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Note-taking for learning

Published on August 31, 2026   8 min

A selection of talks on Management, Leadership & Organisation

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0:00
Hi, I'm Dr. Cynthia Nebel, the Director of Learning Services at St. Louis University School of Medicine. Today, we're talking about note-taking for learning.
0:15
The research on note-taking really splits up note-taking into two different types. There's note-taking in order to record, where you're trying to get as clear a record of what is happening in any situation as you possibly can. Then separately there's note-taking for learning, where the goal is for you to better understand the material and better retain it long-term. These two different types of note-taking really are in opposition with each other. Note-taking to record doesn't lead to a ton of learning. Let's try to split these up a little bit more and talk about what this looks like.
1:01
Note-taking to record is very much verbatim note-taking. That is, you're trying to write down every word that is being said. A lot of students naturally do this in the classroom, where as a presenter is speaking, they are furiously trying to write down everything that is on a slide, perhaps, and every word that the person is saying. That kind of verbatim note-taking involves very little thinking. You're not really thinking about the material; You're just trying to get it down as quickly as possible. Because there's very little thinking happening, that leads to very little learning. In reality, this type of verbatim note-taking is rarely necessary. Often in education, you already have information either in a textbook or slides are provided by an instructor, and so you probably don't need to write down every word that you're hearing.

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