Taking notes is the first job of any student, and often the least thought through. You write down as much as you can, as fast as you can, and the pages then sit in a binder until exam season. The Cornell method offers something different: a page laid out so that your notes become a study tool. This article explains it step by step, says honestly what research knows about it, then shows how to go from notes to study guides and flashcards. On the tool side, Mindlet has a rich-text note-taking editor where you can write your Cornell page, then it turns your notes into study guides and mind maps, and into questions to review.
Where does the Cornell method come from?
It was designed by Walter Pauk, a professor at Cornell University, in the 1950s. He spread it through How to Study in College, a guide first published in 1962 and revised many times since. Cornell’s own study support center still teaches it today (Cornell University, Learning Strategies Center).
What does a Cornell page look like?
Take a sheet of paper and draw two lines:
| Area | Where | What goes in it | When |
|---|---|---|---|
| Notes | Wide column on the right (about two thirds of the width) | The ideas from the lecture, in short phrases, abbreviations, diagrams | During the lecture |
| Cues | Narrow column on the left | A question or keyword next to each important idea | The same day, after the lecture |
| Summary | Strip at the bottom (five to seven lines) | The lecture in a few sentences, in your own words | The same day, after the cues |
The left column stays empty during the lecture. That is deliberate: it gets filled in afterwards, when you go back over your notes.
What are the steps?
Cornell’s study center describes the method in five steps, often called the five Rs. In short:
- Record. During the lecture, write the main ideas in the wide column. Do not try to capture everything: leave gaps, use abbreviations.
- Question. The same day, reread your notes and write a question in the left column for each important idea. “What are the phases of mitosis?” rather than just “mitosis”.
- Recite. Cover the notes column with a sheet of paper. Read each question on the left and answer out loud, from memory. Then check.
- Reflect. Ask yourself how this lecture connects to earlier ones, what it is for, what is still unclear. Write the summary at the bottom.
- Review. Every week, go back to older pages and repeat step 3 on the questions.
What does research say about Cornell notes?
There are few solid studies comparing the Cornell layout directly with other note-taking formats, and their results are mixed. Nothing shows that drawing two lines on a page makes you learn better by itself.
What is well established is the set of mechanisms the method puts to work:
- The “recite” step is a test. Answering the left-column questions from memory is active recall. In Roediger and Karpicke (2006), Psychological Science 17(3), 249-255, students who tested themselves on a text remembered 61 percent of it a week later, against 40 percent for those who reread it. Our article on active recall goes through this result.
- The “review” step is spacing. Going back to your pages every week applies the spacing effect, which major reviews rank among the two most effective study techniques (Dunlosky et al., 2013).
- The summary forces you to rephrase. Writing in your own words takes more effort than copying, and that effort helps you remember.
So the Cornell method is valuable mostly for what it makes you do after the lecture. A Cornell page whose notes column you never cover is just a page of notes with a wide margin.
By hand or on a laptop?
This question comes up a lot. In 2014, a widely cited study concluded that students who took notes by hand understood the lecture better than those who typed (Mueller and Oppenheimer, 2014, Psychological Science 25(6), 1159-1168). A direct replication published in 2019, with the same lecture videos and the same questions, did not find a significant difference (Morehead, Dunlosky and Rawson, 2019, Educational Psychology Review 31(3), 753-780).
A reasonable conclusion: use whatever suits you. On a laptop, resist the urge to transcribe word for word; the Cornell method works fine in a two-column table.
How do you turn notes into a study guide?
A good study guide is not a tidy copy of your notes. It is a tool for testing yourself. From a Cornell page, you build it in three steps:
- Keep the summary from the bottom of the page as the guide’s introduction.
- Collect the cue questions from the left column, grouped by topic.
- Add what must be known by heart: definitions, formulas, dates, diagrams to reproduce.
You then use the guide the same way as the Cornell page: cover the answers and test yourself.
How do you turn notes into flashcards?
The left column is already a deck of flashcards waiting to happen. Each question becomes the front of a card; the answer is in your notes. A few rules so the cards work:
- One idea per card. If the question calls for a list of six items, split it.
- A short, precise answer. If you cannot tell for sure whether your answer is right, the question is too vague.
- Do not drop the cards you know. Review them less often, but keep reviewing them.
Our guide on how to make good flashcards covers these rules, with bad cards rewritten.
What Mindlet does, and what it does not
Mindlet is not a note-taking app. It does not replace your notebook or your word processor during the lecture.
It comes in afterwards. You can bring your notes in three ways: a photo of your pages (JPG or PNG; the iPhone’s default HEIC format is not supported yet), a PDF or Word file, or the text of your notes pasted into the input field. The AI then generates flashcards and exercises, and can produce a structured study guide (definitions, tables, “remember”, “watch out” and “example” boxes) and a mind map. The app then schedules your reviews with spaced repetition. Keep in mind that the app interface is in French, while your cards and guides can be generated in nine languages, including English.
You can also write a course directly in Mindlet, or create your own cards one by one. The Cornell method stays yours; Mindlet handles the step people drop most often, the fifth one: reviewing every week, at the right time. If your exam is close, our one-week study plan shows how to use those notes in the final stretch.
FAQ
Frequently asked questions
What is the Cornell note-taking method?
It is a note-taking method developed by Walter Pauk, a professor at Cornell University, and popularized by his book How to Study in College (1962). The page is split into three areas: a wide column for notes, a narrow left column for questions and keywords, and a space at the bottom for a summary.
Does the Cornell method work?
Studies that compare the Cornell layout directly with other ways of taking notes show mixed results. But the step where you cover your notes and answer the questions in the left column applies the testing effect, one of the best-established memory mechanisms. That step is where the method earns its value.
Should I take notes by hand or on a laptop?
A 2014 study by Mueller and Oppenheimer found an advantage for handwriting. A direct replication in 2019 by Morehead, Dunlosky and Rawson did not find a significant difference. What you do with your notes afterwards, rephrasing them and testing yourself on them, matters more than the medium.
How do I turn my notes into flashcards?
Use the question column of your Cornell notes: each question becomes the front of a card, and the answer is in your notes. Add a card for each important definition, date or formula. An app such as Mindlet can also generate cards from the text or a photo of your notes.
