I recently made big changes to my note taking method. I was struggling with the concept descriptor framework because I first of all felt like it made me practise things that aren‘t really relevant to the test. Like I very rarely have to define or describe a concept on an exam. And I also wasn‘t sure what should be concept content and what a descriptor. So this lead me to trying out different things with the goal of getting the closest to actual exam questions. And this framework from an older Ali video is what I recently tried https://youtu.be/fDbxPVn02VU
(for anyone that‘s interested, this method requires lots of preparation and because it‘s active recall only, it takes time. So don‘t start like a few days before the exam like I did, this method should basically replace the note taking and if you want to cram, you gotta have all questions already written out) Has anyone tried this as well on RemNote? Any tips?
Perhaps you could describe your framework a bit more, because from the video it’s just question flashcards arranged into bullets without the automatic repetition time based on how well you recalled it the last time. You certainly can replicate that setup in RemNote, but with the ability to self-grade, as described here. You may wish to augment your questions with some clozes, just to cut down on the rewriting time.
My workflow:
I read through my exam materials and while doing so I try to imagine everything to make sure that I understand it. If I can’t imagine it, I don’t understand it. In the case that I can’t imagine or “retrace” something, I write down my question on RemNote, look for an answer and then write down the answer as well.
Once I’m through and understand everything, I write a question for every statement I find. I try to formulate the question in a way that the answer is word for word what’s in the text. I often just copy paste from the textbook and maybe replace some words with pronouns. I also try to integrate given exercises into RemNote.
Organisation wise, it’s kinda a mess because it’s just the topic, indent and then questions or exercises but I don’t know what I could do about that because I feel like parents can give away the answer a little. In the video it‘s suggested to not write down the answer but I prefer to write it down so that I can study where I want and without having to carry around books
This is great.
Unless you will be tested on knowing stuff word for word, this is worse than elaboration and active recall (what you are doing above). If you must have it verbatim, don’t waste time on Jeopardy rules, just cloze it, drill it into your head, and move on.
I’m assuming by exercises you mean either multiple choice or actual (math) problems. The more of those you do, the better, but their purpose is less memory testing and more actual application testing. Unless you feel you can extract some meaningful content for your main notes, I’d say just keep banging those out wherever you found them. If you run out, find past exams or some online curriculum aligned places (Khan Academy provides alignment comparisons, but they are mostly pre-university level).
If at all possible, fix that. Elaboration is crucial for learning. Chances are, you will discover duplicates and flat out wrong items. So the better your flashcards, the better the information you are remembering (I know, what a shocker).
Yeah I agree with that the most. While studying I was struggling with the copy paste answers because it’s just not the way I recall information. I will try to implement your suggestions and see how it goes. Will do an update of course