Taking notes… we all need them. From classes or meetings, to projects and research, summarizing content and action items is important for retention, review, and collaboration. Some people are nuts for handwriting notes, while others are faster typing. Either way, you may find yourself scrolling through pages upon pages of notes or hastily switching between tabs and notebooks to find what you need. It makes studying, working, brainstorming, and project organization stressful and overwhelming. Microsoft OneNote can be your one-stop resource for getting organized and staying on top of everything!

Notebooks at the Next Level

OneNote is a digital notebook that saves and organizes your notes in one place for easy access and seamless collaboration, even for the most chaotic of projects. OneNote notebooks can be organized into sections, pages, and subpages, and can contain anything from text notes to images, emails, PDF files, and spreadsheets. And the fun part is, you can color coordinate each section to your liking!  Decide to change how you organize a notebook (maybe from class sessions into course modules, or from meetings into projects)? No biggie. Create new sections and drag and drop pages where you want them!

Losing notes is a student’s worst nightmare, and faculty and staff need them just as much. Fortunately, with OneNote, there is no need to worry about your work getting deleted or lost in a mass of tabs because OneNote syncs your pages all in one place in a matter of seconds! You can also keep multiple tabs open to quickly navigate between pages to maximize productivity. Can’t find a particular vocabulary term within your notebook? Simply click the search icon located on the left sidebar to effortlessly locate keywords and phrases.

Not only does OneNote support personal notetaking, it also facilitates real-time collaboration. The shared notebook feature lets whole notebooks, sections, and pages be created, viewed, and edited by multiple people for group projects and collaborative notetaking. This notebook feature can come in handy for study groups, where separate sections can be added to a notebook to create study guides and pages categorized by units or study concepts.

Favorite Features

Figuring out the basics of OneNote is very intuitive. Create a notebook. Create a section. Add pages. Start typing. But there are some great tools in OneNote that will give you the edge when it comes to getting organized and collaborating with others.

To-Do Lists

OneNote’s To-Do list feature allows individuals and groups to keep track of tasks with ease. For the weeks when you have a packed schedule and looming deadlines, organize your tasks by creating a list. Then use the “Important” tag to highlight the tasks you need to prioritize for the week.

Charts and Tables

OneNote also offers the convenient feature of integrating charts and tables directly within the app. This eliminates the need to switch between OneNote and other applications like Excel to input data or generate visual representations. Everything can be seamlessly created and managed within OneNote itself!

Shared Notebooks and Pages

You can ensure that you and your team members stay up to date on group responsibilities without having to bombard their email with files and meeting reminders, which could end up getting lost in their inbox in the end. Shared notebooks (or notebook sections/pages) let you combine notetaking and collaboration.

• Update your coworkers on what was discussed at Wednesday’s meeting and summarize action items.
• Work with a classmate to take and share notes with a shared notebook where you both take notes and can see what the other has written.
• Brainstorm project ideas without mixing them up with your active note pages by creatin a new page specifically for that purpose.
• Don’t want to resend the same file to your group every week, while trying to keep track of the most recent version? Share notebook, once again.

Get on the Same Page with OneNote

The best part of OneNote? You already have access to it! It is included in Microsoft 365, which is available to all Pitt students, faculty, and staff! Just open OneNote on the desktop or mobile app on your device, or log into Microsoft 365 Online to access OneNote.

Want a little help getting started? Check out LinkedIn Learning for some great OneNote on-demand courses. You can also go straight to the source with Microsoft’s OneNote Help and Learning page, which has videos, articles, and tutorials.

Happy notetaking, Panthers. Let’s make this semester a great one!

-- By Haree Lim, Pitt IT Student Blogger