Visual Note-Taking Will Bring Your Learning Process to the Next Level

I have always been the type of person who likes to take lots of notes when learning something. During College lessons, during conferences or even during job interviews. But has this habit really helped me? Honestly, I would say that more than 70% of the notes I have taken in the last four years have served no real purpose. However, that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t be taking notes. It means I have probably been taking them the wrong way.

Taking notes should be a technique that enhanced our learning process and helped us learn faster and more efficiently. If we just write down almost everything we are taught or told, we are actually slowing down the process. However, if we enhance those notes with less text and more sketching, we will bring our learning process to the next level. It’s called Visual Note-Taking.

I recently enrolled in a UX & UI Design Bootcamp Course at Ironhack School, and they encouraged me to embrace this form of note-taking. I had previously used this method a couple of times, but I never paid much attention to it. After reading a few articles suggested by Ironhack, studying the technique and completing a short assignment, I had to admit it: It’s a game-changer!

It really isn’t that complicated. It doesn’t matter if your drawing skills aren’t good. With a few simple shapes, you can draw amazing and easily readable things that will help you link concepts with pictures, therefore, making ideas easier to understand. My experience couldn’t be more positive. The drawing part didn’t worry me since I used to sketch a lot for my Fine Arts degree back when I was in college. However, what I did find challenging is the holistic aspect of note-taking this way. Keeping your mind open to the whole picture and the general ideas rather than focusing on details is crucial for this exercise and something you have to train your brain for.

For this first pre-work exercise at Ironhack, I was asked to watch a Ted Talk by Margaret Gould Stewart, called How Giant Websites Design For You, and sketchnote through the whole conference. I had to watch it from start to end before being able to sketch anything. I wrote down a few bullet points and felt ready to start drawing. For the second watch, I tried to catch and understand the general ideas and immediately sketch those on a piece of thick paper. I was actually having fun while taking notes! But where I felt there was a big difference is in concentration. My brain was fully engaged with that activity and converting that Ted Talk into knowledge. This is the result.

Now, I can use that knowledge to discuss the topic with other people without using vague or undefined ideas. Visual Note-Taking enables you to not only get a better understanding of what’s in front of you, but to discuss and expand that knowledge. It helps you create connections with your past experiences and generate new thoughts and ideas.

I would strongly recommend embracing Visual Note-Taking. It’s what I will do from now on for sure! With just a couple of exercises, it has proved to be a very reliable approach to understanding new concepts, helping to improve the learning process and bringing it to the next level.