Reading Games: Strategies for Reading Scholarly Sources

John Lauer

ENGL 250

Reading Games: Strategies for Reading Scholarly Sources

By Karen Rosenberg

Thought Piece

My Thoughts…

               My first thought… wow that was a long article. But guess what?! All Scholarly sources are on the longer side and may be even longer then twelve pages, so I need to get used to longer readings. I have never liked reading books or any long text. Non-fiction, such as scholarly sources, has always been more enjoyable for me to read than fiction. Things that are of real life always make more sense to write about because they actually affect us and they matter for the betterment of the world. I enjoy them more because it seems more useful to read something that was worth telling people about than reading about Jimmy, the magical seahorse, who saved his pet dragon from the ferocious Snow Leopard of Gonovan City. Even though those kinds of stories are fun, they don’t help advance the world’s technology, assist with national crises, or keep the neighbor from killing your family.

               Now this article covered a lot of good ideas about what you should look for in scholarly sources and how to read and analyze them. It was quite helpful and insightful to read, but what I thought was most interesting about the article was the idea of reading academic texts like you are entering a conversation. When I read this, I couldn't help but stop and think about what that might actually mean. Whenever I read something, I usually try to absorb the main points and ideas from the writing, and then I go on to figure out how I use that information. The bad thing is that a lot of the time I don’t like to read. So when I do, I sometimes start “blankly reading”, which means I read the words, but don’t understand or absorb anything from the text. This causes me to go back and reread the material. How can I fix this? Well for the longest time I figured I would always be this way because I never would like to read. But when this idea of a “conversation” was presented, it made me think of something. What if while I read an article, I also stopped at points in the writing and had a conversation with the text in my head about what I was reading about? Then I would reiterate the ideas and it would help me remember the information better. This could help my comprehension skills in doing my homework and learning in classes. Having a conversation with the text is simply responding to the ideas and information you are reading about and talking about it in your head to yourself. This is a simple concept, but not many people do it because it takes more time and it feels weird talking to yourself while reading a book. Most of the time I just want to rush to get through the reading so I can do the assignment and do something more fun, but if I take the time to try to improve my writing and be a better reader, then I can see myself improving in my studies in college.

               When I think about myself as a reader, I usually don’t put my skills very high. Since I have never liked reading, I have never worked to get better at it. I have always struggled reading long, boring text, but if I start conversing with the writing while I read, I might be able to improve my reading and start enjoying it. Since I’m in college now, I will be reading more of what I’m interested in, so this is the perfect time to start diving in to my major and be proactive in what I want to learn. When you go to college, a lot of what you do is study, so why not make it worthwhile, go the extra mile, and really indulge in reading. Plus most of the material professors give is usually good, unlike high school teachers who just cover the anonymous basics of subjects.

               This paper overall gave me a good look at what scholarly sources look like and how to interpret them. So now I am better prepared for finding good information when I need it. Thanks!

J-Lauer out.