How to make notes for UPSC IAS Exam 2020

"HUMANS tend to lose almost 40% of the latest information within the primary 24 hours of presentation or hearing it. If we take notes effectively, however, we will retain and retrieve almost 100% of the knowledge we receive"

Given the voluminous nature of the UPSC exam syllabus, it's almost impractical for a candidate preparing for UPSC to expect an entire revision of all the textbooks and full syllabus right before the examination, at an equivalent time to attain good and to crack the examination, revision plays a serious role. Hence, to beat this challenge, most of the aspirants believe their self made notes for a fast revision during exam days.

Notes making plays an important role in UPSC preparation. One cannot expect to clear the UPSC examination without preparing his notes and revising it regularly. Take any UPSC IAS Online Course and you'll find most of them had notes making as a part of their strategy to crack the UPSC examination.

There are two hypotheses on how our notes making is useful to students:

1. Encoding Hypothesis: when an individual is taking notes, the processing that happens improves our "learning and retention capacity."
2. External-Storage Hypothesis: an individual learns by having the ability to seem back at his notes, or maybe the notes of people.

The very exact meaning of notes making is to write down things, which you'll forget and things which may be revised in quick succession of your time 

While note making is crucial, it's important to not waste much of our time and to form such notes that one can reminisce at and understand in one reading.

Learning is that the initiative of notes Making

• Notes making is sort of often confused with writing everything down on pen and paper or digital software.
• Quite often you'll see students choose notes making in one go and without understanding the precise meaning of notes making and the importance of notes making.
• The very exact meaning of notes making is to write down things, which you'll forget and things which may be revised in quick succession of your time.
• Notes making is an art where you read things and use that information smartly in pinning down that information in a crispy and precise manner in order that you'll remember those things.
• Before note making you ought to collect information, information is that the key in note-making. once you will know the topics, even in the lightest of the way it'll assist you in note-making.
• So, the mantra of note-making goes for information collected within the initial stage, and afterward, you'll disseminate that information in note-making.

Reading less analyzing more

• Visualize things to recollect the studied matter.
• One of the common problems that are found in students is that they forgot, what they need to read after a while.
• You don't need to worry about this stuff much, as although it's quite natural that you simply will forget the studied things but revising time and again holds the key during this examination.
• Civil service examination isn't about bookish knowledge and it goes beyond your limited knowledge of the book. So, keep it up expanding your knowledge, not by book alone but analyzing the items in practicality that's understanding the concept in a more natural way. E.g. the Delhi government implement the Odd-Even scheme in November per annum. In this case, understand that Delhi pollution is solely liable for pollution in Delhi or neighboring states also contributes to pollution in Delhi. you ought to also understand what quite an air is injurious to health and their source of emergence.

Making notes in own words

• Make a Mind-map or Flow chart.
• Making a mind-map or flow chart isn't only beneficial in notes making point of view but, this same flow chart is often utilized in mains answer writing to urge a foothold ahead as compare to other students.
• Making a diagram or flow chart is useful in terms of answer writing; when thanks to the crisis of your time you'll need to choose to depict relevant information on your copy. These little things also can fetch you good marks.

Confining notes as Small as Possible

Make precise and crisp points.

• Make notes in the maximum amount as possible in a crisp and precise way. Write notes into the points during a when, how, and where format.
• Sticking to the purpose is most vital in notes making as you'll find yourself filling your notebook with irrelevant information, which can not have much use.
• In a nutshell, you'll find yourself making another voluminous note for yourself before the exam, which could not be much useful.
• Linear notes are much more superior as compared to writing down whole in a notebook and increasing your work burden by increasing the fabric. So, attempt to persist with the knowledge and skim as if you've got to hold that information for a lifetime.

Linear Notes and Pattern notes

Making notes from voluminous study material is nothing but a big task. There are different methods of creating notes and one should decide which method suits you the simplest. There are two sorts of making notes; one is that the 'Linear Notes' the opposite is 'Pattern Notes'.

1 Pattern Notes:

In pattern notes making each topic at the center of the page and every line radiating from it should represent a branch of the most ideal. Each point is written as briefly as possible employing a keyword or a phrase. this is often an appropriate method to adopt because it's more flexible and one can add extra information at any point of your time.

Pattern notes making is useful as you'll see the whole pattern at one go without actually turning the pages. you'll indicate the links between different topics more easily. it's useful from one's memory point of deem one can keep jotting down the points as and once they crop within the mind.

Pattern notes are much easier to recollect the content of the notes. This pattern helps in revision much faster as only brief keywords are getting used to form notes.

The disadvantage of pattern notes making is that if there are too many facts and an excessive amount of information, your notes become messy and overcrowded. Using keywords can remind of basic ideas but when it involves remembering details, this method can't be sufficient alone.

So the best method of creating good notes is to use a mixture of both Linear and Pattern methods and evolve your unique pattern of creating notes which will assist you in your last-minute revisions.

2. Linear Notes:

In the Linear notes method, you condense the fabric you've got read and jotted down the foremost details using headings and subheadings. this is often the simplest method to form notes after reading a book newspaper or a magazine. Here one has got to avoid copying tons of fabric and tons of care has got to be taken while condensing the contents. the proper way is to use loose sheets of paper to form notes on a given topic because it is simpler to stay adding information through additional sheets.

Notes are often made by using colors, block letters, boxes, and highlighters. this may assist you in arranging the notes in sequence and grabbing the eye to the particular contents and that they would make it much easier for quick recall of the details of a subject.