Ashley Meyn

Thought Piece #2

With the first paragraph of Resenberg’s article, I found myself laughing. This piece has Ashley written all over it. I can pick up a Nicholas Sparks book and read cover to cover within days. Nothing intrigues me as much as a drama or love story. However the second I pick up my religion or personal finance textbooks, it’s as if I have been sleep deprived for days and could pass out within the first paragraph. I too, often wonder, is there something wrong with me? Maybe I’m not cut out for this college thing. It was comical and calming to read that this is a common problem and that I might not have a major issue on my hands. I was reassured in the fact that she started out the way I am and as a graduate student, learned to crave scholarly texts.

I also enjoyed Rosenbergs insight into how scholarly reading works. It is not just flat information that does not have anything to do with you. She explains that it can help you to understand your stance on issues and I believe make you a more well-rounded person. Class discussions are also very important to help understand what you are reading and force you to see different interpretations. For example, I had a class last semester that had large amounts of scholarly readings every day. The writing was old fashioned and hard to understand. The most helpful thing my teacher did was peer discussions. The way I understood what the author was saying was sometimes much different than what the people around me thought. This is a helpful tool for me to use even out of class settings.

I find it very helpful what she said about breaking a scholarly article down. Finding the audience, focus questions, and asking your own questions while reading could be very helpful. I feel I have probably been missing out on a lot of the informations that I could have gained just by breaking everything down and using more resources. Though this is no doubt a lot of work, doing these things can really help me to absorb and understand a lot of the information I previously slept through or skimmed right over.