The book "How to Take Smart Notes: One Simple Technique to Boost Writing, Learning and Thinking" was written by Sonke Ahrens in 2017 (updated edition in 2022). The book presents a method for managing knowledge fragments. Although the author lives in the academic world and primarily offers how to implement the method for research writing, the method, as he declares, is also suitable for the business organizational world and, essentially... for all life circles requiring writing, thinking, and learning.
The book presents the method at the technical level (how to implement it) and then introduces a multi-stage methodology for writing, thinking, and learning while highlighting its inherent advantages.
Key topics covered in the book:
The need
Summary: Method essentials
Recommendations and guiding principles
Detailed: Good writing stages
The book resonated with my long-existing understanding that writing is more than documenting thoughts. Knowledge doesn't exist only in the head; writing is more than recording and reporting thoughts. Writing is a more profound thinking process. Thinking is not just in the head but also in the dialogue between the writer and the text.
This understanding gains additional significance in the new world of generative artificial intelligence, where the machine not only echoes human thoughts but can also be of significant value in developing them. But about that - in a separate article (M.L.).
Recommended reading.
The need
Proposed Thesis:
Writing plays a significant role in every learning or research process.
Writing is more than a technique; it involves thinking.
Writing down fragments of knowledge that pass through our minds and the information we encounter can be helpful. These written knowledge and information fragments are the tangible form of thinking, ideas, and understanding. These fragments are also the basis of our memory.
Easy and correct organization of knowledge and information fragments can significantly contribute to understanding, learning, and success.
The essence of the thesis is not focused on individual notes or their collection but on the integrated network of notes connected and linked to shared topics and contexts.
Summary: Method essentials
The Writing Method of Knowledge Fragments Based on SLIP BOX
The method, developed in the 1960s by a German government official named Niklas Luhmann, is also known as the Zettelkasten method.
Key Principles:
Writing- Write notes representing ideas, thoughts, and important quote citations while reading. It requires an easily accessible writing device (computer or pen) that doesn't require excessive mental effort.
Processing- Examine notes to determine:
What is not sufficiently important
What needs completion to ensure the note contains a complete, self-contained idea
Refine content to be concise
Each note should contain only one message.
Connecting- Link notes to the existing note system. This offers several advantages:
Filtering out duplicates
Understanding potential relevant contexts
Gaining a better overall understanding of the project/activity/research
Tagging- Tag notes to create new connections and strengthen existing ones.
Notes can be handwritten (the author encourages this, especially initially—it helps with focus and understanding) or taken using assistive software, either specialized (like Zotero or Citavi) or word processors (MS Word or Google Docs).
For further reading on the method:
For reading about complementary similar methods:
Recommendations and guiding principles
Less is More- Focus on writing fundamental and meaningful ideas. The skill of distinguishing between ideas that are merely passing notes versus those with significance that will become permanent notes is complex. Therefore, it is recommended to save more but filter - if there is no use, then more.
Simplicity- Maintaining simplicity in the formulated ideas
Future-Oriented Tagging- Tagging and context are not based on where the knowledge was learned but on where it could be relevant in future contexts and current topics. Luhmann originally referred to four types of tags, of which only two apply to the digital world: tags indicating the domain to which the idea belongs and tags directly connecting different notes.
Note: This recommendation is a cornerstone of ROM Global's tagging lessons in insight repository solutions - M.L.
Separation of Note Types- When building a critical mass of notes, one must distinguish between three types of notes and ensure a sufficient quantity of each:
Transient notes - reminders of ideas, thoughts, and learning before processing; temporary
Permanent notes - constitute the knowledge system and central part of the SLIP BOX
Project notes - relevant to the current project; can be archived afterward
Detailed: Good writing stages
Sonke Ahrens presents six steps for good writing.
These steps refer to academic writing for research or doctoral work, but they can easily be applied to other writing processes in the business world or other contexts.
Focus on Learning and Nothing Else
We are all busy with endless tasks and have more than one task on our desks at any moment.
Good writing begins by stopping simultaneous work and achieving complete, undisturbed focus on learning and writing notes.
Focusing on the learning task means focused attention, improved memory, and focused decision-making in this context.
Reading with Comprehension Orientation
Reading to extract knowledge and information notes that will form the basis for learning.
The great advantage is that one never needs to start writing the article or conducting research from a blank page; the extracted notes, which are subsequently combined, form the basis for the first draft.
When reading, one must maintain an open mind. This is complex, as humans can err based on confirmation bias, distorting objective perception. Collecting notes in a bottom-up process that considers each note an independent knowledge body helps address and overcome this bias, improving our ability to examine the knowledge and information we've written independently and impartially.
When reading, we should not deceive ourselves into thinking we understand something if we do not. This tendency is strengthened when we return to a specific text; since we already know it, it becomes easier to think we understand it.
Sonke Ahrens even recommends practicing reading as a tool to improve learning.
Here's the English translation:
Note-Taking
Note-taking should be smart:
You can copy a quote;
You can record an idea that came to mind;
You can write a note about something missing from the text;
You can write feedback on what was read or on previous notes and thoughts;
You can raise direct questions and follow-up questions arising from the reading;
You can raise critical thinking questions related to the text (Really? What if?);
You can record patterns identified from reading the information;
You can write an idea about how the knowledge connects to the rest of the note system (the SLIP BOX) in a meaningful way;
It's also advisable to write why the idea on the note is meaningful (rationale).
Is there a quota? No, but to ensure thought progression, reading enough daily to generate three new notes is advisable, thus providing a critical mass of ideas and thought progression.
It's important to understand that writing allows us to:
To think better.
To expand our external memory base.
To free thought from immediate memory since everything is written down.
Idea Development
Developing ideas based on notes involves processing them, making them permanent, and linking them together.
Using "notes" is not coincidental: the information or knowledge written should be concise.
Adding tags is part of processing and developing ideas; thinking about the proper tags directs attention to contexts—what topic is the note associated with, and are there other notes related to the concept presented here?
As implied, the processing process refers not only to the individual note but also to an overall look at the note system—comparison, correction where required, and the distinction between the nature of different ideas. In the comparison process, the reader can examine previous notes again, perhaps seeing them in a new light.
The process performed in the note system simulates the process occurring in the brain and operates in alignment with it, so they feed and develop each other. In other words, working with notes serves creativity and knowledge development. As described above, it allows for overcoming memory barriers and biases, wrestling with ideas, rethinking them, generalizing (topic tags), connecting (direct tags), and so on.
Limiting an idea to a piece of knowledge requires its condensation and precision - a limitation that becomes an advantage in idea development. Similarly, structuring serves the broad coverage of different directions (divergence) through multiple notes, looking at them comprehensively and creating questions leading to additional notes.
While this is not proposed as the only creative method for humans, it is undoubtedly an important part of the creativity toolbox.
Sharing Insights
The proposed process of reading and learning based on notes makes writing an organized document of ideas accessible. One of the barriers many of us face is the "blank page" obstacle. Notes allow relatively easy integration into an initial backbone, forming a basis for a document, thus facilitating insight sharing with others. The method where each note is viewed separately, and subsequently the entire collection is examined, enables integration of Bottom-Up (each note independent) and Top-Down (all as a whole) approaches, thereby simultaneously improving and streamlining the entire writing and sharing process.
Creating a Consistent Habit
To achieve the method's success, it must become a consistent habit: start carrying a pen and notebook everywhere - and write.
In summary - a method is proposed here that does not place the learner at the center; instead, it places the thinking in learning at the center, thus making learning more effective and agile than ever before.
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