Free Cornell Notes templates to save you time and help you use the Cornell method effectively.
Taking notes is inevitable for university students, but not all notes are created equally. A messy page of scrawled impressions isn’t going to help you as much as a well-thought-out and carefully organized sheet detailing what you learned and what you still need to know. Cornell Notes are great for improving your critical thinking skills and learning to manage your notes visually, making them easier to understand and review. By highlighting the most important information and keywords, you are more likely to remember the lesson.
What are Cornell Notes
Cornell University Education Professor Walter Pauk created the Cornell Notes system in the 1950s to help students organize and summarize the notes they take in classes. This well-respected system is easy to learn. By breaking the page into four primary sections, not only is the information neatly organized, but it is also easy to review. The keywords and questions area lets you expand upon anything you need to delve into more deeply. However, most of the page is dedicated to the information collected during the class.
Cornell Note-Taking Method
The Cornell Note Taking Method breaks your pages into four basic areas.- At the top is a large section for a title and the date.
- Below that, the main body of your page is split into two vertical columns, roughly 30% of the page on the left and 70% on the right. These sections will be for your keywords and questions on the left and notes from the class with main ideas and essential concepts on the right.
- Finally, at the bottom, you will summarize your notes briefly so you can review the whole page in a minute or two.
In addition to the handy format, Cornell Notes uses a process for note-taking that helps you remember the information better. Not only will you write down what you are learning, but you’ll have to use the data later as you review, so critical thinking is essential. You must listen for the main ideas and ensure you get all the main concepts and keywords and any questions you may need to answer as you study and find a way to boil that information down to just a few sentences for your summary.
