I have been taught as a kid that it is better to write and study- as Christina loves to tell in class as well: we can not write super-fast on paper, so we summarize the material in our mind and write a condensed version of the material- somewhat like a mind mapping. Yes, my habit is so bad that I feel tempted to sit down with a notebook while watching series; why are they so lengthy and overdramatic?
Although I love making my own notes, mapping the different portions together is difficult. For example, taking sequential notes helps me during my cryptography class, but wait- what was the relation between blockchain and cipher? How did I come from mining to nodes? My point is, bullet points help me visualize the concepts from one class, but not the hierarchical and structural dependencies between different subtopics from different classes.
This extends to wider contexts as well. Previously, I had mainly worked on specific technical or research problems where the problem was well-defined. In this class, I enjoyed brainstorming new wild ideas and products- but I couldn’t help but notice how we processed the same idea or product specifics differently. This difference helps to develop a holistic product, but it is important to reach a common consensus before the team starts implementing. Having better visualization techniques helped us present our ideas better during the team meetings and sync our work well.
I will surely use this approach further, while taking notes, making presentations (a flowchart is definitely a great add-on), developing prototypes, and designing our product- oh, it might also make my journaling faster!
