For homework this week, please conduct a close reading of "On Reflection" by Kathleen Blake Yancey.

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Suggested Approaches for Close Reading

"Close reading" is not copying and pasting entire swaths of the text into your notebooks! Close reading involves strategies that encourage readers to slow down and think, to engage with the text more deeply, and help readers approach the text in different ways than perhaps they might be used to/than in a first read-through.

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Part 1 (due Wednesday)

• Identify the purpose or potential for reading the text

• First read-through: Read the article/essay/artifact once in its entirety, focusing on the key ideas and details in the text

  • Briefly highlight or underline points that stand out to you

    • Comment on what intrigues, impresses, amuses, puzzles, confuses, disturbs

    • Consider: Why do certain points of the text confuse? Where do they illuminate or clarify? 

    • Consider: Moments of agreement or disagreement

  • Annotate (take notes in the margins or on a piece of paper/document). Identify: 

    • Main ideas

    • Supporting examples (images, situations, outside data)

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Part 2 (due Friday)

• Second read-through: Identify and analyze complex elements or ideas

  • Choose one specific section for in-depth discussion on your second read-through

  • Annotate. Identify: 

    • Key details and supportive information

      • How does this connect to ideas previously discussed in class?

      • How does this connect to personal knowledge, ideas, or biases?

    • Significant terms or phrases

      • What is the significance of these terms?

      • How do these terms play a role in your discussion or inform previously discussed ideas?

    • Lines/sections/quotations that are particularly powerful, meaningful, or informative

      • Why do you identify this line as particularly important?

    • The major takeaways from each paragraph or section

    • Places where further study/discussion or outside information might bolster your understanding of the text

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Feeling Stuck?

Consider what you might include in your annotations:

• Any unfamiliar words

  • One method is to box them in and write their meaning close in the margin, or rewrite passages in your own words

• Places where you can connect ideas to each other or to other texts

• Places where you experience an epiphany

• Anything you would like to discuss or do not understand

• Notes on how the author uses language – note the significance if you can

• Notes on the use and effect of word choice (diction) or sentence structure or type (syntax)

• Notes on the repetition of words, phrases, actions, and events

• Any patterns or cluster ideas

• Note the narrative pace / time / order of sequence of events

• Tone and mood

• Use of imagery

• Any contrasts / contradictions / juxtapositions / shifts

• Themes

• Allusions or symbols

• Figurative language (simile, metaphor, personification, kenning, etc.) or lack thereof

• Summary techniques

  • One method is after you read a chapter, you go back to the page where the chapter begins and write the key events or discoveries. Also, you can mark significant events as they occur at the top of the pages in larger writing. Both of these techniques make referencing key events later much easier, but they are not the only ways you can go about summarizing – feel free to use or experiment with what works for you