6.10: Summary

Chapter Takeaways

Reading

• Reading, like learning, involves a cycle of preparing, absorbing, recording, and reviewing.
• In college, you will be expected to do much reading; it is not unusual to do two or more hours of reading for every hour you spend in class. In college, you are also expected to think critically about what you read.
• Active reading involves four steps:
  1. Prepare for reading by scanning the assignment and developing questions for which you want to discover answers through your reading.
  2. Read the material and discover the answers to your questions.
  3. Capture the information by highlighting and annotating the text as well as by taking effective notes.
  4. Review the reading by studying your notes, by integrating them with your class notes, and by discussing the reading with classmates.
• Before you read, learn as much as you can about the author and his or her reason for writing the text. What is his or her area of expertise? Why did the instructor select this text?
• When scanning a reading, look for clues to what might be important. Read the section titles, study illustrations, and look for keywords and boldface text.
• Do not highlight your text until you have read a section completely to be sure you understand the context. Then go back and highlight and annotate your text during a second read-through.
• Think critically about what you are reading. Do you agree with what the author is saying? How does it relate to the rest of the material in the course? What does this new material mean to you in “real life”?

Special Texts and Situations

• Do all the exercises in math textbooks; apply the formulas to real-world situations.
• Practice “reading” the illustrations. Each type of graphic material has its own strength or purpose.
• Look for statements of hypotheses and experimental design when reading science texts.
• History, economics, and political science texts are heavily influenced by interpretation. Think critically about what you are reading.
• Working with foreign language texts requires more time and more frequent breaks. Don’t rely on word-for-word translations.
• If you need to read with children around, don’t put off your reading until you have a large block of time; learn to read in short periods as available.
• When reading on the Internet, be extra diligent to evaluate the source of the material to decide how reliable that source may be.
• If English is your second language, seek out resources that may be offered on campus. In any case, be patient with the process of mastering college-level English. And always remember this: what feels like a disadvantage in one situation can be a great gift in another situation.

Vocabulary

• Reading and vocabulary development are closely linked. A stronger vocabulary makes reading easier and more fun; the best way to build a vocabulary is to read.
• Look for new words everywhere, not just in class.
• When you encounter a new word, follow these steps:
  1. Write it down and write down the sentence in which it was used.
  2. Infer its meaning based on the context and word roots.
  3. Look it up in a dictionary.
  4. Write your own sentence using the word.
  5. Say the word, its definition, and your sentence out loud.
  6. Find an opportunity to use the word within two days.

Note Taking

• There are four primary ways of taking notes (lists, outlines, concept maps, and the Cornell method).
• Select the note-taking method that best serves your learning style and the instructor’s teaching style. Remember that methods may be combined for maximum effect.
• Completing assignments and reviewing the syllabus can help you define the relative importance of the ideas the instructor presents.
• Don’t expect to capture everything the instructor says. Look for keywords and central ideas.
• Anything the instructor writes on the board is likely to be important.
• Review your notes as soon as possible after the class, to annotate, correct, complete, and summarize.

Reading and note taking are major elements of college studying and learning. The expectations in college is that you read considerable amounts of text for each subject. You may encounter reading situations, such as professional journal articles and long textbook chapters, that are more difficult to understand than texts you have read previously. As you progress through your college courses, you can employ reading strategies to help you complete your college reading assignments. Likewise, you will take notes in college that need to be complete so you can study and recall the information you learn in lectures and lab sessions. With so much significant information that you need to collect, study, and recall for your college courses, you need to be deliberate in your reading and note taking.

Chapter Review

1. Describe the four steps of active reading.

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2. What part of a textbook should you compare with a class syllabus? Why?

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3. Why is it important to know something about a textbook’s author?

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4. What time of the day should you plan to do your reading? Why?

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5. What is the difference between using the Cornell method for taking class notes and using the Cornell method for reading notes?

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6. Why do you think it is important to pose some questions about the material before you read?

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7. What should you do if you are getting tired when reading?

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8. List three requirements for a good reading location.

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9. Can you multitask while doing a reading assignment? Why or why not?

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10. Describe the process of evaluating a Web-based reading selection.

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Career Connection

Sanvi is a pre-nursing student who is having trouble between all the reading she is expected to complete, her general dislike of reading, and her need to comprehend both her reading assignments and her own notes to be successful in nursing school. She has spoken with several of her instructors and a tutor at the Student Success Center on campus, and their advice centers around Sanvi’s reluctance to read in general. She is working on how to manage her time so she has more dedicated time to read her assignments in between her classes and her work schedule.

That is helping some, but Sanvi is still worried because she knows one problem is that she doesn’t exactly know what types of reading or notetaking she would need to know how to do as a professional nurse. This confusion makes her doubt that the extra reading she is doing now is really beneficial. After some reflection on what was holding her back, Sanvi mentioned this aspect of her studying to one of her instructors who had been a hospital RN for years before coming to the college to teach. She recalled that the first time she read a patient chart in the hospital, she had to think quickly about how to get all the meaning out of the chart in the same way she would have read a complex textbook chapter.

Sanvi’s nursing instructor reminded her that all professions need their personnel to read. They may not all need to read books or articles, but all jobs involve reading to some extent. For example, consider this list of disciplines and the typical types of reading they do. You may be surprised that not all reading is in text form.

Table 6.4 Professions and types of reading

Reading types and professions

Nurses/doctors	Patient charts, prescription side effects, medical articles
Teachers	Student work, lesson plans, educational best practices
Architects	Blueprints, construction contracts, permit manuals
Accountants	Financial spreadsheets, tax guidelines, invoices, trend diagrams
Beauticians	Client hair and facial features, best practices articles, product information
Civil engineers	Work site maps, government regulations, financial spreadsheets
Auto mechanics	Car engines, auto manuals, government regulations

As this incomplete list shows, not every job you pursue will require you to read text-based documents, but all jobs require some reading.

• How could Sanvi and her instructor use this list to make more sense of how college reading will prepare Sanvi to be a stronger nurse?
• How would understanding the types of professional reading help you complete your reading assignments?
• If your chosen field of study is not listed above, can you think of what sort of reading those professionals would need to do?

Think about the questions that opened this chapter and what you have read. How do you feel about your reading and note taking skills now that you have some more strategies?

Where do you go from here?

Reading is such a part of our everyday lives that we sometimes take it for granted. And even we don’t formally write down our thoughts, we take notes in our heads far more often than we use our note taking skills to make sense of a textbook passage or a graphic. Honing these fundamental skills can only help you succeed in college and beyond. What else about reading and note taking would you like to learn more about? Choose topics form the list below to research more.

• How to maximize e-readers to comprehend texts.
• How professional use reading and note taking in their careers.
• Is speed-reading a myth or a viable strategy?
• Compare reading and note taking strategies from different countries to those you use

Activity: Make an Action List

Action List

Two things I will do to improve	Actions	By when I expect to take the action	How I will know I accomplished the action
My reading comprehension/understanding	1.
	2.
My reading speed	1.
	2.
My vocabulary	1.
	2.

Rethinking

Revisit the questions you answered at the beginning of the chapter, and consider one option you learned in this chapter that might change your answer to one of them.

1. I am reading on a college level
2. I take good notes that help me study for exams
3. I understand how to manage all the reading I need to do for college
4. I recognize the need for different note taking strategies for different college subjects