“Typing vs. Handwriting Notes: An Evaluation of the Effect of Transcription Method on Student Learning”

by Matthew Hertogs | Xchanges 8.2

Data

There were two students that took notes and participated in interviews about their various notetaking strategies and perspectives on notetaking for this study. Student 1 is an undergraduate freshman who is part of the interdisciplinary honors program; he is planning to major in engineering and he went to a public high school in California. Student 1 took notes with his laptop for two days and wrote notes by hand for the next two days in Chemistry 142 and Honors 394.³ Student 2 is also an undergraduate freshman who is part of the interdisciplinary honors program; however, unlike Student 1, he was homeschooled. Student 2 took notes in Honors 230⁴ for two days with his laptop and wrote notes by hand for the next two days. Both students used Word 2007 when typing their notes. The notes were scored using a variation of the NOTES evaluation system (see tables below).

Student 1’s Chemistry 142 Notes

Student 1’s Honors 394 Notes

Looking at the scores given by an adjusted version of the NOTES evaluation system, Student 1’s notes were more effective when typed for his Honors 394 class, the more word intensive class. The average score for his typed notes in Honors 394 was 38.5 while the average score for his handwritten notes in the same class was 33.5. However, in his Chemistry 142 class, the differences in scoring between typed and handwritten notes were quite minimal — 33 and 33.5 respectively.

By analyzing the scoring system in three different categories — format, organization, and meaning — distinctive trends within each method of transcription become more apparent. All of the typed notes scored higher in the “format” category; Student 1’s legibility and usage of page with the laptop were usually much more adroit than the handwritten versions. Furthermore, the ease of dating and storing the notes in an accessible fashion gave higher scores in the formatting category for the typed notes.

However, while the formatting score was consistently higher for Student 1’s typed notes in all his classes, the scoring began to diverge between Chemistry 142 (a more mathematical and formula-based lecture) and Honors 394 (a more word-based lecture). In his Chemistry 142 class, the handwritten notes scored higher in the “meaning” category. In contrast, the exact opposite occurred within his Honors 394 class — the typed notes consistently scored higher in “meaning.”

When I revealed my findings to Student 1, he was not very surprised. He initially told me that he found it easier to take better notes in class with his laptop, except for when he had to write “anything involving numbers or formulas because it is much easier to write them than type them.” Student 1 also noted that both his handwritten notes had doodles drawn in the margin, while he admitted checking Facebook “maybe once or twice” during laptop lectures — though he felt doodling was ultimately more distracting.

Student 2’s Honors 230 Notes

In all three categories — format, organization, and meaning — Student 2’s typed notes scored higher than his handwritten notes. Student 2 was not particularly surprised by these results, claiming that “once [he] actually sat down and looked at the differences between the two, it was really obvious how much better the typed notes were.” He attributed the higher typed scores in part to the fact that he could type faster than he writes, allowing him to organize his thoughts more clearly. Like Student 1, Student 2 also found himself doodling on handwritten notes and occasionally checking Facebook on the laptop, but felt doodling was more distracting overall.

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[3] Honors 394 is a class on the history of gender roles.

[4] Honors 230 is a class on human trafficking.