Introduction to Zettelkasten note-taking tools for writing research

This workshop is open to all. Graduate students, register through GradProSkills. Everyone else can register on this page.

This hands-on workshop will introduce students to the modern, no-cost, digital note-taking tool, Obsidian (or Zettlr). Integrated with Zotero and used in an academic framework, these tools can foster productive research writing. The workshop will help students start practising the principles of a Zettelkasten technique to build a personal knowledge base of literature notes, interlinked ideas, long-form writing, visual concept maps, and more. It will show how to associate Obsidian notes with bibliographic information in Zotero as part of the research writing workflow.

The workshop will revolve around Obsidian's structure as a markdown file editing tool, suited to short or longform notes stored as a knowledge graph or in a hierarchy. The workshop will include the option to use the tool Zettlr instead of Obsidian and will cover techniques for writing with Markdown and options for transforming notes into other digital forms. It does not require programming knowledge but participants should already be comfortable using Zotero.

Learning Objectives

In this workshop, students will:

• Apply a note-taking technique that supports a productive writing practice
• Use the cutting-edge note-taking tool, Obsidian (or Zettlr), integrated with Zotero and its bibliographic information
• Learn fundamental skills for writing with markdown
• Transform digital notes into written outputs and new forms of research outputs