Active Reading

From: College Rules!, 3rd edition, How to Study, Survive, and Succeed in College
Don’t Read Homework Like You Read a Magazine

Reading for pleasure is often done passively, without

intentions to organize the writer's ideas or, more
importantly, your responses to those ideas.

• Passive Reading: reading done without active,

critical mindset.

• Active Reading: using certain techniques to more

fully engage with a text.
 Follow these steps
1. Look at the chapter title and think about what you
already know about the topic.

2. Read the chapter heading and subheadings.

3. Look at the figures, charts, pictures, and graphs.

4. Scan the boldfaced or italicized words.

5. Check out the end-of-chapter materials.

6. Make a plan for reading the chapter

 Annotation: Text messages for active Reading
Annotation is a strategy for active reading wherein you write the
key information (such as major points, definitions, and examples) in
the margins of your text.(a note of explanation or comment added
to a text or diagram.)

• Read before you write. Might be just a paragraph. It might be an

entire section. It will depend on the difficulty of the material and
how much you already know about the topic.

• Think about the ideas you’ve read. If you were going to talk to
someone about the information, what would be important to tell
them? This will be the information you will annotate.
 Annotation: Text messages for active Reading
Write Key ideas in the margins. Think text messaging.

• Definitions.

• Examples of the main ideas.

• Details or characteristics of the main ideas.

• Lists. Listed items are usually important. If you notice that text that isn’t in
a list but could be summed up in a list, annotate it in this way.

• Names, dates and events.

• Cause and effect or comparison and contract

• Possible Test Question. Put a “TQ” in the margin

• Confusing information, Put a “?” in the margin.

Example of Annotation
 Example of Bad Annotating

http://www.lbcc.edu/astarros/documents/active.reading.PP.pdf
 Studying Your Annotations

1. Cover the text. Read just your annotations.

2. Read your annotations and ask yourself questions. Do

you understand all the key ideas?

3. Reread selectively. Uncover text and reread the section if

you don’t understand the concepts clearly.

4. Test yourself. Just look at heading and subheadings and

try to say the information to yourself.
“The mind is like the stomach. It is not how much you
put into it that sounds, but how much is digested.”
-Albert Jay Nock
 Remembering what you have read and heard

1. Reflecting: Thinking about Information. Put the

material in your own words to make sense of it.

2. Rehearsing: Getting Information into your Memory.

Read it aloud or to yourself several times, or write it
down.

3. Reviewing: Keeping Information in Memory

4. Monitoring your Learning. Stay on top of what

you know and don’t know.
 Concept Map
What Are Concept Maps?

Concept maps are graphical tools for organizing and

representing knowledge.

They include concepts, usually enclosed in circles or boxes of some

type, and relationships between concepts indicated by a connecting line
linking two concepts.

Words on the line, referred to as linking words or linking phrases,

specify the relationship between the two concepts.

The label for most concepts is a word, although sometimes we use

symbols such as + or %, and sometimes more than one word is used.
Writing things down
Create a Concept Map
 Write things down

1. Create a chart.

2. Create a Time Line.

3. Create Questions and Answers.