Reading has a key role to play as you step up to University study or progress to the next stage of your degree programme. Read on to find out how to make good reading choices...
How will reading help me?
Reading is how you develop your knowledge, investigate topics that interest you in more depth, prepare for assessment and build evidence to support your arguments in your work.
Reading will help you develop your academic writing skills, as texts provide a model for the style of writing in your subject discipline. It is a great way to learn how authors integrate their reading into their writing, how they build citations into their work to support their own research, and how they use the style of referencing common to your area.
How do I choose my readings?
If you are new to the University and have visited the Library or begun to search for resources in Library Search, you are probably struck by the sheer amount of information available to you. The wide-ranging collections of books, e-books and journal articles provide you with millions of sources to choose from. For those stepping up to independent research projects or dissertations, it is likely you will be exploring new types of information or resources beyond your comfort zone as you are asked to read and discover your own sources.
So how do you know what to read? How do you decide which sources are of good academic quality, appropriate for your level of study and fit for purpose?
In the Library, we talk a lot about being critical in your approach and carefully evaluating information. We recommend using these Six Questions to help you make judgements about the quality of the information you have found.
But there are other simple ways to ensure that you are searching in the right places and identifying information that is reputable and of appropriate quality for your academic studies.
We asked members of the Library Liaison Team to share the advice they would give to students. Watch this short video of our top tips to help you know what to read, including making use of recommendations and focusing on academic, peer-reviewed literature.
For more tips on finding information and reading, visit the ASK website. Or explore the finding quality information online topic for tips on studying remotely, including evaluating the information you find online.
