Your timetable is complete and so the real
work is about to begin. Fortunately, there is an embarrassment of riches when
it comes to note-taking apps for OS X and iOS.
The
best note-taking apps focus on not only making notes, but on finding and
sorting them later as well
First among these, in our opinion, is
Evernote (evernote Corporation, OS X, iOS: free, Premium version: $4.5 per
month, $48 per year). The basic version costs you nothing at all and yet is still
a fairly powerful suite of tools. Essentially it’s a big but well-ordered
briefcase in which you can store all manner of coursework for effortless
retrieval later on. You can import images, PDFs, internet clips and so on and
over these you can add your own text and annotations in order to clarify
salient points or remind you to explore in more depth later on. All of this
information is stored centrally so if you install the apps on all your
computers and iPads and phones, you’ll have access o your work at any time.
It’s incredibly useful for jotting down any ideas that occur to you, taking
copious notes in class and storing important websites that you can later view
offline. The free version, while extremely generous in its offering, is limited
in various ways. If you come to depend upon the Evernote system you might want
to consider paying the annual subscription that gives you bigger uploads, the
option to take your stored notes offline to view at any time, sharing of notes
with other users, and the rather nifty option of being able to search text in
images.
Not all students require such an exhaustive
set of tools, so a cheaper, more streamlined, but still very powerful option is
Course Notes (Dear Panda LLC, OS X: $4, iOS Universal: $4). The basic features
include the ability to make notes from text image and PDF sources, organize
your notes according to subjects and link assignments to them, and sync your
work over Wi-Fi between your desktop computer and mobile devices. It’s
straightforward. But an elegant way to keep all your stuff in one place.
NoteHub
If you really only want an alternative to a
briefcase and pad in class and don’t want to lug your laptop around, you
couldn’t do better than NoteHub (Hubapps.com, LLC, iOS: free). This iPad-only
app enables you to easily store text notes and call calculations, make
sketches, attach documents and organize your work via a simple interface.
To finish, there are a couple of
non-essential, but rather pleasing apps any committed student might want to
consider. Skitch (Evernote Corp, OSX and iOS Universal: free) is a stylish app
that enables you to import web pages, documents, photos and the like, and via a
few swipes, add arrows, annotations and so on in order to quickly and easily
store information for later study. In this regard it’s useful both to students
and teachers.
The fashion-conscious student should also
look out for Paper by FiftyThree (FiftyThree Inc, iOS: $2-$7.5 IAP). It’s a
very basic note-taking app but it’s beautifully presented in the style of
individual, high-quality notebooks (of the Moleskine variety famously used by
Ernest Hemingway and Picasso). After scribbling and sketching your ideas you
can then flick through the pages of these beautiful objects.
Revision apps
Regardless of how well you comprehend the
tidal wave of information that washes over you during a given college term,
making it stick and being able to recall it at will is entirely another matter.
When the dreaded exams lumber into view on the horizon you need something to
make the process of revision that much more efficient and enjoyable.
Our primary recommendation is Mental Case
(The Mental Faculty, OS X: $32, iOS: $4.5). Despite the hefty price tag, we
would suggest you try to squirrel away the readies for the OS X and iOS versions
of the app, as it is without doubt a superb tool with which to cram for your
exams. As you progress through your course you can begin to enter the
information you’re given into Mental Case in the form of flash cards. These
contain the subject, the key piece of information, explanations of the
concepts, audio and visual notes and so on.
No
matter what subjects you are studying, Mental Case will greatly improve your
chances of academic success
Once you have a completed deck of
flashcards you are then able o go back in and review what you’ve learned in a
variety of ways, either looking up individual items for study, watching
slideshows of your subjects or setting yourself multiple choice papers.
As you work your way through the slideshows
you’ve created you can indicate whether or not you have remembered the
information on any given flashcard, allowing the software to prompt you on your
weaker areas in subsequent sessions. In this way it’s possible to monitor how
well your retaining all the information. And if manually entering all this data
proves to be too much of a headache, the killer feature is the online
FlashcardExchange, where you can browse a substantial library of pre-existing
flashcard decks across a vast range of subjects and download those pertinent to
your course.
The budget alternative to mental case, and
a very solid option at that, is Smartr (Barefoot Hackers AB, OS X: free). What
it lacks in sophistication it makes up for in simplicity and functionality.
This is a tool for creating your own card stacks. You simply create a card,
then add all the necessary info. You can provide question and answer data for
testing, add concepts and explanations, definitions, include images along with
explanatory notes and essentially build up a vibrant database of all your work
that you can then come back to for cramming. And as you work through your
flashcards, the software automatically selects subjects according to your past
performance.
Finally, if you don’t own an iOS device and
want a relatively inexpensive revision tool, iFlash (David McGaven, OS X: $16)
proves to be a no-nonsense way of creating your own flashcards featuring texts,
images and audio and the option for users to share their decks online. The
result is a library of over 5,000 freely available flashcard decks.
In looking through the vast array of
educational apps out there, we’ve tried o find a selection that fits every
pocket and collectively covers every aspect of your learning adventure.
Importantly though, with your coursework mounting up, the last thing you need
is o be finding your way around dozens of new apps, which is why we’ve split
the options down into distinct sections. Our advice is to start with a time
management app… organizing your term is of paramount importance. After that,
you can take your time choosing the apps that best suit the rest of your
educational needs.
