Manuals on note-taking formeda subset of advice books on how to study that appeared in the mid-seventeenthcentury.

The problem in my experience isn’t that teachers don’t teach enough notetaking systems… the problem is we don’t have good tools to ramp up the difficulty of an individual student’s education at an appropriate rate.

For most people, the most efficient method to get a quality paper done is to sit down and write it. Short of a project like a dissertation, most people can handle the organization of an essay without a lot of front-loading.  Predictably, then, kids start resenting being forced to outline for no reason. Ditto studying habits or notetaking; most of my “good” students hate taking notes because … why should they bother? They’re going to remember most of what they actually need to know without having to study, not least of which because they’re more likely to be tested on skills than knowledge.

Weirdly, in the master of fine arts classes I’ve taught so far, there’s never been a single class on how to store and access your research.