by was_a_dev on 5/14/23, 8:30 PM
During my physics undergraduate, it was for two primary reasons
1) Writing is more efficient when taking notes in real-time for maths notation
2) Better rentention of knowledge from the act of writing vs typing
Now as I teach, more students use tablets to take notes. But they're still writing, not typing
by mytailorisrich on 5/14/23, 8:32 PM
I disagree and am not sure what you mean by "efficient". I have never liked typing notes, be it in school or at work. Handwriting flows much better for me and I also find reading through notes, or just finding them, on paper easier.
I still usually show up at meetings with only a notebook and a pen... (added bonus: no-one asks me to connect to Teams/whatnot because they have a problem)
by allears on 5/14/23, 8:04 PM
Many claim that writing notes by hand helps in retention of the material.
by detaro on 5/14/23, 8:13 PM
- Fewer distractions from other things on the computer
- digital becomes harder if you want to sketch things or write formulas (some friends in uni could type LaTeX as as fast as the lecturer could write on the blackboard, I certainly couldn't)
by akeck on 5/14/23, 10:32 PM
Efficient for what, though? It's certainly faster for rote recording of information, but I learn complex information in less time when I hand-write it out. Also, you have to be really well-practiced in LaTeX math packages to type arbitrary math well. Hand-writing math is much more straightforward with limited learning time.
by runjake on 5/15/23, 3:18 PM
I write notes when I want to retain the information in my head.
I type notes into my "second brain"[1] when I want to be able to later refer to that information but not retain it in my head.
1. Currently, a Markdown file in Obsidian.
by gus_massa on 5/14/23, 8:23 PM
It depends on the topic. Math notation is a 2D horrible domain specific mess, and it's much faster to draw it in 2D than forcing it into a 1D symbol chain. (Bonus point for Greek letters or $\weird$ symbols.)
by canxerian on 5/15/23, 8:06 AM
When studying CS questions for software engineering interviews, I found being able to sketch and freehand draw helped me understand concepts such as memory, cpu architecture and recursion better
by dysoco on 5/15/23, 7:50 PM
Absolutely not more efficient when dealing with Mathematics or math-heavy notation which is 90% of my notes. Maybe an iPad might help but it's out of my budget right now.
by hgsgm on 5/14/23, 10:00 PM
Why at all? If you want to record the lecture, use photo, video, audio recording.
by is_true on 5/15/23, 12:03 PM
Citation needed.