Table of Contents
Having been a student for many years, I have become attached to certain products to assist in my workflow. Here is a list of various applications I use to assist me, as well as how I use them. I also discuss which pieces of software I previously used, and why I moved on from them.
Note Taking
Thankfully, my university is not one to mandate expensive books, and instead provides all the required readings, along with module materials, on a website or in .PDFs
Originally during my undergrad, I used Evernote. At the time, it was one of the only free applications which could be used to capture website information, store it for offline use, and, more importantly, enabled ‘handwritten’ notes which could be ‘scribbled’ in along the margins, something more done in paper books.
As a student, my university granted me free access to the Office 365 suite, and I soon discovered I could use its OneNote. Same functionality, but with significantly less restrictions.
Since then, my workflow is simple. Use the Clipper add-on on the university’s website, store the material in a neatly organised notebook, and then work through it adding my notes as I go.
I initially used a cheap drawing tablet for my handwritten note taking, though was forced to upgrade after the right-side of the tablet began missing some of my writing strokes.
Having purchased a cheap bundle containing Corel Painter, in hopes of undertaking some therapeutic artistic expression, I decided on a significantly better drawing tablet than before, the XP-Pen Deco Pro.
I am very happy with the purchase, the top button toggles between pen and eraser for quick fixes in writing errors, and the dials are used for scrolling and zooming in, saving me from having to put the pen down to use the mouse for navigation, as well as the configurable shortcut keys for undoing, redoing, copying, pasting and so forth.
Additionally, although perhaps only applicable to certain institutions, my university is very mindful of disabilities, and I have found it invaluable to access the transcripts of audio and visual material, copy-and-paste them into OneNote and then read along and write my notes down as I listen/watch the material.
Writing
While I do have access to Microsoft Word via my university access, I struggle with two issues: dyslexia and typos. Both of which have become serious problems using Word due to the spellchecker being unintuitive. I frequently struggle spelling particular words, and despite well over a decade of typing now, I still make frequent mistakes. While the spellchecker does identify my mistakes, it fails to fix them automatically. Instead, I look back at a sentence and see a long string of red underlined words which I then have to go through one-by-one to correct.
It takes time, and it distracts from my train of thought.
As such, being on a Mac, I have free access to Pages, which is significantly more forgiving and corrects most of my mistakes automatically.
However, I still have to load up Word with my near finished assignment for two reasons:
- My professor is using Word and I want to make sure the assignment is formatted correctly for them
- Word counts differ between the two, and I have had last minute additions/removals to fulfil the word count obligations the best I can
Referencing
Although I have been intrigued and tempted by various referencing offerings (not at least by an add-on created by my university to assist in saving and generating references), I am satisfied by my simple system of abbreviations written alongside my notes, and then later reading the handbook for the final bibliography.
Project Planning
Assignments vary, ranging from simple essays to expansive reports.
Most of the time, I write a basic plan in Pages and create a checklist in OneNote on requirements and expectations of what my assignment is expected to do.
However, there are situations where I have to juggle vast amounts of data and obligations. In these cases, I have found myself using one or two of the following applications:
Trello
Trello utilises a ‘Kanban-style‘ approach to task management, which displays tasks as ‘sticky notes’ which can be moved around into different sections.
I have at times needed to break my assignments down into a few key topics, and then find extracts of my notes which align with the topic in question. I can then go through them as I write my assignment, and grab pieces of notes which are relevant. I colour-code them as well, with red as ‘not used’ and green as ‘used’, as well as orange for ‘important’ and blue for ‘not important, but interesting’. As I travel between topics while writing, I can quickly grab the note I need, change its colour to identify it has been used (to prevent accidental duplication of points), and resume with my assignment.
I have tried self-hosted solutions, as Trello does not have offline support, and this has affected my work before. However, I struggled with ease of accessibility, which prevented me from switching away from Trello. However, I am considering revisiting this area again as self-hosted options have seemingly improved.
Pagico
Admittedly, Pagico was not an application I sought out, but rather one included within a bundle I purchased more interested in the other apps on offer.
However, for extensive assignments when I have needed to address a dozen requirements and a seemingly endless amount of topics, I have found Pagico to be very helpful in organising this vast amount of data.
Other
Although I have not needed it every module, I have also used iThoughtsX in the past for my mindmapping and diagram-making needs, and am very impressed with its simplicity and end results.
I have also utilised Studies for the modules with exams, and found its flashcard feature very helpful in drilling bits of information into my memory.
Conclusion
Overall, I have found the process and these applications to support my studies well. As time consuming as it is though, I would recommend trying different options out for yourself to see what works best. For example, many of my fellow students do not handwrite notes, and utilise applications without drawing support, such as Notion. I have also heard great things about various writing applications such as Manuscripts and Ulysses, but for me, I am more than satisfied with simple Pages!
Tags: Applications Productivity