Highlighting in the age of digital content

I have highlighted much of what I read for probably 50 years. I started in college, and I tried different approaches, sometimes highlighting with different colors. My preference was the slim highlighter in yellow. When I began reading using my phone, iPad, and Kindle, I learned how to highlight using these devices. My interest in educational technology led me to look more deeply into the opportunities to highlight and annotate on these devices, and you may have read what I have had to say about these tools in previous posts.

Here is the thing about highlighting. If you follow the research on the efficacy of different learning/study strategies, you soon understand that highlighting is not particularly useful. I knew this too, and I was interested in study techniques long before personal computers were a thing. I taught educational psychology to college students, and studying was a topic I hoped the students would find relevant. 

There are good reviews of the research on highlighting (Dunlosky, et al, 2013) that reach the conclusion that highlighting has low utility. I think it is important to carefully understand the methodology used in the studies that investigate highlighting. What is the breadth of the perspective? In research that examines the application of note-taking, a distinction is drawn between the generative and external functions of notes. I think a similar issue applies here. The research indicates highlighting is not cognitively active and has limited generative value, but what about external storage? If it was an hour before a major test and I was trying to review the 120 pages that were assigned in my textbook, I would rather I had highlighted that book than not.

Here are some of the major findings that challenge the value of highlighting.

Highlighting may improve recall but not comprehension. (see Ponce and colleagues resource as the source for most of the comments focused on recent studies of highlighting)

Learner-generated highlighting can improve memory for the highlighted material. However, this memory boost often doesn’t extend to improved comprehension. If this distinction makes little sense, think of the difference in terms of the types of questions that might be asked to evaluate memory versus understanding. College students seem to gain more memory benefit from self-highlighting than K-12 students, potentially because they are more experienced at identifying key information. Studies focused on the importance of content that is highlighted demonstrate that college students are better at identifying core or main ideas. This makes sense for a couple of reasons. First, highlighting tends not to be encouraged among K-12 students as they use books that are not theirs. Second, college students are more experienced with the educational process and have a better feel for what content is likely to be the focus of future examinations or projects they will complete. As a consequence, and anticipating that advanced learners are likely to make use of highlighting, instruction focused on the identification of priority information is often recommended. Younger students should be asked to highlight and the type of content they designate should be evaluated.

Illusion of Mastery: Like passive rereading, looking at highlighted text can create a false sense of familiarity, leading learners to believe they know the material better than they do. This confuses familiarity with actual retrievability and understanding (Johns).

When I explored highlighting as a study technique with my students, I described a similar phenomenon. I call it the “I’ll get to that later” effect. What I proposed is that students seem to actually identify important content (these are college students), but may be challenged to understand this material. An easy way to move on and complete the reading assignment was to highlight this material, but not stop to struggle with the ideas. Later may not actually happen, or if it does, the highlighted material is then encountered out of context and less easily processed to a deeper level.

Ahrens (citations appear at the end of this post) proposes that underlining (I would assume a practice similar to highlighting) is similar to what Ahrens classifies as fleeting notes. Fleeting notes are taken to quickly capture information, and the idea of smart notes that Ahrens emphasizes focuses on the translation of fleeting notes into smart notes. A smart note can stand alone to convey meaning to the note taker and others and requires the note taker to use personal knowledge to generate a note that is meaningful now and hopefully in the future.

Highlighting of digital material may be different.

Digital reading can be different. Highlights can be exported and saved isolated from the original document. The accumulation of this once-deemed potentially useful text can be searched and examined, or potentially can become the target of an AI chat years later. This is very different than the way we highlighted journal articles or books a decade or so ago. The journals and books were stored in long rows on our office shelves, with the highlighted prose unlikely to be discovered when useful. Some books while read, were returned to the library and not highlighted in the first place. 

An Edutopia article on highlighting reached a negative conclusion about the value of highlighting (it may even hinder learning) and suggested solutions that educators should explain in a way very similar to that of the difference between fleeting and permanent notes. Those who are into Personal Knowledge Management methods for taking and retaining useful notes probably recognize this distinction. Ahrens suggested these terms as a way to identify important content (fleeting notes) with the expectation that this original material will receive further processing. He suggests that students a) annotate their highlights with short summaries and personal reflections or b) generate questions related to the content they have highlighted.

The Edutopia suggestions bring me to the perspective I want to emphasize.

Technology-based reading offers advantages over paper-based reading that are seldom emphasized. I rely heavily on highlighting when I write on my Kindle or using a browser extension that allows me to highlight web content. I don’t read from paper much anymore, but when I do, I also highlight a lot. When I use my iPad or computer to read and highlight, I tend to be using tools that allow me to add annotations (actually extended additions I would prefer to describe as notes) as part of the same integrated approach. I suppose I could read from a paper source and have a notebook on my desk at the same time, but I have never actually worked in this way. These highlights and notes are part of the original documents, but can also be exported for storage and further processing.

When I used to take notes from a highlighted book or journal article, it was usually later in some process of reviewing material in preparation to write something myself. In thinking about how I work now, I propose that reading using a technology-supported environment encourages the process of creating meaningful notes earlier in the process of writing, and is often disconnected from the process of creating the end product. There is an efficiency when meaningful notes are made during the initial process of reading new content in comparison to trying to create the same context when trying to make sense of highlights or notes that simply move unprocessed words from one paper source to another after a delay.

Here is my major use of the highlights from what I have read. As an academic researcher I read many, many journal articles. For the last 15 years of my career and since, I did my academic reading on the pdfs of these articles. Like other academics, I had access to these pdfs from pretty much any journal I wanted and I used these pdfs even when I owned the journals and they were on the shelf across the office from my desk. The tools I used to keep a record of the PDFs I read (originally to access the citations for articles) and to highlight these documents changed over the years, but I generated a large collection (hundreds) of highlighted articles. In recent years, I have been able to export the highlights and annotations and store this material using a personal knowledge management tool (Obsidian on my desktop and Mem.AI online). This large collection of has become a resource I can explore, link and tag. In the past couple of years, I have been able to chat with my content using AI tools (e.g., NotebookLM and Smart Connections). The opportunity being able to interact with material I have generated over decades is a very interesting experience and for someone who writes a boon to productivity,

Given the opportunities of reading on a digital device, I think we are at a point where highlighting may have value. Under these conditions, highlighting services as a placeholder for what should be a fairly immediate generation of meaningful notes. The placeholder has two benefits — it marks and saves a location in content that offers the benefit of context should a reader need to make use of the source material later. The marked material is also isolated through highlighting, and this would seem to benefit the note-making process.

One other conclusion for the Ponce and colleagues review of highlighting studies I drew from in previous sections of this post. These authors concluded that the effectiveness of highlighting was greatly enhanced when used in conjunction with more generative learning strategies, such as note-taking or creating graphic organizers. Combining highlighting with these activities showed a notably larger effect size compared to highlighting alone

I suggest it is time to prepare secondary students for these opportunities. I also argue that educators abandon the paper is best assumption. If learning is understood as a process with initial exposure not isolated from studying and review, I cannot see how paper sources have an advantage. Learn to use a digital highlighting and annotation tool and work this tool into your knowledge generation and storage workflow.

If my position makes sense to you, you may find the series of posts I have generated on note-taking to be of value.

Summary

Highlighting has often been dismissed as an effective learning strategy. Here, I argue that this is an outdated perspective based on assumptions related to the use of paper-based content. With digital content, highlighting can be an important first step in the processing of content for comprehension and value over extended periods of time. 

Sources

Ahrens, S. (2017). How to take Smart Notes: One simple technique to boost writing, learning and thinking for students, academics and nonfiction book writers

Dunlosky, J., Rawson, K. A., Marsh, E. J., Nathan, M. J., & Willingham, D. T. (2013). Improving students’ learning with effective learning techniques: Promising directions from cognitive and educational psychology. Psychological Science in the public interest, 14(1), 4–58.

Johns, A. (2023). The science of reading: Information, media, and mind in modern America. In The Science of Reading. University of Chicago Press.

Ponce, H. R., Mayer, R. E., & Méndez, E. E. (2022). Effects of learner-generated highlighting and instructor-provided highlighting on learning from text: A meta-analysis. Educational Psychology Review, 34(2), 989-1024.

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Writing down a crisis

I began working on a post about the similarities of expressive writing and writing to learn some days ago. In the meantime, the stock market and the general attitude of the country took a decided nosedive. I could not ignore a possible interaction between this dramatic negative mood swing and the original focus of expressive writing so I will just recommend writing to those struggling to deal with our present political crisis and encourage you to read the rest of the post to learn why.

Dr. Jamie Pennebaker found a use for writing that produces both consequential and fairly consistent results. His results relate to clinical psychology which is somewhat outside my own background as an educational psychologist, but I at least can appreciate the impact of an intervention that can be classified as both consequential and fairly consistent as such outcomes are less common than others might imagine when it comes to impacting human behavior. Pennebaker asked college students to think of a traumatic experience from their own lives. His instructions – think about your feelings and emotions related to this experience. I want you to write about this experience for 15 minutes. I will have you do this for three straight days. What you write will be confidential – no one will read what you write. A control group (randomly assigned) was asked to write about their daily routine for the same periods of time. The researchers conducting this study then followed the number of student visits to student health in the following months and found that what Pennebaker eventually described as the expressive writing group had significantly fewer visits. Writing appeared to have an impact on mental health.

I know this seems on the level of magic or weird as I can imagine many reasons this connection might not materialize. Even if the treatment had an immediate consequence on the “problem” why would it follow that the results would be related to medical issues? What if the “problem” was an issue they experienced in their childhood? Why would such a random task during their college days have an impact?

I can’t answer these questions, but hundreds of follow-up studies have produced related results. Pennebaker and other researchers found that expressive writing could enhance immune function, lower blood pressure, reduce muscle tension, and even decrease doctor visits. These benefits were observed across various studies involving participants with both physical illnesses (e.g., arthritis, asthma) and mental health challenges. There has to be something to the benefits of writing.

I first encountered the concept of expressive writing not through my prior work as a psychologist, but because of an interest in the benefits of keeping a notebook. Pennebaker’s work was described in one chapter of Allen’s book “The notebook: A history of thinking on paper”. Once I became interested, I conducted literature searches that might point to an explanation for what about writing might produce this impact. Meta-analytical papers are relevant to the goal of why things work as they do because such papers examine many studies on a given topic, successful and successful experiments, and attempt from this variety of studies to determine what are the factors that contribute to successes and failures. The logic in this approach is that the differences are key to understanding why a technique might be successful and what are the boundary conditions. 

The following are the suggested explanations for the benefits of writing.

  1. Catharsis without social risk. You have likely heard of an LBGTQ+ individual “coming out”. This decision when public provides a release from feelings that you have to hide who you are and what you feel. Perhaps expressive writing works in a similar way even though writing is private. This is my example of how catharsis works and I hope this comparison is appropriate.
  2. Cognitive-processing theory. Writing requires concreteness as the abstract and fuzzy ideas in your mind must be made concrete as the ideas are put down on paper. Pennebaker built a digital tool for identifying keywords and concepts in what was written (not in the original study promising anonymity). Those participants with more positive outcomes made greater use of causation words (e.g., because, cause, effect) and insight words (e.g., consider, know) in the content they produced. Perhaps writing helps work out why something happened to you and how significant long term consequences might actually be.
  3. Self-regulation theory. Being able to label stressors and challenges may give the writer a greater sense of understanding and control reducing negative affect leading to greater confidence in better outcomes in the future.

Generative processing as a general explanation for the benefits of writing

I have tried to translate some of these clinical concepts into something more familiar to me. I see similarities in learning and study techniques described as generative learning. In past posts on generative activities, I have explained that the use of a self-imposed or assigned external task encourages productive mental activities. In other words, a learner has the capacity to apply process productively, but for one reason or another does not. The external task (e.g., answering questions, writing summaries, explaining to a peer) encourages these productive thinking behaviors in order to perform the external task and better understanding and retention is produced as a consequence. The cognitive processing of emotional issues may similarly be manipulated by a concrete external task (i.e., expressive writing). This way of thinking seems to fit with the theoretical proposals in the meta-analyses I listed and I think offers a tangible approach that is easier to understand and communicate.

I can’t help thinking about AI as I write this post. How might one encourage tangible “externalization” and processing of life experiences? You may have heard of ELIZA which while not AI could carry on a conversation of a sort through the use of some clever programming that used language patterns built on the input from a user to generate responses and encourage further input on their part. The Wikipedia link in the previous sentence offers more detailed information. Current large language models can now do far more. AI therapy exists and is controversial, but how different is chatting with CHATGPT and writing something you know no one will read? 

What about Trump and the stock market? I will write something and put it on Facebook and I do hope someone reads it. 

Sources:

Allen, R. (2024). The Notebook: A History of Thinking on Paper. Biblioasis. (Chapter 24)

Frattaroli, J. (2006). Experimental disclosure and its moderators: a meta-analysis. Psychological bulletin, 132(6), 823-865.

Fiorella, L., & Mayer, R. (2016). Eight Ways to Promote Generative Learning. Educational Psychology Review, 28(4), 717-741.

Guo, L. (2023).  The delayed, durable effect of expressive writing on depression, anxiety and stress: A meta-analytic review of studies with long-term follow-ups. British Journal of Clinical Psychology,  62,  272–297. https://doi.org/10.1111/bjc.12408

Pennebaker, J. W. (1997). Writing About Emotional Experiences as a Therapeutic Process. Psychological Science, 8(3), 162-166. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9280.1997.tb00403.

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Linear narrative chains

I have become fascinated with what I now call linear narrative chains (Hays and colleagues, 2008). The phrase is appropriately descriptive in how we experience life including reading and listening to lectures and explains why reprocessing such inputs is important to understanding and learning. What the phrase indicates is that inputs come at us as a sequence of events and ideas. This is obvious when you consider reading a book or listening to a lecture, but it also applies to the events of daily life. One thing follows another.

An important insight related to learning is that what is stored when imagined by cognitive psychologists and to some extent supported by neuroscientists is best understood as a network with links among nodes differing in strength. It follows that some sort of processing and organization is necessary to get from the form of the input to the form of the storage.

When I first encountered this notion of changing information formats, I was reminded of something I used to present to my educational psychology classes. There appear to be different types of memory stores. What might be described as knowledge is stored as a web of concepts connected by links — semantic memory. We also store inputs using other formats, with the most relevant one for this description being episodic memories. I liked to describe episodic memories as stories as this was a convenient way to explain an approximation of this concept. We like stories, and the value of stories can be noted in the way we interact with others. Often, one person tells a story, and then the other individuals respond with a story of their own both to indicate they understand and to further the interaction. We often include stories in writing and teaching as a way to provide examples of ideas. Episodes are stored with our cognitive web linked with the abstract nodes of semantic memory.

Episodic memories (stories) have a time course or sequence. What I speculated about for my class was that stories are often processed into semantic memory and one of the issues with learning from experiences including class lectures was whether the lecture as story was processed into semantic memory. I asked about how students studied their notes and whether they repeatedly went through them and could even imagine where specific items, perhaps a graph, appeared in a location within their notebook. I suggested that this capability indicated at least some aspects of an episodic representation was being retained. The content stored in that fashion may not have been processed for understanding.

When are academic episodic representations converted? I suggested for some this may happen at the time of an exam. A question might refer to an example from class and ask for an application. If the class example had not been processed during the lecture or during study as related to a concept or principle, the student would have to go through this process of abstraction and organization in trying to answer the question.

External activities to encourage processing

I often write about generative activities — external tasks that change the probability of desirable cognitive behaviors involved in understanding and learning. The idea here is that we can understand and learn by self-imposed and self-guided thinking, but this may not happen for a variety of reasons. External tasks can be provided to increase probabilities. Questions are an easy example. Questions encourage different types of processing depending on the type of question. Some encourage recall, and others encourage application.

Some generative activities might have value in converting a linear input. Creating an outline requires a hierarchical organization of ideas. Something closer to the desired output as a web would be mind mapping or concept mapping. If you are unfamiliar, I would recommend Davies ( 2011) as a resource that would explain more than you probably want to know about mind mapping, concept mapping, and argument mapping. Among other things, I learned from this source was that there are differences among these tactics and many subtleties or variants of each. Some researchers and educators who apply concept maps go deep into fine details.

One differentiation among those who conduct concept mapping research (the general term I have always preferred) is whether maps are constructed by learners or constructed and provided by teachers/authors. Concept mapping assignments would be a type of generative activity and encourage the translation of a linear input into a representational web. The provision of a mind map in support of a linear narrative is different and is an attempt to show the structure that the presenter imagines as a way to encourage the learner to consider relationships among ideas that might expand whatever organization of ideas the learner had already established.

Smart notes and the creation of web structures

I am making a transition here that the uninitiated may have trouble following. Some of these who have made the study of note taking a serious focus have developed approaches that are quite different from the continuous paraphrasing and summarization that most learners use in recording notes in a notebook or on a laptop. I think of a smart note (a formal term as used here) as a concise note focused on a specific idea with enough context that it will still convey the original meaning at a future date to the note taker or others with a reasonable background. Think of a smart note as a building block that can then be combined with other smart notes in a cumulative way. The idea of specificity is that a given block can be combined with other such representations in a variety of ways. You can build different structures from different combinations of ideas. Notes are connected in several ways. Some of the possible connections can be attached as metadata — tags and links among notes.

Hopefully, the similarity between such notes and links and concept maps might now become apparent.

A web of notes within Obsidian

Obsidian is my personal note-taking tool, and it fits well with the idea of isolating specific ideas or concepts and then identifying connections between these specific notes over time. Rather than focus on using this tool as a learner, which has been the focus of multiple posts in the past, my intent here is more on the potential of sharing the structure of personal notes with others. So, in keeping with the theme of converting linear narrative chains, how might an instructor or author share the structure behind what they might present as a lecture or written product?

I briefly mentioned how a colleague who teaches history shares his background content with students in a previous post. Here, I want to describe the use of a mapping tool, Canvas, available as an extension to Obsidian. Obsidian includes its own tool for creating a map of notes and connections, but Canvas is more typical of what I have already described as a tool for concept mapping.

The following image shows a Canvas concept map I quickly created to show I might share the web of ideas that might be the basis for a couple of presentations I might offer describing the behavioral and cognitive models of learning. I had to find a workaround for the way Canvas was designed to work. The intention is that a Canvas web would show the entirety of notes. So, if you imagine a note consisting of a paragraph of content, you might have Canvas nodes representing concepts (as is the case in my example) linked with visible nodes containing entire paragraphs. This works fine if you are in control of a device as you can shrink and expand the content that appears on the screen very easily and expand a portion of the display if you need to make the paragraph larger so you can read it. I used a different approach, repurposing a typical text note as a node descriptor and then a link. The link would reveal the linked note layered on the basic map (second image).

To make this work in practice, you would have to pay for an Obsidian service ($8 a month) called Publish. Obsidian is a device-based tool, but Publish offers a web-based interface and storage option that allows others to view your Obsidian vault (a collection of notes). 

There are likely multiple ways in which an individual could generate a shareable web experience for students. I have been focused on how I might do such a thing based on the note tool (Obsidian) I use. As another example example, in a previous post, I explored how Padlet could be used by a middle school or high school teacher to share a web of concepts and notes. 

Summary

Students experience information as linear narrative chains even though the information within is likely based on a web of concepts and ideas. Since human memory is more web-like, the learner must transform a sequence of ideas to fit within his or her personal webs. Concept maps have been used to encourage the building of a personal web and can also be used for the author/teacher to share his/her web to assist in the construction of a personal representation. Note-taking tools based on the identification and linking of core ideas (Smart Notes) offer a related experience on the part of learners and possibly with some adaptations provide a way to share the structure the author/teacher used to generate their presentations. 

Resources:

Ahrens, S. (2022). How to take smart notes: One simple technique to boost writing, learning and thinking.

Davies, M. (2011). Concept mapping, mind mapping and argument mapping: what are the differences and do they matter? Higher education, 62, 279-301.

Hay, D., Kinchin, I., & Lygo-Baker, S. (2008). Making learning visible: The role of concept mapping in higher education. Studies in Higher Education, 33(3), 295–311.

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Notes and the Translation Process

I recently read a research article (Cohen and colleagues, 2013) about students notetaking in college lectures that included interesting observations about the challenges students face. First, information comes at students quickly and to decide what to record and then manually recording what is selected is very demanding preventing little more than getting something down on paper or screen. The second challenge was what I found most interesting. The researchers proposed that students experience a linear flow of information that does not contain much of the structure of what the instructor is trying to communicate. The article proposed that students must try to create a structure after they leave the lecture hall and proposed one approach for doing so. 

This comment got me thinking about a more general model of learning from textbooks and presentations. Lecturers and authors must generate a product that is experienced linearly – i.e., presentations and books. With the exception of headings and subheadings in written material, content creators have a structure in mind that guides the creation of what they produce, but is difficult to share. I read elsewhere a suggestion that a presentation should flow from an outline and the presenter should refer back to the outline from time to time to try to communicate this structure. 

Thinking about the process perhaps at an even deeper level, I came up with the following representation. By increasing the complexity a bit, it might be possible to identify points of intervention.

So, this graphic is intended to suggest that the knowledge of a content creator is present is a cognitive network. To create a practical product for communication, the content creator has to transform aspects of this knowledge network into a hierarchically focused structure. I think an outline (physical or conceptual) is a good way to understand this transition step. This structured representation is then transformed into a linear representation that is shared in one way or another with an audience. As I suggested, a physical form of this outline may also be shared in some cases (the outline itself, or headings and subheadings). The learner then processes this input and from this processing, perhaps consisting of several steps, attempts to generate their own network of personal understanding. 

The initial notetaking or perhaps highlighting would be a basic process and perhaps many students decide this will be sufficient. However, those who propose study skill or personal knowledge management strategies focus on what other activities might be added to improve retention and understanding.

What other activities can be added to recreate the structure intended by the content creator or formed in a more personalized way by the learner? Some of these “post-processing” activities may be familiar. For example, creating concept maps, sketchnoting, the left-hand column and summary of Cornell notes, and the proposal that students take class notes on the left-hand page or their notebook and save the right-hand page for follow-up recollections and additions would fit. All of these tactics involve at least basic connections if not hierarchical relationships.

For those interested in translating the processing of information from the perspective of personal knowledge management. You can substitute a “smart note” for a node in the concept map strategy and consider the similarity of links created among notes by tags and forward and backward links. The sharing of this structure as Obsidian makes possible with Obsidian Publish offers a way to share both information and more complex structure as externalized by a content creator.

I have a book club colleague, History Professor Dan Alosso, who is building something like this for his U.S. History class. The idea is not to replace lectures but to offer related content as organized by the lecturer. Dan writes and offers videos through Substack.

So, what are the points of intervention I mentioned? Certainly, study strategy advocates have many ideas about what processing stage of the model I suggest. The sharing of a structure during or after the exposure of students to content is less frequently explored.

Reference

Cohen, D., Kim, E., Tan, J., & Winkelmes, M. A. (2013). A Note-Restructuring Intervention Increases Students’ Exam Scores. College Teaching, 61(3), 95-99.

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The Space Between Encountering Information and Application

One way to characterize Personal Knowledge Management (PKM) is to suggest it involves the analysis of actual and potential tactics applied between encountering information and the application of that information. I came to this topic with a background in the development and evaluation of technology tools for academic studying which involves considerable overlap with PKM. I think it fair to say that studying offers an advantage to interested parties because it has a superior theoretical framework and a large volume of theory-driven research. PKM seems to have developed within a framework I could describe as logical rather than research-based, but it is related to methods of considerable longevity (e.g., commonplace books, note-taking within procedural systems such as the Zettelkasten). 

This post was prompted by the announcement and availability of a new version of Mem.ai. There are many digital note-taking tools available, but for some time I have concentrated on two – Obsidian and Mem.ai. My rationale has been that I wanted to invest sufficient time in creating and using a personal knowledge management system so that I could offer credible comments on the tools I use and the tactics that are recommended and that I have employed. Part of this involves building a significant collection of notes over an extended period of time. Many recommended practices cannot really be evaluated with a small body of material used for a short period of time. 

When I started using Mem it was because I wanted to explore how AI could be applied within a PKM system. With time, Obsidian extensions allowed several different ways to add AI to Obsidian so there was no longer a unique difference, but I have continued to use both nonetheless. 

Comparing Obsidian and Mem.AI

When comparing how Obsidian and Mem serve writers between reading and writing, there are distinct approaches each platform takes to facilitate the transition from note-taking to writing.

Obsidian

Obsidian is known for its flexibility and emphasis on linking notes to create a network of ideas. It supports a bottom-up approach to writing, where notes are interconnected through backlinks and tags, allowing users to discover relationships between ideas organically. This method aligns with the slip-box or Zettelkasten approach, which encourages the creation of permanent notes that can stand alone and be easily integrated into future projects. Obsidian’s use of markdown files and its ability to handle large volumes of notes make it a powerful tool for writers who prefer a structured yet flexible environment for developing their ideas.

Mem

Mem, on the other hand, focuses on enhancing the linking capability through AI-driven suggestions. It extends beyond manual tagging and keyword searches by proposing related ideas and documents, which can come from the user’s own mems or those shared by team members. This AI-driven approach aims to improve the retrieval and linking of information, making it easier for writers to access relevant content and insights. Mem’s design is centered around the concept of a “second brain,” where storage, retrieval, and linking are optimized to support the writing process.

Key Differences

  • Linking and Organization: Obsidian relies on manual linking and tagging, while Mem uses AI to suggest connections.
  • Flexibility vs. Automation: Obsidian offers more flexibility in how notes are organized and linked, whereas Mem provides automated suggestions to enhance the linking process.
  • User Experience: Obsidian’s interface is more suited to users who prefer a hands-on approach to organizing their notes, while Mem’s AI features cater to those who appreciate automated assistance in discovering connections.

Both platforms offer unique advantages depending on the writer’s preferences and workflow. Obsidian is ideal for those who enjoy a more manual and customizable approach, while Mem provides a more automated and AI-enhanced experience. 

When is the process the product?

Part of the marketing for the original Mem.ai made the argument that the AI capabilities freed users from some of the process requirements of other note-taking tools. The differentiation of notes into folders and the connecting of notes by manual links was not necessary. You could search and chat with your notes to accomplish your goals. Such capabilities were there (@ in Mem to create a link instead of the [[]] in Obsidian), but were claimed to be unnecessary.

The AI can do it for you is what concerns practitioners in some domains for some purposes. Educators may be concerned that students use AI to complete homework assignments. Writing assignments can easily and reasonably be completed by giving an AI tool a prompt. With writing there are two interrelated problems. As a skill writing needs to be learned, so practicing the subskills (procedures) involved in skilled writing are not practiced when the work is done by the AI. A separate concern is that writing is a way to process the content that can be the focus of the assigned writing task and this processing does not happen when the AI provides and assembles the content. There are counters to these concerns as AI can contribute in different ways allowing some subskills that are involved to be ignored so that others can be emphasized, but this possibiity is making my example unnecessarily complicated.

With note-taking, I think of the argument for what I am calling the manual approach is based on the assumed value of generative cognitive processing. I describe a generative activity as an external task that is likely to increase the probability of an internal (cognitive) process. When proposing an example of a generative activity, I use questions. In theory, connecting new concepts with experiences is an important learning process. Individuals may or may not do this on their own. If I request that they provide an example of concept XXX, it is fairly likely they will think and come up with something. Hence, questions function as generative activities

The organization of notes into folders or categories and the searching for connections to be made permanent with links involves thinking and decision-making that is less likely without the commitment to tasks that require such thinking. These actions may also serve generative functions. While educational researchers have proposed and evaluated many manual processing activities associated with note-taking as part of studying, to my knowledge such research does not exist for some of the procedures recommended by recent, digital note-taking gurus (see an earlier post on the lack of such research). So, unlike the abundant research on the benefits of provided and self-generated questions, the specific activities associated with digital (and manual) note-taking skills are largely untested. This is partly the reason I continue to duplicate my collection of notes within both Obsidian and Mem. Personal experience is a weak research tool, but better than nothing. 

This is what I mean by questioning whether the processing requirements of the various note-taking tools strongly contributes to the eventual application. The recent development of systems such as Obsidian and Mem seem more likely driven by the long-term use of information in comparison to what might be associated with academic studying, Purpose and length of the exposure to use processes may be important differentiators. What is interesting about Mem is that it has come out with the argument that AI can eliminate many of the activities focused on and debated by Obsidian users.

Summary

This post attempts to identify and differentiate two note-taking and note-using approaches that can be associated with two specific products. While both systems can now be used in the same ways, the proposed differences are interesting. How important are the manual actions AI can eliminate? I will offer one observed advantage to the AI capabilities that can be applied with either system, with the large collection of notes I have now accumulated, I have found that AI prompts surface useful notes I would not have identified based on the manual links I had accumulated. I suppose there might have been benefit in a continuation of exploration by the use of links, tags, and search, but I must deal with the reality I could not necessarily make the effort. Perhaps continuing to use both and adding links to connections identified by AI makes the most sense.

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Notetaking in the lab and the wild

Human behavior can be scientifically studied in the laboratory and the wild. This is the case with notetaking and other study behaviors. When politicians use the phrase “the science of learning” it can be misleading to the public because science in laboratory settings and in the wild can seemingly lead to different conclusions and related recommendations. I believe that the controversy of the “science of reading” is related to this issue, but I have greater experience with notetaking and study behavior so I will stick to explaining how this works in this more familiar area.

I have been referencing Daniel Willingham’s work a lot lately, and the following quote offers a good introduction to my point. In commenting on textbook companies building in proven study opportunities within their textbooks as aids to students, Willingham offers the following comment:

… if the readings include learning aids such as chapter outlines, chapter previews and summaries, boldface or italicized terms, or practice test questions, don’t try to use these learning aids as a replacement for reading the text. The funny thing about these features is that there’s very good research evidence that they work. Publishing companies paid to have high-quality research conducted; researchers had people read textbook chapters (with or without the learning aids), and they found that people who used the learning aids understood and remembered more than those who did not.

But the psychologists Regan Gurung and David Daniel pointed out that students “in the wild” will not necessarily use such materials the same way they were used by students in the laboratory. Gurung and Daniel suggested that some students use learning aids not to supplement the reading but to avoid it. They read the summary, look at the boldface terms, and then try to answer the practice test questions to see whether they understand enough to we skip the reading.

Willingham and other researchers (e.g., Gurung) note that educational research conducted under carefully controlled conditions may not predict applied situations. Applied situations often involve interactions as individuals make personal decisions about how learning strategies are applied. They may have different goals, different abilities, or different goals and life situations which cause them to use strategies in ways not intended or maybe not at all. Also tactics intended for the classroom situations may not encourage the development of personal skills that would be most likely used in life situations.

When I was still teaching, I sometimes contrasted attempting to do science with humans in contrast to what are often described as the “hard sciences” by note that the chemicals in a chemical reaction don’t decide if they feel like interacting. 

In looking back on my own research which was conducted in applied settings I was continually frustrated by this type of issue. I focused a lot of what I did on trying to create adaptive computer-supported study environments. The idea was that a computer can offer questions related to learning goals and use student accuracy and answer confidence to identify areas of weakness and to provide direct connections to the related textbook material. The idea was to identify heat maps of more difficult material for individual learners, to provide questions related to the areas of difficulty more frequently during a study session, and even to provide access to the question related content on the screen if the student wanted. Built into the online delivery system were ways to record the amount of use, the question performance and awareness of understanding, the use of the online content and the delay following wrong answers. My frustration arose from the findings that the system was really designed to assist less capable students (lower reading ability, poorer metacognitive awareness of strengths and weaknesses) who as it turned out were far less likely to use the system and to use it in ways the research would suggest were helpful (e.g., taking advantage of the feedback following wrong answers and especially wrong answers readers thought they understood). The failed opportunity to use the system to try to recognize the lack of understanding makes a good example of what Willingham, Gurung, and others have described. Even when investing time, these learners answered question after question without taking advantage of the opportunity to process feedback.

Understanding Why Tactics Work

Those situations in which learners invest time, but do so in an inefficient way are what I find most fascinating. Motivation makes a huge difference in learning, but would seem less of an issue with these individuals. Perhaps motivation is reflected in how hard in comparison to how long a learner works. This way of thinking would seem similar to Willingham’s “Outsmart your brain” suggestion that the brain interprets easier as better. It could follow that a possible remedy would be better understanding of how a given tactic works in addition to simply learning how to perform certain tactics. Answering questions is harder than rereading but works better because answering questions requires greater effort in actively engaging memory and thinking. Taking notes is better than highlighting because taking paraphrase notes requires more cognitive thinking. Etc.

I can’t help thinking about the fascination and process-oriented debate those interested in Personal Knowledge Management have with tools and tactics in comparison to most students in formal learning settings. Perhaps this is just an impression on my part, but it seems generally to be the case. If I am correct, I think the difference is in the opportunity self-directed learners have to set personal goals and as a consequence invest time in trying to understand why differences in processes matter. The only alternative I can imagine would involve more direct instruction and how to study instruction is not emphasized or cut when resources are in short supply. 

References

Daniel, David B., and Debra A. Poole. “Learning for life: An ecological approach to pedagogical research.” Perspectives on Psychological Science 4, no. 1 (2009): 91-96.

Grabe, M., & Flannery, K. (2009/2010). A preliminary exploration of on-line study question performance and response certitude as predictors of future examination performance.  Journal of Educational Technology Systems, 38(4), 457-472.

Grabe, M., Flannery, K., & Christopherson, K. (2008). Voluntary use of online study questions as a function of previous minimal use requirements and learner aptitude. Internet and Higher Education. 11, 145-151.

Grabe, M. & Holfeld, B. (2014). Estimating the degree of failed understanding: a possible role for online technology. Journal of Computer Assisted Instruction. 30, 173-186.

Gurung, Regan A. R., and David B. Daniel. (2005).  Evidence-Based Pedagogy: Do Pedagogical Features Enhance Student Learning? (pps. 41–55). In Best Practices for Teaching Introduction to Psychology, Dana S. Dunn and Stephen L. Chew (eds.), Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum.

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Notetaking – Your brain is lazy

My favorite writer who focuses on classroom learning is Daniel Willingham. He has a way of explaining and applying research that is both approachable and actionable. My interests and vocational focus overlap with the topics of his books allowing me to be appreciative of his insights and his creative way of communicating the mindset of educators and writers and the behaviors of both highly motivated and more casual students. 

Willngham’s most recent book, Outsmart Your Brain, considers notetaking multiple times as he examines several learning challenges (the large lecture, lengthy textbook assignments, labs and other hands-on activities). Taking notes in formal educational settings can differ in important ways from the writing I do about autonomous lifelong learners involved in what is often described as Personal Knowledge Management or Building a Second Brain, but he speculates about important cognitive processes rather than just offering “here is what you should do” tactics. I assume that processes generalize and with so little research focused on learning outside of formal educational settings, the commentary I offer is largely based on using what classroom-focused researchers find that would seem to apply to learning on your own. 

The meaning of Willingham’s title, “Outsmart Your Brain”, is that what seems to be an easy to accomplish tactic is often the wrong choice. He differentiates the notetaking choices made when listening to lectures and reading. In contrast to many, it should be noted that Willingham supports the lecture as an important educational strategy. It is efficient as a way to communicate information, and face-to-face efficiency seems to offer better effectiveness than recorded and distributed content. The major challenge with lectures is that we tend to speak much more rapidly than individuals can write and in a large group setting feedback to a presenter is difficult to generate and would varies greatly from listener to listener. The related issue on the part of listeners is that many are unable to sort out what should be retained in notes. Often what is written is what is understood which is understandable, but an example of doing the easier thing. He notes that collaboration or instructor-provided notes offer a solution, but proposes that these resources should be used in addition to taking notes which is a generative cognitive and thus beneficial process.

Willingham supports the researchers arguing that taking notes with pen on paper to be superior to taking notes using a digital device and as proposed in the “desirable difficulty” hypothesis proposes that the insight that more can be recorded on a keyboard provides a false sense of accomplishment. This is another example of the brain making the wrong decision. I disagree on this point and argue that Willingham ignores the opportunity a digital device can provide a written record and link audio to notes in ways that allow missed information to be re-examined. A link references the corresponding location in the audio when a note was taken. Willingham does recognize and discuss recording lectures, but discusses this opportunity as inefficient unaware I assume that the connections some apps store between notes and audio (or video) allow learners great control of how the audio is used. 

Willingham discusses note-taking as a useful addition to reading recognizing that with reading the learner does not have to deal with the lack of control present when listening. The flawed option he calls out is highlighting which again offers the learner a false sense of accomplishment. He cites an interesting study in which multiple used textbooks from the same class were examined and the finding that the text selected as important varied greatly. I could not help thinking of the “most common highlighted” option available with Kindle books. 

A common issue with both lectures and books is that both tend to be hierarchical, but are experienced as sequential experiences. I interpret this problem to be one that understanding is the construction of a model of how things are interrelated. Lectures and writers tend to have this model and organize what they offer accordingly, but the experience of the learner is sequential and building a hierarchical model in real time is often too demanding. Imagine an outline that is used to develop a lecture or written product and in which the product shared moves through each part of the outline from higher to lower elements as a sequence and you can imagine the issue of reconstructing the outline. Learners can rework the content they have stored in search of this structure and presents can help by offering an overview and referring back to this overview as the presentation unfolds. Willingham speculates that learners possibly read textbooks based on their experience with fiction.

Willingham proposes two additional strategies making use of notes often ignored by students. The first is the sharing and discussion of notes within small groups. Again, this is not to replace the task of taking notes, but a way to identify ideas that have been missed or misunderstood. The second is a cross-examination of notes taken from lectures and from assigned readings. Too many seem to assume that the elimination of one source is a possible opportunity, but he argues that cross-referencing sources like cross-referencing with peers allows for additional active processing.

Summary

This was intended as more than a book review, but it is a recommendation that both educators and learners read this book. Many reviewers have noted that it should be assigned reading for new college students faced with the challenge of taking more responsibility for their own learning. The notion that the brain leads us to do things in the moment that are not necessarily the best for the future is important to recognize and the assumption that taking notes or reading a book could benefit from the consideration of nonobvious strategies deserves careful consideration. When are important study skills taught and which educators are responsible for helping learners develop these skills? 

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