Outcome 3 (Active Reading) – Employ techniques of active reading, critical reading, and informal reading response for inquiry, learning, and thinking.

In high school, I always read the texts and highlighted sections of them that I thought was important, but I never really understood the importance of active reading. I would sometimes make comments about the text and ideas I had, but they were never super involved or analyzed too much of the text. It was not until this year that I realized how important actively reading the text was and how much further I understood the text when I did read actively. In Figure 1, I have a page of annotations and highlighted sections I made in Konnikova’s article, demonstrating the process of active reading. It is critical to actively read the text because it ensures that you understand the text completely and fully, and also helps when analyzing quotations, because you can draw ideas from the text that you had previously written about certain sections of the text.

Figure 1: Annotations from Konnikova Article:

I have never done a reading response after reading a new text, until I came into this class. After reading the text, the reading response questions allows me to answer questions about the text, helping me to get a better understanding of the text I had just read, and allows me to come up with new ideas and practice integrating quotes and analysis with my ideas. In Figure 2, I have an example of a reading response question from Konnikova’s text, showing how I have included my annotations and highlighted sections from the text within my response. By completing these reading response questions, it sets me up for success when it comes to actually writing the essay itself, because a lot of the ideas included in the reading response questions are included within the essay. This allows me to have practice with using the text along with analysis and quotes in an informal manner, allowing me to prepare myself to write with the same material in a formal manner.

Figure 2: Konnikova’s Reading Response Questions: