Questions to Ask Yourself
Questions to Ask Yourself
Transcript
I'd like to give you five quick questions to ask yourself before you approach any reading assignment to help make your reading of that assignment as efficient as possible. The five questions are as follows. First, what kind of reading is this? There are many types of reading you'll be given in a college setting, and you'll want to approach each one slightly differently.
Let's talk very briefly about four possibilities. You have a reading for an English novel class, a reading for a science class, a dense, theoretical reading, and a dry, technical reading. Let's talk about how you might approach these four different types. For the novel, which is going to be a long piece of work, you might wanna talk to your professor about how best to approach a long novel like that or you may wanna read the introduction first to help give yourself a feel for the novel and its primary concerns before you jump into reading. For the science reading, which is probably in a textbook, rather than jump right in, you may wanna scan the reading first for the bold headlines to see what the primary topics and the primary areas of interest will be before you actually begin reading. It also sometimes makes sense to go directly to the back of the book for the problem sets before you actually read the science chapter.
For the dense theoretical reading, you may wanna make sure that you have good knowledge of the key terms to help make your reading of that material a little less painful, and finally for the technical reading it can sometimes be a good idea to get a general sense from your professor about how best to approach a reading of that kind and also to make sure that you have a really clear sense of what you're trying to accomplish with that reading.
Again, different types of reading should be approached in different ways, so understand what kind of reading it is you're doing. Second, ask yourself what the purpose of your reading is. What are you trying to accomplish? If you're reading something because you'll be held accountable for it on an exam, you're going to read it in one way. If you're reading it because it's an optional article, you're going to read it in another way.
And so it's important to understand what the purpose of your reading is before you even read the first word. The next three questions may seem a little mercenary because they're really specific and strategic questions about how your reading is going to be evaluated, but please understand that you're reading in an academic context and your reading will be evaluated.
And so it's important to understand in exactly what ways that's going to happen as you approach your reading. The third question asks, how important are the readings for this class? Are the readings that you're doing worth 80% of your grade or 20% of your grade? The answer to that question will help you think about how much time to expend reading those particular assignments. How will I be evaluated on my reading?
That is to say, how will I be held accountable for my knowledge of what I read? If you find that exams focus heavily on your readings, you may wanna approach them a little bit differently than if you're not held particularly accountable, or if you're in a small discussion-style section or a seminar, and you're going to be asked to talk about these readings with other students, you may wanna make sure that you have really in-depth knowledge of some but maybe not of all. So again, knowing exactly how you'll be evaluated is of crucial import, and finally, how do the readings show up on your evaluations?
Think about your last evaluation in a class. Maybe it was a quiz, maybe it was a midterm exam. If there were lots of questions about the readings, you're going to approach them in a particular way. If the exam was a bit light on the readings, you may take the time and energy you invest on those and invest them in other areas of the class.
So again, by asking these five simple questions before you approach a reading, you can allow yourself to be strategic and make sure that you're investing your time and energy wisely across your classes and across your reading assignments.
Let's talk very briefly about four possibilities. You have a reading for an English novel class, a reading for a science class, a dense, theoretical reading, and a dry, technical reading. Let's talk about how you might approach these four different types. For the novel, which is going to be a long piece of work, you might wanna talk to your professor about how best to approach a long novel like that or you may wanna read the introduction first to help give yourself a feel for the novel and its primary concerns before you jump into reading. For the science reading, which is probably in a textbook, rather than jump right in, you may wanna scan the reading first for the bold headlines to see what the primary topics and the primary areas of interest will be before you actually begin reading. It also sometimes makes sense to go directly to the back of the book for the problem sets before you actually read the science chapter.
For the dense theoretical reading, you may wanna make sure that you have good knowledge of the key terms to help make your reading of that material a little less painful, and finally for the technical reading it can sometimes be a good idea to get a general sense from your professor about how best to approach a reading of that kind and also to make sure that you have a really clear sense of what you're trying to accomplish with that reading.
Again, different types of reading should be approached in different ways, so understand what kind of reading it is you're doing. Second, ask yourself what the purpose of your reading is. What are you trying to accomplish? If you're reading something because you'll be held accountable for it on an exam, you're going to read it in one way. If you're reading it because it's an optional article, you're going to read it in another way.
And so it's important to understand what the purpose of your reading is before you even read the first word. The next three questions may seem a little mercenary because they're really specific and strategic questions about how your reading is going to be evaluated, but please understand that you're reading in an academic context and your reading will be evaluated.
And so it's important to understand in exactly what ways that's going to happen as you approach your reading. The third question asks, how important are the readings for this class? Are the readings that you're doing worth 80% of your grade or 20% of your grade? The answer to that question will help you think about how much time to expend reading those particular assignments. How will I be evaluated on my reading?
That is to say, how will I be held accountable for my knowledge of what I read? If you find that exams focus heavily on your readings, you may wanna approach them a little bit differently than if you're not held particularly accountable, or if you're in a small discussion-style section or a seminar, and you're going to be asked to talk about these readings with other students, you may wanna make sure that you have really in-depth knowledge of some but maybe not of all. So again, knowing exactly how you'll be evaluated is of crucial import, and finally, how do the readings show up on your evaluations?
Think about your last evaluation in a class. Maybe it was a quiz, maybe it was a midterm exam. If there were lots of questions about the readings, you're going to approach them in a particular way. If the exam was a bit light on the readings, you may take the time and energy you invest on those and invest them in other areas of the class.
So again, by asking these five simple questions before you approach a reading, you can allow yourself to be strategic and make sure that you're investing your time and energy wisely across your classes and across your reading assignments.