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BA1001: Time, Truth, and the Human Condition Guide: Critical Reading

JCU Library and The Learning Centre resources to help you with your BA1001 assessment tasks

Critical reading and note-taking

You don't need to read every word and take lengthy notes for every paper you have to read at university. Try out these tips:

  1. Make sure you have a clear purpose before you start reading
  2. Read the abstract, introduction and conclusions first
  3. Use skimming and scanning techniques to find relevant information (inc. keywords)
  4. Use the reference list to help you find other relevant sources.

For your research source assignment, these tips are good for your first reading. You will need to delve deeper and read the paper more than once to be able to do a good annotation for BA1001.

How to read research

The Cornell Method of note-taking

You may find you take better notes if you use the Cornell Method. This method encourages you to identify main themes and concepts, quotes, examples and evidence while drawing conclusions and examining the implications of what you are reading.

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