How did you learn to read? How do you feel about yourself as a reader?

How you approach reading now is influenced by how you learned to read and how you felt about reading and yourself as a reader. Children typically begin their reading education formally in kindergarten, and by third grade, have a strong view of reading. Children who enjoy reading and feel good about reading usually build confidence in their reading skills and those that struggle as a young child often continue to feel uncomfortable with reading, even as they build skills and have success.

Your past experiences in early childhood matter and may explain how you feel about reading now, as an adult. It is important to remember that you can build your reading skills and confidence at any age- and that being in college shows that you have the foundation to build on to become a strong, confident reader.

How did you manage reading in high school?

In high school, you build habits that will likely continue in college unless you make deliberate changes. How you approached your assigned readings in high school could influence what you do now in college classes. Unfortunately, many high school students do not read what is assigned and instead find ways to avoid reading while still earning a good grade. If grades are your only goal, this makes sense. But… reading is not about a grade. It is about filling your mind with information and ideas you can access and use. Even the things you do not remember shape your thoughts and ideas, now and in the future.

How do you read now?

Think about your reading habits in high school and if you want to continue them now in college or make changes.

Consider

• How you approached assigned readings: What was your mindset? How did you prepare?
• How you completed readings: Did you read the entire reading? What strategies did you use? Where did you read? How did you take notes?
• How you felt after reading: Did you remember what you read? Did you feel the need to reread? Were your notes helpful in recalling the material? Did you think about how to read the same type of material the next time you were assigned it?

Identify

• What you did well in reading that you want to continue and what you felt was difficult or challenging that you want to improve.

Think about

• The conditions that helped you read successfully that you can use in college
• Distractions and conditions that affects your ability to read
• Strategies and approaches to reading that worked for you
• What you did that wasn’t helpful for understanding and recall
• How long you could read for and how you resumed reading

Compare

How you want to handle college reading to how you handled high school reading and make a plan for how you will approach readings when they are assigned, including what you want to continue and what you want to change (hint: some of your behaviors may be habits- and you’ll want to look at how to change habits later in this book)

You should vary the length of your readings, the difficulty of the reading process, and the difficult of the content in the readings itself. Some short readings are very difficult and require extensive monitoring of your reading process and understanding and some long form readings can be quick and easy to read.

Your reading speed will depend on the difficulty of content and the challenge of the type of material, including tone, vocabulary, and structure.

More than anything, remember that reading is a skill and that the act of reading is good for you!

College reading expectations

As a college student, you are expected to be able to read:

• At length, as long documents are common in college
• With sustained focus as complex language and ideas are part of academic texts
• Flexibly, using different strategies and steps depending on reading type and goal
• Independently, without external oversight or reward
• With understanding and the ability to think critically about what you read

Why can college reading feel difficult?

The expectation of reading in college–the need to read long texts, with focus and flexibility, without supervision and with understanding–can feel overwhelming. Readings in college tend to be harder to understand, with new language and ideas, and denser, with more words and ideas packed into each sentence, paragraph, and page.

The fact that college readings are often material that is new to you can make texts feel more difficult, too. When you are reading materials written by scholars for scholars, you will need to  monitor what you understand as well as the process you are using to read. Many texts in college are not written to instruct you; they are meant to document and store knowledge. For that reason, you’ll need a strong set of reading strategies.

A strategy is a set of steps that you use to increase your success. Strategies can be formal and designed by others, or can be designed by you based on what works for you.

How to approach a new reading

Before starting a new reading, you’ll want to know what you are about to read. This includes understanding who the author is, why they wrote this specific text (and what they want from you as their reader), and how much you can trust what they say. A quick search about the author can help you understand who they are and their credibility. In a classroom environment, your instructor has likely already done these steps and might share this information. Once you have the reading, spend a few minutes looking at the reading and how it is structured.

Getting to know the reading can help you identify:

• How much time you’ll need to read
• How long you will be able to read before needing a break
• The purpose of the reading
• How the reading is structured
• The topics included in the reading
• How much unfamiliar materials (ideas, vocabulary) are in the reading
• After looking at the reading, you can then set up your environment and materials to make the most of your reading time, including deciding how to take effective notes.

Being flexible in how you read can help you develop reading skills by looking for opportunities where you need to:

• Change your reading speed
• Identify and define new vocabulary
• Change your environment
• Stop reading to look into related topics
• Shift from reading to thinking about what read

Reflecting on the reading by stopping and thinking about what you’ve read, let’s you ask yourself:

• What did I already know that this reading confirmed?
• What did I think that this reading contraindicated?
• What am I curious about now that I’ve read this?
• What parts of this reading connected with me?

A strategy for reading effectively and why it works

What do in each step

Reading 1: Read to know what the text contains

• Goal: preview the entire text quickly and gather information, including who the author is, when this was written or published, and where it was published.
• Reading style: skim and skip reading to move through the text quickly, focusing on the areas that catch your attention.
• Pay attention to headings, bold items, formatted items, illustrations, images, and anything else that gets your attention
• Take a break: Taking a break after previewing gives your brain the chance to shift what you read to memory so that it is familiar when you return to it. This read lets you identify how much time you need to read, what notes will be helpful, and how to approach the reading.

Reading 2: Read to know what the text says

Goal: read the text in blocks that work for you (10, 15, 30, 60 min)

Reading style: varied, shifting between reading, critical or deep reading, and slow reading.

Actions:

• • Monitor your comprehension and focus and adjust your reading behavior and environment as needed.
  • Mark unfamiliar words or areas you want to read carefully during note-taking as you read (hint: use a specific color for this or write down the terms/page number as you read on paper).
  • When done (or stopping), write a summary note (if you take a break and then read again, use this note as your starting place).

Take a break: Taking a break after reading gives your brain time to process what you read and move it to memory. It helps you to identify notes you need in the future. After you read, spend some time thinking about what you read, while you take a break of 30 minutes to a day or two to let the reading encode so you retain what you read.

Reading 3: Read to know what you need to use

Goal: Revisit the reading to take notes and check your understanding and memory

Reading style: Skimming and skipping, pausing to check your understanding and memory

Actions:

• • Use highlights for keywords and key ideas (hint: keep your highlights to a few words and write any other information in your own words, in the margin, or on your notes page). Using different colors for different highlights is helpful.
  • Write summary notes for the information you need for the future

Taking notes on the margin of a reading

Highlight keywords

Highlight key ideas (no more than 4-5 words)

Write a summary note for the paragraph in the margin that captures the main idea

Taking notes in a document

Your notes should contain:

Reconsidering reading: Building your college reading skills

Up until adulthood, reading is something you do without thinking or for pleasure, or because your teachers have told you to. Many students in high school do not read their assigned readings and in fact spend more energy avoiding reading. While this can work in a classroom situation, it does not prepare you for college and career reading, where you need to not only “get through” the reading, you need to understand and internalize what it says.

As you move through college, you may find yourself needing to upgrade your reading skills, and using strategies like 3Reads can help you read more efficiently, clearly, and with more understanding.

Reconsidering your approach to reading can help you move forward in your classes and prepare for you for your future. Focus on finding ways to be proactive, independent, and flexible, helping to develop new reading habits that are both effective and satisfying.