I am trying to improve the way I teach students how to read an article and would therefore like to have insight into the different ways of reading an article.
Below is my example:
First I try to answer the question 'should I read it or not?' with successive filters at the level of 1) title, 2) abstract, 3) figures, 4) methods. At each step I check that the content corresponds to what I anticipated at the previous step.
Then depending of whether I know the background or not I would read directly the results or the introduction.
How do YOU read an article?
Teaching University undergraduate students and some who conduct their own research projects, I suggest the following reading strategy based on their key word search:
1. Read title and abstract. If article seems to be of interest, continue.
2. Read Introduction and Conclusion. If still interested, continue.
3. Skim the headings to determine if still interested. If yes, continue.
4. Read the article fully, paying particular attention to the sections that are relevant to their needs at the time (aim, focus and purpose of what they are doing.
First, I must define the field and topic and be in the circle of my interests, then when starting to read the article, determine whether its introduction corresponds to its title, then move to the essence of the topic and then the conclusion to come up with information or an idea and by practice you can criticize the article positive criticism and distinction How good is it
Pour lire un article : en amont je pars d'une sélection par mots-clés, je regarde le résumé, l'introduction et la conclusion. Si j'ai un doute (Contenu qui me parle mais de loin) je regarde la bibliographie. Et enfin je peux faire une lecture de certains passages dont les titres m'intéressent ou m'interpellent. Il m'arrive également d'aller chercher des notes de lecture produites par des chercheurs dans des revues. Cette façon de faire, assez ouverte m'amène souvent à identifier un intérêt du texte mais pour un autre sujet que celui que je suis en train de traiter. Je diffère la lecture et transferts alors l'article dans la thématique qui correspond, en vue de l'utiliser pour une autre écriture d'article.
I read the abstract first to see if the contents are matching with my anticipation. Then I go to the methodology section and try to understand the design and tool. I also look at sampling so I can see how reliable will the findings be. I lean towards a larger sample in terms of respondents. Finally, I read carefully the conclusion or discussion section. If the article favour my search, then I take out my highlighters and read each word because I intend to use it in my writing.
As a primary and secondary school teacher educator, I initially use a method similar to what Ambreen has described and select an article based on the relevance to the teacher content and pedagogical knowledge I am focused on during a particular week of the course (lectures, tutorials, on-line set work and allocated additional hours that I expect them to invest in the course). This involves 2-3 readings a week.
When I begin my courses I introduce my students to a coding strategy that will support their critical engagement with each required reading. I encourage them to work with different coloured highlighters. This is a code we co-construct that works for us all. We identify symbols to go with the different colour highlighter eg a tick symbol highlighted in blue would indicate I already know this.
I model the analysis of an abstract and another part of the text (eg. the literature review). Then independently, they go through the text identifying our codes and write the symbol in the margin and highlight the text in that colour. My expectation is that they will read an article more than once. When they return to read the article the symbol prompts remind them of what was important on the first reading. They can readily see how their knowledge acquistion progressed throughout the course.
Delia Baskerville thanks for sharing! I like a lot your coding scheme idea. I might have two questions on that: 1) do you redefine them every year?, 2) are they similar or very different from the coding scheme using in the 'science in the classroom' series?
Marie-Hélène Doublet une stratégie qui laisse de la place à la sérendipité, donc! c'est vrai que ça arrive merci de l'avoir formalisé.
Hello
I read the resume, methodology, and results
Best regards
Ph.D. Ingrid del Valle García Carreño
I have prepared a small form, from the answers above. You can therefore contribute to the discussion in this way also! https://forms.gle/LvD2iCbq33Uok1Mj8
Antoine Taly : c'est exactement ça, une stratégie basée sur la sérendipité. On peux s'y perdre, ça m'arrive souvent, mais c'est aussi une source de réflexion créative et de petites trouvailles qui viennent répondre à mes questionnements.
If the title it's of my interest: 1) the abstract + key-word, 2) bibliography, and then, all the article.
If the article is in my interests, i read the abstract, the methology and the conclusion
It is interesting that this would come up at this moment. Like many of you, I just began another term of teaching and I have listed the majority of the readings for each course in the syllabus and weekly schedule. More and more, we need to teach the skill of "reading with intent" to our students. There is simply too much information out there on the internet and in print to choose what is most meaningful. I would use research-gate as a perfect example of this notion. We simply cannot read everything, so what we really need is to become better at identifying the best and most helpful resources for the way each of our minds works.
So - what do we really need to teach our students about reading articles and doing research? What has been effective for me and my students is to teach them how to "skim-read or speed-read" through the article first and then, if they find it interesting, useful to them or if it makes sense to them - then go back and read it more in-depth.
What this will also demand is for us (the guide to their learning) to provide more resources that we trust on the topic.
The basis of this approach is that we know that every person learns and takes in information in their own way.
There is a lot more to this approach that I cannot share in a simple response, but I hope it will help some to approach reading more efficiently and effectively.
Best wishes to all. Dale Lonis
Teaching University undergraduate students and some who conduct their own research projects, I suggest the following reading strategy based on their key word search:
1. Read title and abstract. If article seems to be of interest, continue.
2. Read Introduction and Conclusion. If still interested, continue.
3. Skim the headings to determine if still interested. If yes, continue.
4. Read the article fully, paying particular attention to the sections that are relevant to their needs at the time (aim, focus and purpose of what they are doing.
Dale Lonis I completely agree. One of the reasons for me to teach them the ability to read articles is to allow them to renew their knowledge after university. As you mention the amount of information is gigantic and they therefore need to carry out some screening. Interestingly there seams to be many strategies for this filtering. Most of us start from the title and abstract and then strategies diverge a lot. One of the reasons might be that articles have very different forms depending on fields of studies. Another one, as mentioned by Midgie Thompson is that our needs vary so our strategy can also be adapted.
I guess if I can get students to have all this in mind that would be great. I will try to have those aspect explicitly in my documents!
One of the reasons for me to teach them the ability to read articles is to allow them to renew their knowledge after university. As you mention the amount of information is gigantic and they therefore need to carry out some screening. Interestingly there seems to be many strategies for this filtering. Most of us start from the title and abstract and then strategies diverge a lot. One of the reasons might be that articles have very different forms depending on fields of studies. Another one, as mentioned by Midgie Thompson is that our needs vary so our strategy can also be adapted.
attached is my working document to work with students. any feedback welcomed! At some point I might also manage to write a paper on the subject, at least for a conference proceeding. Tell me if you would be interested in joining the writing!
Antoine, what is your area of research? I will be interested in writing.
Ambreen Alam my background is in biochemistry/biophysics but try to analyse my teaching as rigorously as possible. I will contact you privately!
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