Literacy Strategies
The Role of Active Reading in Interpreting & Writing About Texts[1]
Active Reading Defined Reading can either be passive or active. “Passive [or non-critical] reading is a process of absorption. Active reading is a process of interpretation and reflection, whereby a reader constructs meaning, establishes significance, and reflects on the limits of his or her understanding. Active readers are often conscious of their moves and can describe them” (Salvatori 128). Active reading is “recursive”—“a reading that returns the reader to a previously covered terrain. A deeper, more thorough, interpretation” (128). Because good writing about literature depends on good reading of it, this is the kind of skilled reading we need to develop and hone for this course.
Ä Components of active reading:
a) Slow down and know that a second (or even a third) reading is in order.
b) In the preliminary, “grammar” stage, read with a pen or pencil in hand in order to notate your text.
c) Upon subsequent, more studied readings – the logic and rhetoric stages – begin to furnish the work with explanatory / interpretive notes (annotation) as you embark the process of 1) judging the merit of a work’s claims (evaluation); 2) assessing how the parts of the work fit into the whole (analysis); and 3) forming an interpretive position about the meaning, significance, and relevance of the work as a whole (argumentation).
d) To facilitate your understanding at all levels, ask questions – basic or “practical” as well as theoretical or “interpretive” – and begin to respond to them in writing.
1) Notational System: “a pattern of marks readers employ during the reading process to remember certain elements of a text and record their reactions to these elements. Such notations function as a method of retrieval, allowing readers to return to a text, recall their first impressions, move beyond, and complicate the.” Readers who employ a system of notation find themselves reading more actively and respond better in class discussion (and on quizzes!), since while they read they actively engage themselves in the process of thinking about and writing to a text. (Salvatori 19)
Ä Suggestions for developing a system of notation (adapted from Gardner, 5-6)
a) Underline, circle, or otherwise highlight passages that strike you as particularly important and relevant.
b) Make notes in the margins as to why certain points strike you.
c) Look for unusual features of language.
d) Look for and take note of recurring motifs, words, symbols, images.
e) Develop a system of shorthand and coded symbols (i.e., ? for question or confusion; ! for a surprising idea, something unexpected; (¶) to make something stand out).
2) Annotation: furnishing a literary work with explanatory notes; responding to a text with the goal of interpreting, establishing, and constructing meaning. You might annotate a significant passage or two, focusing on how isolated and salient places in the text form larger patterns of meaning.
3) Interpretive Questions: “If you are reading well, your textual annotations and notes will probably be full of questions. Some of these may be simple inquiries of fact, the sort of thing that can be answered by asking your instructor or doing some quick research. But ideally, many of your questions will be more complex and meaty than that, the sort of probing queries that may have multiple, complex, or even contradictory answers. These are the questions that will provoke you and your classmates to think still more critically about the literature you have read. You need not worry—at least not at first—about finding answers to all your questions. As you work more with the text, discussing it with your instructor and peers, writing about it, and reading other related texts, you will begin to respond to the most important of the issues you’ve raised. And even if you never form a satisfactory answer to some questions, they will have served their purpose if they have made you think” or in some way frame your interpretation of the text (Gardner 7-13).
Basic queries, remember, have definitive, generally simple answers and are often grounded in “literal,” surface-level meanings of a text; there is little complexity and depth. Theoretical or interpretive questions require more lengthy, in-depth responses that are not conclusive but matters of “lawyer-like” persuasion and evidence-based argumentation. Until you have answered all the basic questions about the text (such as “What is taking place?” “Who is this about?” and so forth), you will not be able to answer the interpretive or theoretical ones with complexity and nuance. Nor will you be able to achieve the level of specificity and depth that produces sharp analytical and argumentative writing.
Some Interpretive Questions:
a) Questions about the text: These questions might focus on issues such as genre, structure, language, style, the presence of certain images, etc.
b) Questions about the author: Questioning how an author’s age, gender, religious beliefs, family structure, and other factors might have an impact on the writer’s expression and may lend relevant critical insight to the study of a particular text.
c) Questions about the cultural context: Questioning how a particular time and place, the wider social and cultural context of the author’s life and its influence on the production of the text, inform or even challenge our understanding of the text.
d) Questions about the reader: This type of questioning takes into account how different readers may filter the same text—through personal associations, emotions, shared cultural experience—and with different outcomes. It is worthwhile, for example, to consider the difference (and implications) in how a work’s originally intended audience may have responded to a text versus how the text affects its contemporary readers.
It is crucial at all stages of the reading process to respond to questions through “informal” writing. The goal here is two-fold: (1) to discover meaning by responding to a question that makes you “rethink” and “reread” a text and your initial responses to it; and (2) to climb the level of specificity, both in your questioning and writing, in order to move from a more “obvious” to more complex examination of the text at hand. Oftentimes you will find that this informal writing leads you to discover a “driving question” (the key question or “problem” your essay will address), the findings of which you will present in your paper in the form of the thesis idea (see handout on “Thesis Construction”).
Ä Components of active reading:
a) Slow down and know that a second (or even a third) reading is in order.
b) In the preliminary, “grammar” stage, read with a pen or pencil in hand in order to notate your text.
c) Upon subsequent, more studied readings – the logic and rhetoric stages – begin to furnish the work with explanatory / interpretive notes (annotation) as you embark the process of 1) judging the merit of a work’s claims (evaluation); 2) assessing how the parts of the work fit into the whole (analysis); and 3) forming an interpretive position about the meaning, significance, and relevance of the work as a whole (argumentation).
d) To facilitate your understanding at all levels, ask questions – basic or “practical” as well as theoretical or “interpretive” – and begin to respond to them in writing.
1) Notational System: “a pattern of marks readers employ during the reading process to remember certain elements of a text and record their reactions to these elements. Such notations function as a method of retrieval, allowing readers to return to a text, recall their first impressions, move beyond, and complicate the.” Readers who employ a system of notation find themselves reading more actively and respond better in class discussion (and on quizzes!), since while they read they actively engage themselves in the process of thinking about and writing to a text. (Salvatori 19)
Ä Suggestions for developing a system of notation (adapted from Gardner, 5-6)
a) Underline, circle, or otherwise highlight passages that strike you as particularly important and relevant.
b) Make notes in the margins as to why certain points strike you.
c) Look for unusual features of language.
d) Look for and take note of recurring motifs, words, symbols, images.
e) Develop a system of shorthand and coded symbols (i.e., ? for question or confusion; ! for a surprising idea, something unexpected; (¶) to make something stand out).
2) Annotation: furnishing a literary work with explanatory notes; responding to a text with the goal of interpreting, establishing, and constructing meaning. You might annotate a significant passage or two, focusing on how isolated and salient places in the text form larger patterns of meaning.
3) Interpretive Questions: “If you are reading well, your textual annotations and notes will probably be full of questions. Some of these may be simple inquiries of fact, the sort of thing that can be answered by asking your instructor or doing some quick research. But ideally, many of your questions will be more complex and meaty than that, the sort of probing queries that may have multiple, complex, or even contradictory answers. These are the questions that will provoke you and your classmates to think still more critically about the literature you have read. You need not worry—at least not at first—about finding answers to all your questions. As you work more with the text, discussing it with your instructor and peers, writing about it, and reading other related texts, you will begin to respond to the most important of the issues you’ve raised. And even if you never form a satisfactory answer to some questions, they will have served their purpose if they have made you think” or in some way frame your interpretation of the text (Gardner 7-13).
Basic queries, remember, have definitive, generally simple answers and are often grounded in “literal,” surface-level meanings of a text; there is little complexity and depth. Theoretical or interpretive questions require more lengthy, in-depth responses that are not conclusive but matters of “lawyer-like” persuasion and evidence-based argumentation. Until you have answered all the basic questions about the text (such as “What is taking place?” “Who is this about?” and so forth), you will not be able to answer the interpretive or theoretical ones with complexity and nuance. Nor will you be able to achieve the level of specificity and depth that produces sharp analytical and argumentative writing.
Some Interpretive Questions:
a) Questions about the text: These questions might focus on issues such as genre, structure, language, style, the presence of certain images, etc.
b) Questions about the author: Questioning how an author’s age, gender, religious beliefs, family structure, and other factors might have an impact on the writer’s expression and may lend relevant critical insight to the study of a particular text.
c) Questions about the cultural context: Questioning how a particular time and place, the wider social and cultural context of the author’s life and its influence on the production of the text, inform or even challenge our understanding of the text.
d) Questions about the reader: This type of questioning takes into account how different readers may filter the same text—through personal associations, emotions, shared cultural experience—and with different outcomes. It is worthwhile, for example, to consider the difference (and implications) in how a work’s originally intended audience may have responded to a text versus how the text affects its contemporary readers.
It is crucial at all stages of the reading process to respond to questions through “informal” writing. The goal here is two-fold: (1) to discover meaning by responding to a question that makes you “rethink” and “reread” a text and your initial responses to it; and (2) to climb the level of specificity, both in your questioning and writing, in order to move from a more “obvious” to more complex examination of the text at hand. Oftentimes you will find that this informal writing leads you to discover a “driving question” (the key question or “problem” your essay will address), the findings of which you will present in your paper in the form of the thesis idea (see handout on “Thesis Construction”).
| IREAD Foldable |
7 CRITICAL READING STRATEGIES
1. Previewing: Learning about a text before really reading it.
Previewing enables readers to get a sense of what the text is about and how it is organized before reading it closely. This simple strategy includes seeing what you can learn from the headnotes or other introductory material, skimming to get an overview of the content and organization, and identifying the rhetorical situation.
2. Contextualizing: Placing a text in its historical, biographical, and cultural contexts.
When you read a text, you read it through the lens of your own experience. Your understanding of the words on the page and their significance is informed by what you have come to know and value from living in a particular time and place. But the texts you read were all written in the past, sometimes in a radically different time and place. To read critically, you need to contextualize, to recognize the differences between your contemporary values and attitudes and those represented in the text.
3. Questioning to understand and remember: Asking questions about the content.
As students, you are accustomed (I hope) to teachers asking you questions about your reading. These questions are designed to help you understand a reading and respond to it more fully, and often this technique works. When you need to understand and use new information though it is most beneficial if you write the questions, as you read the text for the first time. With this strategy, you can write questions any time, but in difficult academic readings, you will understand the material better and remember it longer if you write a question for every paragraph or brief section. Each question should focus on a main idea, not on illustrations or details, and each should be expressed in your own words, not just copied from parts of the paragraph.
4. Reflecting on challenges to your beliefs and values: Examining your personal responses.
The reading that you do for this class might challenge your attitudes, your unconsciously held beliefs, or your positions on current issues. As you read a text for the first time, mark an X in the margin at each point where you feel a personal challenge to your attitudes, beliefs, or status. Make a brief note in the margin about what you feel or about what in the text created the challenge. Now look again at the places you marked in the text where you felt personally challenged. What patterns do you see?
5. Outlining and summarizing: Identifying the main ideas and restating them in your own words.
Outlining and summarizing are especially helpful strategies for understanding the content and structure of a reading selection. Whereas outlining reveals the basic structure of the text, summarizing synopsizes a selection's main argument in brief. Outlining may be part of the annotating process, or it may be done separately (as it is in this class). The key to both outlining and summarizing is being able to distinguish between the main ideas and the supporting ideas and examples. The main ideas form the backbone, the strand that holds the various parts and pieces of the text together. Outlining the main ideas helps you to discover this structure. When you make an outline, don't use the text's exact words.
Summarizing begins with outlining, but instead of merely listing the main ideas, a summary recomposes them to form a new text. Whereas outlining depends on a close analysis of each paragraph, summarizing also requires creative synthesis. Putting ideas together again -- in your own words and in a condensed form -- shows how reading critically can lead to deeper understanding of any text.
6. Evaluating an argument: Testing the logic of a text as well as its credibility and emotional impact.
All writers make assertions that they want you to accept as true. As a critical reader, you should not accept anything on face value but to recognize every assertion as an argument that must be carefully evaluated. An argument has two essential parts: a claim and support. The claim asserts a conclusion -- an idea, an opinion, a judgment, or a point of view -- that the writer wants you to accept. The support includes reasons (shared beliefs, assumptions, and values) and evidence (facts, examples, statistics, and authorities) that give readers the basis for accepting the conclusion. When you assess an argument, you are concerned with the process of reasoning as well as its truthfulness (these are not the same thing). At the most basic level, in order for an argument to be acceptable, the support must be appropriate to the claim and the statements must be consistent with one another.
7. Comparing and contrasting related readings: Exploring likenesses and differences between texts to understand them better.
Many of the authors we read are concerned with the same issues or questions, but approach how to discuss them in different ways. Fitting a text into an ongoing dialectic helps increase understanding of why an author approached a particular issue or question in the way he or she did.
Previewing enables readers to get a sense of what the text is about and how it is organized before reading it closely. This simple strategy includes seeing what you can learn from the headnotes or other introductory material, skimming to get an overview of the content and organization, and identifying the rhetorical situation.
2. Contextualizing: Placing a text in its historical, biographical, and cultural contexts.
When you read a text, you read it through the lens of your own experience. Your understanding of the words on the page and their significance is informed by what you have come to know and value from living in a particular time and place. But the texts you read were all written in the past, sometimes in a radically different time and place. To read critically, you need to contextualize, to recognize the differences between your contemporary values and attitudes and those represented in the text.
3. Questioning to understand and remember: Asking questions about the content.
As students, you are accustomed (I hope) to teachers asking you questions about your reading. These questions are designed to help you understand a reading and respond to it more fully, and often this technique works. When you need to understand and use new information though it is most beneficial if you write the questions, as you read the text for the first time. With this strategy, you can write questions any time, but in difficult academic readings, you will understand the material better and remember it longer if you write a question for every paragraph or brief section. Each question should focus on a main idea, not on illustrations or details, and each should be expressed in your own words, not just copied from parts of the paragraph.
4. Reflecting on challenges to your beliefs and values: Examining your personal responses.
The reading that you do for this class might challenge your attitudes, your unconsciously held beliefs, or your positions on current issues. As you read a text for the first time, mark an X in the margin at each point where you feel a personal challenge to your attitudes, beliefs, or status. Make a brief note in the margin about what you feel or about what in the text created the challenge. Now look again at the places you marked in the text where you felt personally challenged. What patterns do you see?
5. Outlining and summarizing: Identifying the main ideas and restating them in your own words.
Outlining and summarizing are especially helpful strategies for understanding the content and structure of a reading selection. Whereas outlining reveals the basic structure of the text, summarizing synopsizes a selection's main argument in brief. Outlining may be part of the annotating process, or it may be done separately (as it is in this class). The key to both outlining and summarizing is being able to distinguish between the main ideas and the supporting ideas and examples. The main ideas form the backbone, the strand that holds the various parts and pieces of the text together. Outlining the main ideas helps you to discover this structure. When you make an outline, don't use the text's exact words.
Summarizing begins with outlining, but instead of merely listing the main ideas, a summary recomposes them to form a new text. Whereas outlining depends on a close analysis of each paragraph, summarizing also requires creative synthesis. Putting ideas together again -- in your own words and in a condensed form -- shows how reading critically can lead to deeper understanding of any text.
6. Evaluating an argument: Testing the logic of a text as well as its credibility and emotional impact.
All writers make assertions that they want you to accept as true. As a critical reader, you should not accept anything on face value but to recognize every assertion as an argument that must be carefully evaluated. An argument has two essential parts: a claim and support. The claim asserts a conclusion -- an idea, an opinion, a judgment, or a point of view -- that the writer wants you to accept. The support includes reasons (shared beliefs, assumptions, and values) and evidence (facts, examples, statistics, and authorities) that give readers the basis for accepting the conclusion. When you assess an argument, you are concerned with the process of reasoning as well as its truthfulness (these are not the same thing). At the most basic level, in order for an argument to be acceptable, the support must be appropriate to the claim and the statements must be consistent with one another.
7. Comparing and contrasting related readings: Exploring likenesses and differences between texts to understand them better.
Many of the authors we read are concerned with the same issues or questions, but approach how to discuss them in different ways. Fitting a text into an ongoing dialectic helps increase understanding of why an author approached a particular issue or question in the way he or she did.
What to Avoid When Taking Notes
- Don't attempt to write everything down, just reflect the main themes. Aim to get the gist of the topic or the main points.
- Try not to get flustered if you miss something out or come across something you don't understand. Use a question mark to highlight the point in your notes and come back to it later.
- Don't lose track of your purpose in making the notes in the first place - keep focused.
- Don't be concerned about whether anyone else could make sense of your notes, you are the only person who needs to read them.
- Don't try to remember everything you read or heard in a tutorial session, it can't be done.
- Don't forget to revisit and organise your notes and get them systematically arranged so that you can find the information you need when you want it.
- Don't forget to check you have complete references when you revisit your notes, this will save you a lot of time later on if you want to cite particular sources of evidence.
- Don't be afraid of trying different ways of taking notes - try lists, colours, bullet points, underlining, highlighting and mind-mapping. Experimenting with various methods helps you discover the technique that suits you.
- Don't take notes all the time - spend some time at tutorials engaging with the tutor and other students or just thinking about what you're doing.
*Information was used from salisbury.edu and http://www2.open.ac.uk/
