Do I need notebooks for college? will i actually use them? ?

Question

i know this sounds like a dump question but i am going to be a college freshman in a couple of weeks and i was wondering whether or not i should buy notebooks for each of my classes. considering that i plan to take lecture notes on my laptop....

Answer 1

If you take notes on your laptop, I'd strongly advise printing them out after each lecture and putting them in a binder....yes computer's do crash...You may also get handouts, and you need a place for those.  You should also check if you can take laptops in your class, some profs do not allow them, as unfortunately students have abused them...on facebook and e-mail instead of focusing on class.  (college prof)

Answer 2

Some teachers will not let you use a laptop, some will. And computers break, run out of juice, freeze up, etc. You might also try to contact each teacher ahead of time and ask. But even if all do, you still need a paper backup. Notebooks come in all kinds, I'd get a few of my faves and wait and see how many more I need. Good luck!

Answer 3

you know what?? use both!!! because in case something bad happened and you lost your notebooks you'll get your material from the laptop or the opposite if it got stolen

Answer 4

Depending on what your major is to begin with, using a PC to take notes may not even be feasible.

I started college in 1993, before laptop PCs were the norm.  I did my undergrad in Electrical Engineering.  Even in our freshman year, between calculus, physics, general Engineering courses, etc...there were so many teachnical drawings and such that a laptop would have been useless anyway.  It would have been much, much faster to take notes in a notebook.

Personally, I would buy notebooks by the case from Wal-Mart when they were on sale at the beginning of the year.  A case would lask me around 2 years, give or take (notebooks were $0.05 each at Wal-Mart a few weeks ago when I bought them to send to soldiers in the Middle East).

Assuming that it is even feasible to take notes on a laptop, I probably wouldn't recommend it.  PCs can and will fail.  Hard drives will blow up, screens will break, batteries go bad and will run out of power, and data will be lost.  Studying for your finals is a bad time for your PC to break and make all your data unretreivable.  Short of putting a match to it, notebooks can be spilled on, torn, neglected, and forgotten about and you can still get your notes off the page when you pick it up.

With Wireless Internet being everywhere now, another thing I'd be concerned about in class with a PC would be the temptation to surf the web and not pay attention when you get bored.  You will get bored in more than 1 class.  Wiht a notebook, you really have to pay attention because there is nothing else to do.  With a PC, chances are you can log in and surf the web while you should be listening (hey, I've done it at work more than once in boring meetings).  

So, personally, I'd recommend going old school and taking notes using a pen and paper.

Good luck in school!  Remember not to overwork and make some time to make it the best 4 years of your life!

Answer 5

I would use notebooks for two main reasons. One, like the other poster said, computers do crash. If it does you could be sitting down to do some last minute studying the day before the test and have nothing to use.

Second, even if you are going to use your computer anyways, I'd still bring a notebook or two. Some teachers do not allow computers to be used in the classroom. Most I've ever had didn't care but there are some who will not allow kids to click away (maybe on notes, maybe on the net) while they're trying to teach.

Answer 6

Yes.  Even with full notes on the computer, you are going to need to do stuff by hand.

Answer 7

At my school, the only people who bring laptops into lectures are the people who play games online and goof off on their computer during class.

I would stick with notebooks if I were you... I know it's old school, but you'll get a lot more out of your class. When you get back to your dorm room, transfer your written notes onto your computer - that equals studying! I know tons of people who do that and swear by it.

Good luck at school!

Answer 8

Computers can crash. I've learned this the hard way many times. Just keep it old school and get notebooks -- that's what I did.