Reading for meaning

Abstract

This research was developed from a previous CELT project (2003/04 Focussed seminar groups, Clarke, 2004) in which students were asked to read a specific article and then discuss it in a seminar situation. It was noted was that students approached reading in different ways but in the main interacted with the text by marking it in particular ways. However, from working with different groups of undergraduate students, and discussing this with colleagues, the general feeling is that many students balk at reading academic literature. This is affirmed in research undertaken by Mateos et al. (2007) who found 93% of students on three different degree courses stated that the main source of accessing information came through oral exposition from the lecturer. In addition to the previous CELT research, a separate piece of research was undertaken as part of a CETL project which looked at how level 1 students approach academic writing (Clarke and French, 2007). Clearly, the link between efficient reading and appropriate levels of academic writing is undisputed; Wyse (2006:4) suggests that ‘(we) must learn to read like writers.’ Consequently, researching the process by which students assimilate their reading and apply it to their work seemed to be a natural evolution from the previous research projects.