Note-taking and Its Impact on Learning, Academic Performance, and Memory

Abstract

Note-taking is a significant part of students’ academics because it improves their
learning and helps them with their memory. Writing effective notes that are
concise helps students to understand the information easier and allows them to
retrieve information efficiently. Note-taking allows students to organize
information and to enhance their cognitive processing. There are many different
ways to structure notes such as intentional free notes, outline notes, and matrix
notes. Therefore, it is important that students find their own structured way to
write effective notes during lecture. The purpose of this research study is to
investigate whether effective-note-taking improves the quality of learning and
memory retrieval for students. A survey was administered and collected from 200
students of the City College of New York during fall of 2022. The survey
questionnaire included Likert-type and open-ended questions, which was used to
examine the students’ thoughts, perceptions and their views about the benefits of
effective note-taking. The data suggest that student’s ability to note-taking and
their method of note-taking is positively correlated with their GPA and
performance. Furthermore, most students believe note-taking is vital to have a
higher academic performance. Furthermore, the data suggests that the students’
perceptions is that effective note-taking helps them with their memory and
information retrieval.