[nxc18]

When I take notes when typing, I can transcribe the content word-for-word without knowing what I am hearing and without thinking about it.

When I hand write, I am generally forced to either slow down and repeat what I am listening/watching (if an option), or actually think about what is being said, and choose the important parts to write down, or rephrase it in a more efficient-to-write way.

I am taking a course right now and I find repeatedly that I understand the concepts from taking down the notes (many aha moments), and then I remember. I rarely if ever actually look at the notes I take - they are objectively inferior as a product compared to the official course notes or the textbook.

Maybe typing would be efficient for learning if I was bad it - could be an interesting hypothesis to test.

[crazygringo]

When I hand write taking notes, I am indeed forced to slow down, and it's maddening. I'm busy trying to figure out how to condense the ideas into something I can quickly write, and in the meantime the lecturer is continuing and I've missed something important they've just said.

I genuinely do not understand how people find it helps them to handwrite notes in a lecture. If I type on my laptop, I can do that "mindlessly", which is beneficial because then I have enough of my brain free that I can also understand what the lecturer is saying. Ask a question if I have one, etc.

If I'm hand-writing notes in a notebook, I can't do any of that. I'm so focused on trying to get the stuff down that it's using a lot of my brain that I'd really rather be using to actually think more deeply about what is being said.

I'm genuinely so baffled by people who find that hand-writing notes helps them understand the material better. I used to assume they were terrible typists, but I don't think it's that.

But for example, with your comment, you say that when typing notes, you can transcribe word-for-word without knowing or thinking. But... why not just actually pay attention? Isn't that the whole point? Why do you need slower handwriting to force you to actually pay attention? That's what confuses me so much. I pay attention by default. Writing notes by hand takes away from my attention, because I have to give attention to that.

[annzabelle]

Writing notes by hand feels like it etches the concepts into my brain in a way that listening alone does not. Typing does not have the same feel.

I have never learned how to do something substantially difficult (math, foreign language, any science, or memorizing a substantial amount of content for a humanities course) without handwriting it. I remember in 8th grade latin, I copied down conjugation charts onto a chalkboard over and over until I had them memorized.

I cannot do university level mathematics without writing it down by hand.

My typing is much better than my penmanship, but it doesn't tend to make topics stick in my brain in the same way that handwriting them does.

[crazygringo]

I'm very curious what that's like.

Like, handwriting doesn't do a thing for me. It doesn't help me learn at all.

I can't help but wonder if there's some advantage that I'm missing?

But on the other hand, I don't seem to have any problems paying attention or learning. So I'm still just so confused as to how it helps. Like, is my brain already doing the things that some other people need handwriting for? Or is it not, but handwriting doesn't do those things either?

I think I'm extra-baffled because I can't even imagine how it could help. Like, I can't think of any analogy to anything else that would help me understand. I already understand the things and listen to and see, I don't have any issues with concentration or anything... so what does the handwriting add?

I see a lot of people say that it forces you to think more deeply about the material, but I'm kind of always on "maximum thinking mode" already.

[annzabelle]

It's hard to describe. In upper level math (real analysis and the like) in college I would write every single thing the professor wrote on the chalkboard down in my notebook. I didn't really study or do much homework, but copying down those proofs made the concepts stay in my brain.

Do you write when you do math? Math and handwriting are so intertwined in my experience, I can't imagine doing math past high school without at least jotting some parts of the process down.

[crazygringo]

Math is different, because most people aren't quick/accurate enough with LaTeX to take notes with a keyboard.

And taking notes in math is different from other subjects anyways, because you are literally just copying verbatim. You're not doing any of the summarization and selection that people talk about being so important to do, because handwriting is slower.

So I think that copying down math notes verbatim is not really what people are talking about at all when they talk about the benefits of taking notes by hand.

[jakevoytko]

It kept me listening. When I was on minute 70 of a boring lecture I started daydreaming. If I was writing even minimal notes, I'd need to briefly consider each idea and decide whether it was worth recording.

[crazygringo]

But if you're taking notes by typing then you have to be listening as well. You can't daydream and transcribe at the same time. At least I sure can't.

[cma]

Where does this explanation fall apart? There must be a cutoff point where more difficulty of getting the info down is worse than more ease. Otherwise, wouldn't a better recommendation be to do all your notes more slowly tracing with your big toe in the sand and then taking pictures? Do touch typists get less out of digital note taking than hunt and peck typists?

[elmo-shrugged]

Give subjects a chopstick for each hand and say you have to hold one end and type with the other, and then test recall/understanding? That could be interesting

[eviks]

If you don't read notes, why waste time making them instead of slowing down even more and spending that extra time/effort on active listening/thinking?

[bluGill]

I get distracted and my mind starts to think of better ways to explain the last point... Soon I have no clue what the last ten minutes were about. Taking notes makes me get back on task faster so I can find the next note to write.

I'd like to slow down and just listen but the reality is I won't.

[eviks]

Interesting, so "otherthinking" is bad here. Have you tried other devices to turn yourself back on track without the extra work?

[quest88]

They way the slow down and spend extra effort is by writing notes.

[nxc18]

Writing is thinking.

[RealityVoid]

Certain kinds of writing is thinking, but you're not writing in the thinking way, you're transcribing.

[eviks]

Thinking is thinking. Then you can write your thoughts for later use of think more instead

[CodesInChaos]

Writing is a distraction from thinking.