How to Use OneNote to Take Notes for School

I grew up taking college notes by pen or pencil in bodily notebooks and loved the guide course of, however there is not any doubt that extra trendy digital note-taking options supply clear benefits over the previous analog strategies. For instance, conventional notebooks are inclined to break and loss, make it troublesome to search out particular notes, and have a finite and stuck variety of pages. A digital note-taking app does not endure from any of those constraints.

Why Select OneNote for a Paper Pocket book Substitute?

I picked OneNote—particularly the OneNote for Home windows 10 app, which requires a Microsoft 365 account—for this information as a result of it is cross-platform, versatile, helps many enter sorts (corresponding to contact, handwriting, and stylus), and syncs to a wonderful cloud storage service (OneDrive). Word you can obtain a free model of OneNote that does not require a Microsoft subscription, however that app lacks some options of the for-pay model.

Whether or not you utilize an previous or totally different model of OneNote; a distinct note-taking app, corresponding to Evernote or Bear; or no matter answer your workplace suite supplies, you’ll be able to apply most of the identical group methods I talk about under. Dad and mom can comply with these identical pointers to arrange notes for kids too younger to take action themselves.

One characteristic I do not cowl is OneNote’s Class Pocket book instruments. These capabilities are actually education-focused, however they require coordination with the teacher. For extra normal note-taking recommendation, try our ideas for managing your notes. In spite of everything, different areas of your life can profit from efficient note-taking abilities, too.

Choose a Construction for Your Notes

OneNote’s hierarchical construction is easy. On the prime degree are notebooks, which break down into sections, after which pages. You too can create devoted part teams inside a bit and subpages underneath a web page. Consider a pocket book as the most important collective organizational group, and transfer down one degree from there with every step.

For instance, you can begin by giving a pocket book your college’s identify or degree (corresponding to elementary college, center college, highschool, or school). You should use your yr or grade degree as a bit identify after which create part teams for every quarter or semester for that yr. Then, create a bit for every of your lessons and use particular person pages for notes. In case your lessons do not change every semester or quarter, you needn’t create part teams.

Alternatively, since there is no such thing as a sensible restrict to web page sizes in OneNote, you can simply endlessly replace one web page with associated data. For instance, you can use one web page to create checklists for every day’s homework task, one for taking notes, and one for brainstorming venture concepts.

That setup will get messy shortly, although, so we suggest deciding on a technique that falls someplace within the center. Preserve the group construction however add particular ongoing pages for homework assignments and venture brainstorms. Simply preface the identify of those sections with a numeral to verify it’s all the time on the prime of the checklist (assuming you’re sorting OneNote pages alphabetically). You too can kind pages chronologically, which is probably going a neater approach to discover notes from totally different factors within the college yr. Should you do cannot discover a word, OneNote’s search characteristic may also help you discover matching textual content at any degree.

Here is an instance of what a OneNote hierarchy could appear like for a highschool pupil:

• Pocket book: Excessive College Notes
• Sections: ninth Grade, tenth Grade, eleventh Grade, twelfth Grade
• Part Teams (Excessive College Notes > tenth Grade): Fall Semester, Spring Semester
• Sections (Excessive College Notes > tenth Grade > Fall Semester): Astrophysics, Tax Regulation, AI Structure
• Pages (Excessive College Notes > tenth Grade > Fall Semester > Astrophysics): Homework Assignments, Challenge Brainstorms, Week 1: Interplanetary Journey
• Subpages (Excessive College Notes > tenth Grade > Fall Semester > Astrophysics > Challenge Brainstorms): Potential Routes from Earth to Proxima Centauri b

You’ll be able to change the colour of every Pocket book and Part that can assist you visually distinguish every one. You too can transfer, delete, or rename notebooks, sections, or pages everytime you need. This makes it straightforward to undertake a brand new construction with out having to begin from scratch, as you’d with a bodily pocket book.

Needless to say you could discover a to-do checklist app, corresponding to Todoist, useful for managing day by day assignments. Job administration apps, like Asana, and even kanban apps, corresponding to Trello, may be extra helpful for preserving monitor of ongoing assignments.

Formatting a OneNote Web page for Word-Taking

Pages in OneNote will be intimidating. Not like Phrase paperwork, OneNote pages have few guidelines of construction. You’ll be able to simply click on anyplace and begin typing. This makes it straightforward to jot down notes shortly, however a collage of random notes isn’t useful when you could examine or discover data.

One format tip I’ve discovered helpful is to allow Rule strains. Click on the View Tab > Rule Strains > Slim Dominated. I like to recommend utilizing the Slim Dominated setting since these pointers match up greatest with the default font measurement in OneNote. Should you favor a bigger font measurement, attempt to match it with one of many different line-spacing choices. These rule strains additionally enable you to guarantee that you’re typing within the left-most area on a web page. Simply click on to the left of the pink vertical line, and your cursor strikes to the left-most place on a rule line robotically. After that, you’ll be able to simply begin typing.

One other sensible advantage of enabling the Rule Line view is that the web page appears extra like a bodily piece of lined paper. Relying in your choice, you’ll be able to even swap the background of every web page (mild or darkish), with a wide range of web page colours to select from in every mode. The strains should not a everlasting a part of your doc, so in case you copy and paste textual content or graphics from a web page, they gained’t present up within the vacation spot.

One other drawback you may run into when writing notes is that every one your textual content packing containers will not be the identical measurement. Sadly, there are not any instruments for shortly aligning them or resizing them to the identical width. One workaround is to simply create one field on the prime of the web page and regularly kind your notes in there for your entire web page.

Alternatively, if you could interrupt the textual content field with a graphic, copy and paste the present textual content field into the specified location. As long as there may be sufficient horizontal area on the web page, the ensuing textual content field would be the identical width as the unique. You’ll be able to then use the Rule Strains to align the textual content packing containers, since they snap to incremental horizontal and vertical positions.

You’ll be able to strive enabling the Grid Line view for a exact visible information. Know, nonetheless, that the sides of a textual content field don’t align with the sting of the textual content; textual content packing containers have a little bit of padding. If a textual content field takes up an excessive amount of vertical area, you could delete the additional strains on the backside of it, since there is no such thing as a vertical resize deal with.

Should you ever by chance drag an object too far to the left of the pink line within the Rule Line view, your web page shouldn’t be ceaselessly ruined. Simply transfer the article again over the pink line after which click on both the Zoom to 100 or Web page Width buttons within the view tab to re-center your view. The scroll bar on the backside stops on the fringe of the pink line once more.

Here is a fast abstract of format ideas:

• Allow Rule Strains so as to add construction to the web page.
• Preserve textual content field sizes constant through the use of a single one or copying and pasting the unique.
• Use the pink line to align your notes.

Creating and Enhancing Notes

I gained’t go into each characteristic of OneNote right here, however quite spotlight instruments that may be helpful for writing college notes. For instance, though OneNote’s glorious drawing instruments and enter help are frequent data, do you know that each marking and scribble will get a layer and will be moved or deleted after the very fact? There’s no have to threat highlighters bleeding by means of a web page or obscuring textual content in OneNote—the whole lot will be undone.

As for broad group instruments, OneNote permits you to create customized tags for classifying notes. Click on on the checkbox icon within the Residence tab to get began. You’ll be able to select from current tags corresponding to To Do, Vital, or Reminder for Later, or you’ll be able to create a customized tag. Click on anyplace inside a textual content field so as to add a tag. If you go to seek for that tag, you could add quotes round it for OneNote to acknowledge it as such.

You most likely additionally need to maintain monitor of while you write sure notes. OneNote makes that straightforward. Click on right into a textual content field, right-click, after which choose the final possibility within the context menu, which ought to present your identify alongside the date and time you first created the textual content field. OneNote then provides this data at your cursor’s place.

OneNote additional advantages from built-in instruments for translation and setting an enhancing language. There’s additionally a Good Lookup device for outlining phrases or exploring matters. Each of those choices open in right-hand panels, so that you don’t need to lose your home in your notes.

OneNote has a ton of built-in math instruments. Simply begin typing an equation, and OneNote picks up on the formatting. The Equation and Math menu choices supply extra capabilities. For instance, you’ll be able to format advanced equations, create embeddable graphs, and get step-by-step directions for locating the worth of a variable.

Not all lecture rooms help you maintain a digital gadget out in your desk throughout class, however that shouldn’t cease you from utilizing OneNote. For instance, you can ask your teacher in case you can document a lecture, after which insert the audio recording later. One cool characteristic of OneNote is you can sync audio recordings to your notes, in order that the related elements of a recording play on the precise time you wrote down a word. You would even use a transcription service to transform the recording audio into editable textual content.

You would ask your instructor for a duplicate of the slides they offered, insert these into OneNote, after which add your in-class notes. You’ll be able to even scan your handwritten notes utilizing a scanning app, corresponding to Microsoft Lens, insert these footage into OneNote and replica the textual content from the image by way of the right-click context menu. For many who are studying remotely, you need to use this identical functionality to shortly flip a screenshot into editable textual content.

Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, many college students should be studying from house at the least a part of the time when the college yr begins. Meaning a very good portion of your training shall be delivered digitally. With that in thoughts, verify our information on how and why you must create a separate education-focused account in your PC.

Securing Your Notes

OneNote permits you to password-protect any sections of your pocket book, which is useful if you wish to maintain your notes from prying eyes, however you could not neglect the password you set. It’s not recoverable. Should you neglect your password, there’s no approach to reset entry and you’ll lose all of your notes in that part. One answer can be to retailer this part password in a password supervisor, which you need to be utilizing for varsity anyway. Even so, I don’t suggest utilizing the password-protect characteristic, as a result of the danger simply appears too nice. As well as, locked sections can nonetheless be completely deleted with out coming into the password.

If you wish to safe entry to OneNote, a greater approach is to allow multifactor authentication on the Microsoft account you used to sign up. Microsoft affords a number of strategies for safeguarding your account, together with by way of its glorious authentication app. That approach, you’ll be able to be sure to are the one one signing in to your account.

Though your OneNote notebooks are all robotically synced to your Microsoft account’s OneDrive storage, you should still need to again up your notes on occasion. Sadly, the OneNote for Home windows 10 app doesn’t embrace any guide backup choices. The free Workplace-centric model of the app features a native storage possibility, nonetheless.

To create backups of your word manually, signal into OneNote on the net and head to your Notebooks web page. Proper-click on the pocket book you need to save, and choose Export pocket book. Preserve these exports in a secure location for emergency entry. If you wish to add these exports again into OneNote for Home windows 10, right-click on the Zip file and choose Extract All. Then, right-click on any extracted sections, hover over the Open with possibility, and choose OneNote for Home windows 10. OneNote could require you to create a brand new Fast Notes part earlier than importing that part, however you’ll be able to transfer sections and pages round as you want. These new sections then get synced again to your account’s cloud storage, like some other sections.

Exporting notebooks can be useful for college students who need to share notes. Sadly, OneNote solely formally helps sharing on the Pocket book degree. Should you export a pocket book and extract particular person sections, you’ll be able to simply ship these recordsdata over to a classmate for them to import or copy into their very own Notebooks.

Should you don’t care about re-adding these sections to your pocket book, you’ll be able to print sections to a PDF format, too. To take action, open the part in OneNote on-line (on a Home windows gadget), choose File > Print > Print > Microsoft Print to PDF. Then, simply identify the obtain and choose a save location. You too can print sections to a PDF from the desktop app.

Any of the above strategies is way extra advisable than making an attempt to maintain a bodily pocket book in pristine situation for a complete college yr. To recap:

• Do not lock a bit if there’s any likelihood you will neglect the password.
• Arrange multifactor authentication in your Microsoft Account.
• Head to OneNote on-line to export your notebooks.

Take Word-Taking to a New Degree With OneNote

OneNote for Home windows 10 flexibility and quirks will be intimidating, however it is a wonderful platform for creating and syncing your notes when you choose a construction that works for you. Proper-clicking to create a brand new pocket book could by no means be as thrilling as traversing out to an workplace provide retailer in the beginning of a faculty yr, however this can be very handy. Plus, a digital note-taking app affords you much more versatile formatting and group instruments that don’t contain bodily tearing pages out.