Get better soon. I’ve had a pretty crappy week this week myself… xxx

Your idea of writing the notes out longhand is great, I’ve done that before and found it very effective although at the time it just took too long (because I was basically copying out an entire textbook plus lecture notes!). Maybe now I’ve made my studying more efficient I can come back to that technique! I’ll give it a go, thanks for reminding me Something I didn’t mention in my post is I use Microsoft OneNote for my notes, which allows me to add in pictures, videos, hyperlinks, and all sorts of hilights and tags. I find it a fantastic tool (if a bit clunky at times).

I used to record lectures but to be honest I found I never had the time to re-listen to them, and transcribing takes me AGES (we did some for our qualitative assignments). I admit that it’d be an effective way to learn the material (I can still remember much of the conversation I transcribed last year) but in terms of the time that it would take me personally it doesn’t quite pay off

Thanks for posting, you’ve given me some good ideas, and other readers might be better at transcribing than me too

For lectures, I make notes on the slides (if I have them available), or just as many notes as I can. Immediately following the lecture, or at least on the same day, I write out my notes and any lecturer provided notes in full sentence/paragraph form as if I were writing a textbook from them. I draw in diagrams, graphs etc if necessary. Since I type out all my notes, I write any additional ideas or thoughts I have about how it all ties in with readings etc in italics.

Basically, those two methods are how I cement information into my mind. If I have to memorise stuff, I condense all my notes together (i.e., make another file that is the super-summy of it all) and then condense those notes down, and down again until they are 5-10 key words on a flash card. Once I have done that, I memorise the key words. Then, I can take each key word and reconstruct the in-depth notes from memory.

Another good way is to make an audio recording of lectures and transcribe the audio. I have done that in the past (I am a transcription typist as well as a student), and it is even better than the above method. If you can’t transcribe or don’t have the equipment, you can hire someone to do it if you have the means to do so via the internet.

I always print out my notes as well, and read over them one or two times. I highlight, write questions in the margins and other thoughts that pop into my head – it’s really good to tie what you are learning into other things you have learnt, as well as everyday life.

It’s a slow process, but incredibly effective.