you must know that taking notes is so tricky

you take a lot of notes from language lessons

books or videos podcasts you fill one notebook after another

but it often takes a lot of work to organize to search

and review or you just

note down a lot of new vocabulary but never review them again

if you want to know how to take notes

smartly absorb what you have learned this video is for you

I'm Zoe , a PhD student in sociology

in France and now in Germany who speak seven languages

note taking

is part of my life I have to read many books and papers

and learn different languages

after years of struggling

and trying out to different methods I finally found some

practical ways to take note

efficiently and I would like to share them with you in detail

I'm going to tell you why I prefer certain tools

over others at different learning levels

so this video is structured by my favorite

note taking techniques

for different learning levels beginner

intermediate and advanced level

please please please give me a like if you

like this video and find it helpful

is the best way to support me

remember to subscribe to my channel let's get into the video

the key to

smart notetaking is asking yourself the right questions

how to select

organize

and highlight the information to reuse and review them quickly

I don't note down everything I learn.

For the beginner level focusing on pronunciation

basic grammar structures and frequent words is more important

no need to note down

long and complicated sentences

or even a paragraph to show you have worked a lot on it

which is often overwhelming when it comes to reviewing

if you note down a word or an example sentence

keep the sentence simple

short clear and related to your daily life

this phase is essential to keep your interest

and build good learning habits

for intermediate advanced level the same principle: be selective

less but useful

one mistake I used to make is to

note down everything without selection

I used to read a news article on Aljazeera

for learning Arabic every day

and I checked

all the new words and noted down

all the long and complicated sentences

by expecting that I would memorize everything

first I copy them into an excel sheet

translates into English and then imports them inside my Anki

it seems super logical

but it was

counterproductive because those sentences were so long

complicated and heavy

so I often feel very overwhelmed to review them

I still have this heavy deck

and I really need more

motivation to reopen it

so now I prefer to note down a part of the sentence

rather than the whole sentence for example

normally I don't note down the whole sentence anymore

but I don't only know down words

because I still need a context so normally I note down

part of the sentence for example

it means climate conference

it's gonna be very useful I understand the context

I will just note down this part

I use

different tools for different resources and different levels

Excel sheet for the beginner level

Google doc for the notes with Tandem partner

Notability on iPad for language

books and articles

new words from YouTube videos

and Netflix I use Reverso

one by one step by step I'm gonna explain it

Excel is more beneficial for the beginner

period by separating notes

into different categories

words and grammar points

I usually start learning a language with the structured book

or videos I usually organize words in different topics

like place, time and food

etc the goal of this period is to have a

basic language structure and gain frequent words

if you want to know more about how

I memorize vocabulary with this method

especially for the beginner level

you can check out

this video of course

you can do it by noting them down in different notebook but

two is enough one for grammar and another for vocabulary

but one advantage of excel is you can search

quickly reorganize them and link those notes together

excel is very suitable for visualizing the

whole structure when you review

you can import them into your Anki

Anki is a super handy to review at the beginner level

why I always emphasize the beginner level I'm gonna

explain you guys

the disadvantage of excel

is you can't practice your writing skill

sometimes we memorize better when we write at the same time

my solution to this problem is to write sentences or journals

so just open

this excel sheet and try to use and link what you have learned

it's actually that active recall

is more interesting than just repeating Anki cards

make new sentences or write Journal by using them and linking them

together

that's that you just learned a couple of new verbs okay

such as to eat

then

add words progressively into food time and place categories

over time while you know down this verb

you can add a simple example by using

other words like this morning he eats the bread

next time you learn a new word for example

library or something you can say

um he eats breakfast in the library

which is super weird for me this kind of things

to be honest I don't use Excel after a certain level

because I already know the structure of the language

making constantly different categories just make this document

heavier and heavier

so next phase we have to simplify

when I start to exchange with the Tandem partner

I will basically note down the date

words and expressions short sentences

then I will put a couple of keywords on the top

I often know down with my Tandem partner on a Google doc

so we can edit at the same time

a Google doc on the drive is very practical now is my favorite

notes taking tool for any kind of notes

not just for language learning even for podcast everything

so because I can review them whenever and whereever I want

one important tip

always take note with highlight

it's actually the most crucial thing but it often neglected

you should assume the future you

who's gonna read those notes without remembering

everything and don't always want to start from the first page

so it will be efficient to keep points

especially the mistakes

you used to make clearly and pop out quickly

for example

while I'm doing my Tandem exchange when she corrects me

I will highlight the type of mistakes in different colors

the pronunciation mistakes is in green

new words in yellow

and grammar mistakes in blue

it's super helpful when I review

I directly target my weaknesses rather than

browsing everything once again

I read those highlight notes after the

Tandem and the language lesson it only takes

five to ten minutes

but it can reinforce my memory

or every day before my language lesson

I browse those notes quickly

it's actually a very good way to review as well

one tip it will be more efficient if you read then out loud

the following tool is Notability when I have a higher level

and want to avoid writing or copying

every new words in an excel or document

because I feel like

I know more about language

I can remember words by their roots and context

so if I study with a book or read articles like news

I often open a file

on my Pad and when I note the translation

I writes them on a blank side of the book

I don't write it under the word when I do revision

I will reread the text I don't read the translation directly

but I try to remember what it means

and I review the whole chapter at the end of the week

by just browsing reading

the articles again

the same highlights technique new words in yellow

grammar point in blue

pronunciation in green and translation in pink

The highlight style should be constant for all your notes

for the words from YouTube videos or Netflix

I use Reverso to take notes by saving them by one click

then I can directly review those cards on application

but I don't like the spaced repetition function

on Reverso, to be honest I found it so slow

and too repetitive I I can't adjust them

so you can try it out maybe it's suitable for you

another way I do is by

exporting the vocabulary list of a period like

one week or two weeks

on an excel sheet and browse them

quickly as a quick review

it's great that they still keep the original sentences from the video

another tip for review is you have to write it

in your study plan like fifteen to thirty minutes

before starting a new lesson

You have to build a habit of reviewing

to sum up Excel and Anki are more useful at the beginner level

I still use all these tools

I use mostly Google documents for my Persian Arabic because

now I only do Tandem practice to keep my level

but I use Reverso or Notability

Google documents sometimes Anki

for my German because I'm learning it intensively

I need to watch the news and read articles every day but I use Anki

uh sparingly to be honest

because it takes too much time to import notes and to review

and it's just boring

I browse the highlight notes immediately after reading

an article or language exchange

and I do a weekly review to go through

everything and the rest is the

immersion

listen read and speak

as much as possible to remember those words by repeating them

in different situations

rather than just memorizing them mechanically

so you can try them out

just find the most suitable one for your level or

learning style I'm just giving you a toolkit

if you have any questions

please leave them in the comments

I will try my best to answer them

and help you to improve your notes

taking skills and language learning skills

if you have good methods please

share them with others in the community

I hope this video is helpful

don't forget to give me a like and subscribe to my channel

see you soon guys bye