QUICK RESOURCE SHEET #52

Critical reading

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What is critical reading?

“To read critically is to make judgments about how a text is argued. This is a highly reflective skill requiring you to "stand back" and gain some distance from the text you are reading. (You might have to read a text through once to get a basic grasp of content before you launch into an intensive critical reading.)”

---from http://www.utoronto.ca/writing/critrdg.html

Why is critical reading important?

"...critical reading is about entering into a special relationship with language. But what does this mean exactly, and why is it important? Paradoxically, the desire to know what something means ‘exactly’ is at the very heart of why it is important to get up close to language.

...writing always outlives its author. Whenever we discuss a novel by a dead author, the text can be said to be alive. Indeed, some literary critics argue that the author is technically dead the moment his or her pen leaves the page. This is because writing depends on a reader for its existence; otherwise it remains nothing more than marks on a page.

However, this explanation doesn’t take into account the way in which words have a tendency to resist our control. We therefore need to remember that writing is intimately involved with language in what can seem like a rebellious or defiant manner.

The unpredictability of language prompts us to seek fixed meanings, to know ‘exactly’...Writing is lively, vital, and on the move in an ‘ongoing process’.

By getting involved in a deep-exchange with language we become aware of this movement; that is, of the way in which the ‘secret treasures’ of language, as Hélène Cixous calls them, entice and distract us, before finally abandoning us at the moment we think we’ve got a grip on our words (Cixous: 1999 165)."

---adapted from http://www.kent.ac.uk/english/writingwebsite/reading/article2_p1.htm

http://www.csuohio.edu/writingcenter/critread.html

Here's a brief and accessible guide to critical reading with a list of strategies for the student.

http://www.brocku.ca/english/jlye/criticalreading.html

This is a more detailed guide for the student, with separate sections on analysis of fiction, poetry, prose in fiction as well as a section devoted to the writing of analytical essays. The site's author, Brock University professor John Lye, does a wonderful job of illustrating his main points with allusions to both popular culture and classic literature. (Click on his name and keep clicking through to see the voluminous archive of his academic writings.)

http://www.ucc.vt.edu/stdysk/essays.html

A straightforward guide to the critical reading of essays.

http://www.criticalreading.com/

"To non-critical readers, many texts offer the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. To the critical reader, any single text provides but one portrayal of the facts, one individual's "take" on the subject. Criticalreading.com shows you how to recognize what a text says, what a text does, and what a text means by analyzing choices of content, language, and structure. It shows you what to look for, and how to think about what you find."

http://www.hope.ac.uk/gnu/stuhelp/reading.htm

A self-assessment tool to give students an idea of their own critical reading abilities, comparing a surface approach to reading to a deep approach.

Previous editions of the QUICK RESOURCE SHEET

#1 – Creating quizzes (and more) online                                                         

#2 – Vocabulary builders

#3 – Online discussion groups for English teachers                                    

#4 – Grammar headaches – and how to cure them

#5 – Resources for new teachers                                                     

#6 – International Education Week

#7 – Mentoring programs                                                                    

#8 – Education publications online

#9 – Applied Linguistics                                                                   

#10 – English for Young Learners

#11 – World AIDS Day                                                                      

#12 – Online writing guides

#13 – E-mail exchanges                                                                      

#14 – Free online English courses

#15 – Effective e-mail communication                                             

#16 – Libraries online

#17 – American Studies                                                                     

#18 – Teaching methodologies

#19 – Internet tutorials                                                                       

#20 – Using the newspaper – Part I

#21 – Making books                                                                           

#22 - Using the newspaper – Part II

#23 – Human rights in language teaching

#24 – Blogging

#25 – Poetry and language teaching

#26 – The communicative approach

#27 -  Idioms

#28 – Earth Day

#29 – Alternative assessment

#30 – Peer assessment

#31 – Self-assessment

#32 – Portfolio assessment – Part I

#33 -  Portfolio assessment - Part II (Online Portfolios)

#34 – Intercultural communication

#35 – Teaching Adults

#36 – Learning disorders / Special needs

#37 – Using computers in reading instruction

#38 – Use of authentic materials

#39 – English for Medical Purposes

#40 – Sources for authentic materials

#41 – Education and technology

#42 – Academic writing

#43 – Teaching and stress

#44 – Back to school

#45 – Motivating students

#46 – Action research

#47 – Internet terminology

#48 – Fluency

#49 – Curriculum design

#50 – Pragmatics

#51 - Podcasting for English teachers