instructor: Jentery Sayers ~ classroom: smi 309 & ougl 101 ~ TTh: 9:30-11:20

Active Reading

Involves the careful analysis of a text, identifying its main claims, and actively responding to it with your own ideas and arguments. 

Active reading should include:

• Annotation.  Underline key terms or sentences.  Make notes, ask questions, or otherwise respond to the text in the margins. Write on the thing!
• Connecting what you are reading with other texts.  While some terms are best defined in context, you can also look to other texts to guide you, such as a dictionary, a reference guide, or a text in a similar field or discipline. 
• Asking: For whom?  By whom? How? And for what purposes?
• Re-reading (sometimes aloud).
• Repeated consideration of and return to the main claims. Don’t forget the big picture. The context!
• Noting recurrences (e.g., common terms and themes).

   uw english | jentery at u.washington.edu