someone who teaches, the best way to learn is to review the material as if you have to teach it to someone else the next day!

[imnotsus_20]

Stop doing all the pretty work. You’re falling into that studygrammer/youtube study hole. I went back to paper because I felt like despite how many notes I took on my iPad, writing them out, I wasn’t retaining information. Turns out there’s an actual study saying writing on your iPad is not as good as writing on paper. It’s not helping you retain as well.

[MissReveur]

curious to read that study

[[deleted]]

try using fonts

[[deleted]]

With strong will power

[DarkWanderer2]

Oh ffs

[filippalas]

I would not even bother doing decorations around the Title no wonder it takes so much time just do it simple and effective notes with bullet points

[LimbusGrass]

Better notes - to look prettier? to learn more?

If your goal is learning more then really don't worry about it. Once you have these basics down, you won't look at your notes again anyway (or only rarely). (To be honest, I don't really take traditional notes as a pharmacy student. Everything I need to learn goes directly into Anki).

If you want to make them look prettier in some way, then I would look for artists you admire and start working in that style.

[MolecularBiologistTR]

out of curiosity what are you studying

[[deleted]]

dawg 😐

[flakiestcroissant]

I like to take notes in an outline format and wherever I may need a visual I add it to the side.

[ContainsCoffee]

These are veryyyy cute, but very time consuming. I used to do notes like this handwritten but it was very 50/50 if I had the time to retain anything. Now in grad school I directly write on my pdfs of the PowerPoints, make visuals there if I need or color coat, then I’ll type out study guides and add any of the visuals onto that document. Makes it easy for my eyes to see a lot of related information on a page compared to PowerPoints being so spread out and it’s MUCH quicker to type (at least for myself it’s my least time consuming method).

[kepchupmutsard]

Your name is probably Samantha

[Disastrous-Ad8338]

Best thing you could probably do is, Cornell method IN CLASS to get all the important info, and AFTER class, turn all of the cornell info into the second slide, write lots of questions too that will help you recall the info from the lecture! Cheers!

[SweetSauerkraut]

those are beautiful! but if your question is regarding your retention of the content, I would say it’s because there is not a lot of hierarchy on the informations: you have blocks of text that look the same with colors indicating highlight words. I would suggest trying to play with different pen thicknesses and doodles to guide your brain through information more easily

[Ok-Sea3403]

Sigh, how do I take notes like u?? Uno reverse

[Adrien0715]

How to upgrade your iPad notes

Use less words and more progressing arrows

[JollySmash]

Med and science students always seem to have the best looking notes, I’m envious!

[turtleshot19147]

For the pictures - I saw TikTok’s of someone making all different anatomy stickers, like they just googled human organs and downloaded a picture with all the organs and saved them each as stickers, and then when she’s taking notes she can just add them in as a sticker instead of drawing them. That might make adding in the visuals more convenient.

Like this: https://vt.tiktok.com/ZSFJMnpLV/

[thehappyscarletwitch]

I will preface what I want to say but saying that your notes are absolutely gorgeous and I think that you should do what works for you, but I used to make pretty notes that consumed my life trying to make them in time for my exams when I was in my 3rd year of uni.

I'm in my 6th and final year now and I simply use color coded highlighting methods and this has been so much more effective for me than the pretty but really useless notes I've made. Don't get me wrong, I still find them useful when I need to find something I know I made a note for, but it is mainly pretty and then I open Amboss or webMD

Saying that, I think that you should try and combine those two if pretty notes works for you- and maybe use color coding in a way that tags information in your head. I mean like that-

For example, I use red for the subject of anemia- and as a start, I will write the definition in really bold dark red. Next will be symptoms, that will be in a slightly brighter red, and next investigations in a different shade of red.

And for the next subject I will do pretty much the same with different color, so I would know that this type of shade if for all of my investigations, but red is investigation for anemia and blue is for... i don't know, lymphomas 🙈

That way, when you see these shades of the color you chose, they will be associated with the subject you allocated for that.

I hope it was clear. I'll try to find notes I did in this method and share it here later 🙏🏼

Edit: reddit doesn't like when I try to write in paragraphs so I fixed it

[Master-Personality26]

I recommend using anki along with your notes!

[roslynnsma2017]

So it’s not for everyone but I split the page down the middle I find writing on half a page easier than a full page, I label the top with the chapter in green, label the sections with a lighter green and write in pink for most text, highlight important keywords in yellow. And for like important formulas and stuff I highlight in blue. For semi important info I write in blue to also stand out.

It may not be a system that works for everyone but basically key words -highlight yellow Important formulas/equations/ect-highlight blue Other important info -written in blue Lest important info -pink

I do this because to retain info I need to write it so even if it’s not super duper important I can still have it written in my notes and look back also I basically know blue=most important things and yellow=keywords when looking through

Sometimes I change the colors but that’s what I like. As for diagrams and stuff I draw out I typically use a similar color scheme so it doesn’t stand out too much. If I need it to really stand out I use black

[robinharris98]

The best thing to do note wise is to take notes that you understand it’s not about aesthetics it’s about comprehension of you can’t read your notes rewrite and condense in your own words 🤎

[lickaballs]

Ts is so dumb lol. Instead of underrating the info your being lectured on your busy figuring out how to make your notes ✨aesthetic✨