Ways to Get College Students to Read Their Textbook
Do yous feel similar yous spend too much time reading textbooks? Do you e'er feel overwhelmed with the amount of information they contain? Do you have a hard time focusing or figuring out what'south important? Textbooks can be tedious and difficult, but they comprise many features designed to help yous larn. This handout will provide applied strategies to assistance you read textbooks more than finer. Constructive reading strategies can ensure that y'all truly comprehend the course material, come to course prepared, and perform meliorate on grade assignments and exams.
How textbooks are unique
Textbooks contain numerous features that you don't ever encounter in novels, articles, or other types of texts. These features provide a wealth of information and clues almost the text. You should always spend a few minutes previewing a affiliate or section before you start to read so that y'all can get an idea of the main concepts in that section. This will help y'all to have a better purpose and focus going into the reading and will help you to be able to pull out the of import ideas more easily.
Active reading strategies
Many students approach reading textbooks by opening upwardly the book and starting with the first sentence in the chapter. They and then typically autumn into 1 of two categories: those who painstakingly read each word and copy pages of notes for hours, or those who casually skim over the words and flip the pages. Though very dissimilar, both approaches are passive in that they don't involve active, disquisitional thought—the first approach turns the reader into a copying machine, and the second is much less time-consuming just doesn't include any active engagement with the text. Neither arroyo leads to a loftier level of comprehension or retentiveness of what you just read.
Instead, inquiry shows that active reading strategies atomic number 82 to comprehension and retentivity and help students perform ameliorate in classes. Active reading strategies are ones in which you force your brain to actually do something (something effective and inquiry-backed) while reading your textbook. Beneath are some practical and effective active reading strategies that you can try to get the most out of your reading time.
Strategies earlier yous read
Preview. Look through the text features in the chapter (headings, titles, graphs, bold words, etc.) to gain clues virtually the chief concepts and important elements of the chapter. Pay special attending to these features when previewing your textbook:
- Titles, headings, and subtitles
- Illustrations, graphs, charts, visuals
- Vocabulary lists, glossaries
- End of chapter summaries
- Introductions
- Review questions and practice problems
- Special interest boxes and notes in margins
- Bold words
Become to know your digital reading platform. Digital or e-textbooks may have some additional features. Does the digital format encourage a specific reading path, or is it easy to jump around? Can y'all bookmark pages, or are at that place other ways to save your progress? If you follow a hyperlink, how do you get back to where you were before? Getting to know the structure of your e-textbook and seeing how folio or section navigation works volition save you time in the long run.
Begin at the end. Read the summary, vocab list, chapter questions, and practice problems kickoff to gain an idea of the most important aspects of the department and what you are expected to know and understand afterwards reading it.
Activate prior knowledge. Make a listing of what you already know about the topic and what you want to know about it/questions yous have almost it.
Set a purpose. Based on what you gathered in your previewing, set a purpose for why you lot are reading this affiliate and what you need to understand, know, or exist able to do after reading it.
Make predictions. Right after previewing, make a prediction about what yous think this chapter or section is going to exist well-nigh.
Strategies while yous read
Effigy out the master thought. Focus on commencement sentences and text features for main ideas of each paragraph or section every bit you read. These oftentimes incorporate the main idea, while the other sentences in the paragraph provide support and details.
Use questions to find answers. Convert major headings and topics into questions, and then read for answers.
Cease an entire section or page before taking notes. When you do have notes, go along them cursory, focus on primary ideas, and put them in your own words. Bank check out our note-taking handout for more than recommendations on effective note-taking.
Try skimming. Bank check out our handout about skimming to read well-nigh how to skim effectively and purposefully.
Generate questions. As you lot read, write downward questions that you have about the text. Too, create questions that you would ask on a test if you were a professor giving a test most this chapter (employ them to self-test later).
Stop and summarize. After every department (or page), stop and write a brief summary of what you just read in your own words from memory.
Keep it short. Tackle no more than 5-x pages at a fourth dimension. Space your reading out across the day and week every bit opposed to cramming it all into hour-long sessions. Check out our time direction handouts to find some calendars and resources to help y'all chunk your reading.
Make connections. Before, during, or after reading, make connections between the material and your own life, the world, and other texts/class material yous take learned.
Strategies after reading
Re-visit the chapter later. Instead of re-reading the affiliate this time, focus on the main concepts. Brand note of how content covered in course connects with the material in the chapter.
Organize your thoughts. Make an outline or concept map to help y'all synthesize and map out data visually. Ideally, start from retentiveness and create all you can without looking at your textbook to better become a grasp of what you know well and what you demand to written report; then utilize your textbook for reference in filling out what you didn't know well. This technique will aid your memory much more than than over-relying on the textbook.
Brand flashcards. Create flashcards for key terms, dates, people, etc. and use them for self-testing. Answer the question/ascertain the word yourself before flipping the bill of fare over and looking at the respond.
Utilise other resources
Academic Coaching: Make an engagement with an academic motorcoach to discuss textbook reading i-on-ane and hear about other resource.
Learning Center Online Tools: Check out all of our related handouts and videos, including annotation-taking, reading journal articles, annotating texts, and many more.
Learning Center workshops: Attend a workshop virtually reading strategies, facilitated by one of our academic coaches.
Role Hours: Schedule an appointment with your professor to discuss the course and textbook further.
Works consulted
Fundamentals: Preview, Read, Call up. Oregon State University. Retrieved from http://success.oregonstate.edu/sites/success.oregonstate.edu/files/LearningCorner/Tools/preview_read_recall.pdf
Jensen, One thousand., & Scharff, L. (2019). Improving critical reading with E-texts: A controlled study in a collegiate philosophy form. Periodical of the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning, 19(iii) doi: http://dx.doi.org.libproxy.lib.unc.edu/10.14434/josotl.v19i2.23978
Reading to Remember: Textbook Strategies. Willamette University. Retrieved from http://willamette.edu/offices/lcenter/resources/study_strategies/reading2remember.html
SQ3R Improving Reading Comprehension. Virginia Tech University. Retrieved from https://world wide web.ucc.vt.edu/academic_support/online_study_skills_workshops/SQ3R_improving_reading_comprehension.html
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