Write It on paper

As someone who has to write repeatedly, either in the way of university assignments or articles, I have to be constantly seeking sources of information in order to get the best data I can and to summarize It in a proper manner. To do this, I usually check books to get the knowledge that their authors have to offer. However, I did notice at one point of my career in university that I usually forgot what I learned in a span of just weeks after studying and applying that information, having to constantly go back to the books I've read before and taking much more time of my advance through It. I know that this has happened also to anyone who reads books or any source of information, where we can't seem to attach anything to our mind for long periods of time. It's because of this that I write this article, in order to provide you with the reasons as why you might be not remembering what you want to from what you read and the importance that employing certain strategies that has worked for me, like taking notes, can bring you. Let's begin:

Why does It happen?

When you are reading to remember something, like an specific date, you use a process known as maintenance rehearsal, where you constantly repeat what you just read in order to remember It. However, this type of memorizing method is pretty superficial and cannot guarantee much for your retention skills, as It just becomes floating information that wanders in your brain, using only pretty specific parts of your mind in order to get It right and forgetting what you just learned after a short period of time. Besides this one, there is another process for learning known as elaborative rehearsal, where you use all kinds of associations with the information absorbed in order to get It attached to your brain. Associating the first letter of a chemical element you have to memorize with a planet, or even imagining an hypothetical scenario where you meet someone with that particular name, to just writing it in a piece of paper writing a related image in order to identify It, all of these strategies count as elaborative rehearsal, and note-taking is one that specially uses It.

Now that we know this, we can point the main factors as to why taking notes is so important for memorizing new concepts:

1.- Identifying the information with something "tangible"

As I've pointed out previously, by writing something in a piece of paper you'll be able to remember It more clearly, as you will have to process the Idea before you write It down, analyzing It and even asking how can you apply It to your daily life. In this way you'll be able to think through any particular concept before just putting It down in a piece of paper.

2.- Forces you to focus

By having to read and write specially what strikes you about a particular part of that piece of information you're reading, you'll be much more focused, all because you have to pay attention to what you're reading to see If It is worth thinking about or just a bunch of connectives.

3.- Uses the whole brain:

By applying different kinds of methods for writing down something, you'll find yourself much more engaged along with your brain as you come up with new ideas to retain the information, a way more enjoyable way of absorbing data than If you just sit down to read something and tried to remember by just looking at It repeatedly.

I hope that with the information provided in this article I could have given you some pointers as to why you might not be able to remember what you learn after a certain time period, and how applying something so simple and reliable like taking notes can bring great advantages to you, not only by increasing the things you can memorize, though also by making It all much more engaging. Thank you for your support and good luck!