The Pen Is mightier than the e-Sword

A student entering a lecture room today would consider taking notes on a laptop entirely natural. Why would anyone in their right mind question that activity? In a learning context that’s what laptops are for, one would imagine. Well, at least partly. Pause for a moment: Can you think of a reason why such technology could actually be harmful? No, I don’t simply mean distraction, though that is problem too of course. Candy crush is a tempting alternative while listening to a lecture on the Hebrew infinitive. And yes, Facebook, WhatsApp and other social media compete for attention too. But none of these distractions it turns out are the really big threat, which is more hidden and has to do with cognition. Paradoxically, for the student who is undistracted and concentrates on capturing the entire lecture on a laptop, who could imagine that Candy Crush would actually be more of a help than a hindrance? Confused?

Two university researchers have conducted some careful experiments comparing note taking using a pen and paper with the corresponding activity using a laptop and keying in the information. Pam Mueller and Daniel Oppenheimer published their surprising results and titled their paper: “The Pen Is Mightier Than the Keyboard: Advantages of Longhand Over Laptop Note Taking”. It seems impossible doesn’t it? How could anything to do with technology possibly be hindering us in any way? Worse still, how could old methods be better than new ones? Keep reading