You don’t have to specifically wait until you have read an entire text, but I find it’s good to at least read a section. There are a lot of approaches to tackle this part which all boil down to applying the knowledge after you read. The third part-post-reading-is where most of us struggle. Imagine if you highlighted every single piece of text-you would have essentially changed the background color and gained nothing. It also prevents you from highlighting too much which is important because the more you highlight, the less useful those highlights are.

This has the dual effect of making sure that you’re focusing all of your attention on understanding what you’re reading instead of looking for sections to highlight. Using the margins to have a conversation with the author, summarizing each section, or my favorite-mindful highlighting.Ī lot of people have a tendency to highlight immediately as they start reading, but as American educator Walter Pauk pointed out in his book, How To Study In College, “You should read the text before you start marking it.” There are different ways to make this process more active. This is when you dive into the text or book. And pre-reading does the exact same thing for words. Once you open your eyes you’re going to start noticing that color everywhere in your environment. Try this: Close your eyes and think about a specific color for a couple of seconds. Doing this before reading has the effect of priming your brain to readily pick out information when you’re going through the text. In the pre-reading stage, you prepare yourself and acquaint yourself with the content. Divide your reading into three parts: pre-reading, in-reading, and post-reading. So, if you’re feeling intimidated, here’s what you can do.

Harappa’s Reading Deeply course helped me figure out how to go beyond just a quick skim and read analytically, a term coined by American philosopher Mortimer Adler.īecause it’s one thing to just read a book, it’s another to understand it. How many times have you said to yourself, “I wish I had a month to stay at home and read all those books on my shelf.” Well, it’s happening.īut now that you have the time to read because of the lockdown, are you suddenly feeling overwhelmed? And wondering where to start? Or how to read intelligently?

Gabe newell these things take time