My Current Note Taking Routine

I haven't posted in a while because my history research has been put on hold for another project. I'm currently building a website for a future-non-profit I'm building, called Executive Dysfunction Research and Advocacy (Facebook, Facebook Group, Twitter). Basically for the last 5 and a half months I've been neck deep in research papers about Executive Functions, and taking infinite notes and doing a bunch of writing. And someone in a different Facebook group (Ologies Podcast) today asked folks for academic writing advice. I started to answer it over there, until I realized that I should probably just turn it into a proper post here. It took me a couple months to develop this system, but it seems to be working well for me now!

First off, I put the paper into Mendeley and I have been using Microsoft OneNote to take my notes. I have Mendeley downloaded on both my windows computer & my boyfriends Macbook which I occasionally borrow, and I have OneNote downloaded on my desktop, and use it via the browser when I'm on on the Macbook, so I can work from either device, which is nice!

I have different sections for the different executive functions (EFs), and then within each section, I have notes for each source, and I also do my writing drafting in there too.

To be honest, most of my notes at this stage is just me copy/pasting parts I think I may reference or quote later, and putting it into OneNote. I try to bold the parts that will help me quickly see where I should put that bit of text in my note outline later.

After MONTHS of dealing with some papers being horribly formatted so that when I copy/pasted text it included excessive and nonsensical line breaks. For a long time I was using Notepad++. When I pasted something and it looked like that, I would then cut it again, then paste it into Notepad++, then selected all, then ctrl + J to remove the line breaks, then I'd paste it back into OneNote. That's incredibly tedious though, and just last week I found something else instead!

Now, I've installed PDF Copy Paster, and instead of reading within Mendeley itself, I just right click a paper and select "Open File Externally." That opens the pdf with Adobe Reader. Then, when I copy/paste, all the line breaks are AUTOMAGICALLY removed! So, that's a nice time saver. But I still have an unbelievable amount of ex- essive hyph- enizations like this that dr- ive me ban- nanas, but since I don't feel like adding another step to put the text into Word or something and doing a search & replace (does that work if you just want to delete a hyphen and the space after it?), I just suffer with it for now. (And I do mean suffer. UGH the red squiggles make it even worse!)

Anyway, the next step involves another new find of mine, Dynalist. I have folders for each EF, and then a page for each eventual page on the website. I can use bold & check boxes

On each page I start with a general structural outline for the page. Then, after I read each paper (or sometimes after a few), I then put Dynalist on one half of my screen and OneNote on the other, and start copying the text into the outline. I put it in the correct section, and as I find patterns in the notes, or new ideas, I will add new sections to the appropriate pages as needed. I will group quotes into sub-sections based on theme/idea just to make it easier to reference when i get to writing, and to make the notes better managable (as you can collapse sections). So the sub-sub-sections don't necessarily mean they'll have their own bit/section in the writing, it just brings together the bits about the same thing from various sources so I can choose the best quote or better reference the idea when I mention it in the writing (if I do at all).

I don't know if this is the most efficient method or not, but currently, before I start copying my notes over, I type & copy to my clipboard " (1st Author's Surname) ". Then, after I copy the text into the note outline (ctrl + V), I hit (ctrl + shift + v) and then hit the number the author is on (for me it's usually 2). I use ClipX clipboard manager so that I can have multiple things in my clipboard at once. But this way, even if I move the notes around, I never lose the source.

Then, as I write, I keep my screen split between Dynalist & OneNote, and I work from my notes as I go, checking off the ideas/quotes I use. For me and how my brain works, this is working quite well for me so far! If my system changes in the future, I will update here.

Oh and one last thing! I also have been using Focus To-Do as my pomodoro timer. It helps me keep track of the passing of time and thus helps keep me from spending too much time on certain tasks, and reminds me to take small breaks throughout the day so that I don't burn myself out.

On Writing EVERY Day (Advice from Twitter)

As a person who follows hundreds of academics across social media, I very frequently see reminders that we should all be writing something every day. Indeed, that was the main reason for making this blog, so I could practice stringing sentences together at least several times a week. But, as anyone who has seen this blog can see, I haven't actually been writing about what I'm researching, only how I'm researching.

The problem is, I haven't known what to write about my topic. I'm researching a number of rather obscure people, groups, and communities, so I don't feel like I have enough information about anything or anyone to write about in any way worth my time quite yet. I did start an annotated bibliography recently, but other than that, I haven't really been "writing" anything yet. Outside of the hundreds of index cards I've been furiously scribbling my notes onto for the past week, that is.

So, during a work break this morning, I shot off the following tweet:

Many academics say it's important to write EVERY day, but what about when you're in the early days of a project, just really starting to take notes and gather information?

I feel like I *should* be writing, but *what* @ this stage? 🤔#twitterstorians #AcademicTwitter #PHDchat

— Ameya Warde (@ameyawarde) March 13, 2018

Now usually, when I ask questions on #twitterstorians or #AcademicTwitter, I almost never get a reply. But, by some magic (and kind RTs from @AcademicChatter, @raulpacheco, & @erin_bartram!) I actually did get a slew of them this morning, and I think they're worth sharing here, too.

Prelim literature review, summaries of works read, essentially annotated bibliography.

— Spring Forward Spice (@errabund) March 13, 2018

In the beginning of my PhD, I wrote a couple of paragraphs summary for each paper I read as in overview why this paper is important for my project. That was quite helpful at a later stage :)

— Mara (@CuriousZebra_) March 13, 2018

That’s when I find my favorite pen and some quality paper and just start jotting down notes or start a mind map. For me, that tactile endeavor is enough in the early stages.

— Daniel Martínez (@dmmartinezphd) March 13, 2018

I like to do literature review when I start a project, to get a feel of where the field of research is at. I also jot down lots of notes/ideas for current (or future) research projects!

— kelsey rose (@kelseyrosemcd) March 13, 2018

Idea dumps are game changers

— Caroline (@carolinecpro) March 13, 2018

I wrote blogs on some of the empirically or theory, or just to explore ideas in a short, low pressure way.

— Professor_of_Power (@Prof_of_Power) March 13, 2018

There were also a number of tweets in support of note-taking itself being considered academic writing:

I count all of that as writing. Early writing just looks different than what you write when your project starts to gel.

— Erin Cassese (@ErinCassese) March 13, 2018

.@ashley_edes @ameyawarde thanks for the kind words! Any sort of written reflection (even "God I don't know where my project goes" IS #AcWri

— Dr Raul Pacheco-Vega (@raulpacheco) March 13, 2018

My website is temporarily down (hopefully back soon) but here's a blog post on what counts as academic writing (surprise - A LOT) https://t.co/eVTrXjvzTq we can't just count "putting words on the page"

— Dr Raul Pacheco-Vega (@raulpacheco) March 13, 2018

And I think @HthrLynnJ's points are especially important and worth highlighting:

When I don’t know what to write, I free write about ideas I’m having related to the work, including what I’m finding challenging. I try out different lines of arguments. I make notes on things I’m reading. Idea generating is tough. I write through it to learn and grow from it.

— Heather Johnson (@HthrLynnJ) March 13, 2018

Last semester I tasked one of my PhD students to write to “Notice and Wonder.” As academics, our job is to develop new ideas. When we write, we record how our ideas are evolving. Our papers become contributions by nurturing and growing those ideas.

— Heather Johnson (@HthrLynnJ) March 13, 2018

You bet! Learning to write to learn has been one of the most valuable processes I’ve developed in this endeavor.

— Heather Johnson (@HthrLynnJ) March 13, 2018

METHODS: Citing Your Sources-- Avoiding Plagiarism - Safe Practices - 2.4 Historical Methodology, saylor.org

Reading: Dr. Steven Kreis’s The History Guide: A Student’s Guide to the Study of History: I've just started working my way through Saylor.org's HIST104: Historical Methodology - The Art and Craft of the Historian, and I'm now on Unit 2: Basic Historical Research Skills. 

In lieu of me actually being in a class where things are discussed, I'll just write my thoughts about the materials here.

2.4 Producing a Finished Product

2.4.3 Citing Your Sources—Avoiding Plagiarism

Reading: Purdue University’s Online Writing Lab: Karl Stolley’s and Allen Brizee’s 

“Avoiding Plagiarism”: “Is It Plagiarism Yet?,” and “Safe Practices”

in "Is It Plagiarism Yet?" the author's reiterate that citation is needed for all words, ideas, visuals, and media that originate from any person, 'magazine, book, newspaper, song, TV program, movie, Web page, computer program, letter, advertisement, or any other medium'.

Citations are NOT needed for "common knowledge" ('folklore, common sense observations, myths, urban legends, and historical events'), 'generally-accepted facts' (including 'facts that are accepted within particular discourse communities'), your own thoughts, observations, conclusions, experiment results, or art (of any format).

According to the authors, a fact can (generally) be considered common knowledge if you can find it documented 'in at least five credible sources/' When in doubt, cite, and an editor or teacher can let you know what is superfluous.

 "Safe Practices" gives a number of suggestions of how researchers can avoid accidental plagairism down the line. This includes labeling 'someone else's words with a big Q' or use "big quotation marks." For ideas, you can label those from the source with a big S, and those from yourself with ME. And of course, always make sure the citation for your source is written with the notes.

 The author's instructions for paraphrases or summaries (whole list is a direct quotation)

•  Use a statement that credits the source somewhere in the paraphrase or summary, e.g., According to Jonathan Kozol, ...).

• If you're having trouble summarizing, try writing your paraphrase or summary of a text without looking at the original, relying only on your memory and notes
• Check your paraphrase or summary against the original text; correct any errors in content accuracy, and be sure to use quotation marks to set off any exact phrases from the original text
• Check your paraphrase or summary against sentence and paragraph structure, as copying those is also considered plagiarism.
• Put quotation marks around any unique words or phrases that you cannot or do not want to change: e.g., "savage inequalities" exist throughout our educational system (Kozol).

 For direct quotes, the author's recommendations include keeping the 'source author's name in the same sentence as the quote,' correctly use quotation marks &/or block-text format, according to the style, and to quote only the material necessesary (both in selections & amount of text within that selection.)

Ellipsis (...) can be used to remove excess information and thus shorten the quotation, but 'terminal puncutuation' should be maintained between the ellipses. Context or other slight changes to a quote can be done with brackets ( [ ] ) but one must 'be careful not to editorialize or make any additions that skew the original meaning' 

Writers should 'proofread and cross-check' with your notes and sources' to make sure all outside words, ideas, etc are properly credited.

METHODS: Citing Your Sources-- Avoiding Plagiarism - Footnotes - 2.4, Historical Methodology, saylor.org

Reading: Dr. Steven Kreis’s The History Guide: A Student’s Guide to the Study of History: I've just started working my way through Saylor.org's HIST104: Historical Methodology - The Art and Craft of the Historian, and I'm now on Unit 2: Basic Historical Research Skills. 

In lieu of me actually being in a class where things are discussed, I'll just write my thoughts about the materials here.

2.4 Producing a Finished Product

2.4.3 Citing Your Sources—Avoiding Plagiarism

Reading: Dr. Steven Kreis’s The History Guide: A Student’s Guide to the Study of History: 

“Section 4.11: The Research Essay—Footnotes”

In this section, which is written specifically for students of history, explains how to properly use footnotes in a paper. Footnotes (or endnotes) MUST be used:

• to cite every direct quote used
• when a controversial fact or opinion is given
• on the statements that are the main points of your paper

They can also be used: 

•  to include your own thoughts/statements about something that doesn't fit into the outline/flow of the paper

The author points out that if you have a string of pages with few (or no) footnotes, you are probably not citing things that you should be, but also 'if you insert a footnote every other sentence, then you may be overdoing it.

A single footnote at the beginning or end of the paragraph can be used instead of a string of footnotes all citing the exact same thing, but this is acceptably ONLY 'if and only if the note refers to the information in the paragraph as a whole.'

 Footnotes should be at the end of a sentence or quote, in superscript. It is okay if two notes are needed in the same sentence, though. The appropriate style manual should be consulted for the details of how to format footnotes.

METHODS: Conducting Research and Organizing Information - Preparing to Write - 2.3, Historical Methodology, saylor.org

I've just started working my way through Saylor.org's HIST104: Historical Methodology - The Art and Craft of the Historian, and I'm now on Unit 2: Basic Historical Research Skills. 

In lieu of me actually being in a class where things are discussed, I'll just write my thoughts about the materials here.

2.3 Conducting Research and Organizing Information

2.3.5 Preparing to Write an Essay

Reading: Purdue University’s Online Writing Labs: Stacy Weida’s and Karl Stolley’s 

“Invention: Starting the Writing Process”

This page discusses the use of rhetorical elements to help orient you as you begin to write. They include the follow questions to ask yourself:

• Who is the audience for your writing?

• Do you think your audience is interested in the topic? Why or why not?

• Why should your audience be interested in this topic?

• What does your audience already know about this topic?

• What does your audience need to know about this topic?

• What experiences has your audience had that would influence them on this topic?

• What do you hope the audience will gain from your text? 

 They also include a list of some of the different purposes writing can have, as it's important to know what you are trying to do before you start to write. One paper can use multiple strategies at different points.

• Summarizing: Presenting the main points or essence of another text in a condensed form

• Arguing/Persuading: Expressing a viewpoint on an issue or topic in an effort to convince others that your viewpoint is correct

• Narrating: Telling a story or giving an account of events

• Evaluating: Examining something in order to determine its value or worth based on a set of criteria.

• Analyzing: Breaking a topic down into its component parts in order to examine the relationships between the parts.

• Responding: Writing that is in a direct dialogue with another text.

• Examining/Investigating: Systematically questioning a topic to discover or uncover facts that are not widely known or accepted, in a way that strives to be as neutral and objective as possible.

• Observing: Helping the reader see and understand a person, place, object, image or event that you have directly watched or experienced through detailed sensory descriptions.

 Once a thesis has been made and the aforementioned things have been taken into consideration, the authors instruct us to "just start writing!", ignoring issues of formatting, grammar, complete sentences-- i.e., brainstorm as much as you can think of that relates to your thesis. Then you can re-read and evaluate, and cut that which doesn't fit. From there you can go on to build an outline structure for your paper.

I'm a Hang Glider of Academic Writing!

I'm definitely not at the writing stage of my projects yet, but I just stumbled upon The Writing BASE quiz on The Writer's Diet and couldn't resist taking it. I might have to check out this book when it's time!