Academic Reading and Texts

Academic Reading

• Academic reading differs from everyday reading, requiring a more active, probing, and recursive approach.
• Strategic reading involves understanding your topic, finding research materials, and developing your ideas.

Layers of Academic Reading

• It includes asking questions, reflecting on relationships within the text, interpreting meaning, connecting with other readings, and refining your topic and purpose.

Academic Texts

• These texts are critical, objective, specialized, and written by professionals or experts in a particular field.
• It uses formal language, style, and tone.
• Academic texts may take the form of grammatical units like words, phrases, clauses, and sentences.

Paragraphs

• Paragraphs are sets of related sentences with one main idea in a topic sentence.
• Supporting sentences develop thesis or main idea of paragraph
• Concluding sentences restate or summarize the thesis or main idea.

Topic Sentences

• Paragraphs can present the topic sentence at the beginning or end.
• Topic sentences control the idea, guiding the paragraphs flow and limiting the topic and should be specific and not a fact

Patterns of Paragraph Development

• Deductive pattern: the topic sentence is stated at the beginning.
• Inductive pattern: the topic sentence is stated at the end.
• Deductive-inductive pattern: the topic sentence is stated at the beginning and restated at the end.
• Inductive-deductive pattern: the topic sentence is stated in the middle.
• Hinted pattern: the topic sentence is not stated but implied.

Academic Text Composition Pattern

• Most academic texts follow the IBC pattern: Introduction, Body, Conclusion.
• Technical texts may follow the ABC format: Abstract, Body, Conclusion.
• A preview-view-review (PVR) approach may also be used.

Academic Language

• It encompasses the oral, written, auditory, and visual language proficiency needed for effective learning in academic settings; formal, impersonal, precise, and objective.
• Social language is informal, personal, and may use slang and repetitive language.

Academic Writing

• Academic writing should be clear, concise, focused, structured, and supported by evidence.
• It starts by posing a question, problematizing a concept, or evaluating an opinion, and ends by answering, clarifying, or arguing.
• It aims to inform, argue a point, or persuade.

Academic Text

• Academic text provides information, concepts, and theories related to a specific discipline.
• Characteristics include complexity, evidence-based arguments, a thesis-driven approach, academic language, and structure.

Direct Quoting

• Copying someone else's words and crediting the source.

When to use quotes

• Use it when focusing on language, giving evidence, and presenting the author's position or definition.
• Critically use direct quotes when it comes to supporting your argument

Basic Principles of Quoting

• Enclose the quoted text in quotation marks/formatted as a block quote.
• Correctly cite the original author.
• Ensure the text is identical to the original.

Proper APA Format in Citing a Quote

• include author's last name, year, page.
• Use "p" for a single page and "pp" for a page range.
• Use a parenthetical or narrative citation.

Ways to Introduce a Quote

• Use introductory sentences or signal phrases.
• Integrate the quote into your sentence.

Other Guidelines in Formatting a Direct Quote

• Shorten a quote using ellipsis (...).

• Add information using square brackets [].

• indicate an original error using [sic] in italics.

• Format block quotations if the quote is more than 40 words.

Paraphrasing

• Paraphrasing puts someone else's ideas into own words without changing the meaning.

Basic Principles of Paraphrasing

• Writing the text in your own words.
• Make sure the text did not change.
• The source is cited according to APA in-text citation rules.

Paraphrasing in 5 steps

• Read the passage and note key concepts
• Cite the source

Citing a Paraphrase

• In APA style, include the author's last name, year of publication, and page or paragraph numbers.

Summarizing With Basic In-Text Citation

• Summarizing is the brief restatement of a text's main points and selecting key features to create a shorter version

Summarizing Formats

• Author heading format: summarized idea after citation.
• Idea heading format: summarized idea before citation.
• Date heading format: summarized idea after the date.

Using Reporting Verbs in Summarizing

• Reporting verbs discuss another person's writings or assertions integrating the source in the text.

Techniques in Summarizing

• Read the word first to understand the author's intent
• Summaries should start by identifying the main ideas and ensuring a smooth flow
• Use only a few sentences to limit the summary
• Proofread your work.

Referencing in APA Format

• Referencing acknowledges and cites sources.
• Provide detailed information for readers to locate original materials.

Purposes of Referencing

• Acknowledge the sources

• Avoid plagiarism

• Provides validation

• Establishes Contextualization

• Upholds academic standards, promote intellectual honesty, and promote the exchange of knowledge with other universities.

Rules in Referencing

• Author: last name, initials.
• Date: after the author's name.
• Title: capitalize the first word.
• Source: should be capitalized including details

APA Reference Rule for Various Materials

• The text details how to reference different materials like books, chapters, journals, and online articles, following APA guidelines.

Review of Related Literature (RRLs)

• It's the analysis of existing scholarly sources relevant to a topic or question.

Purpose of Review of Related Literature

• Provides context to the study
• Identifies any gaps in the literature
• Synthesizing findings from various sources
• Critically evaluating previous studies

Writing Literature Reviews

• Search reliable sources, evaluate their relevance, and identify themes, debates, and gaps.
• Structure the review chronologically, thematically, methodologically, or theoretically.

Writing the Introduction, Body, and Conclusion

• Introduction: The focus and restates the key points

• Body: should be dived into subsections

• Summarize, synthesize, evaluate, and structure paragraphs in the main body which contributes new knowledge.

Three Ways in Explaining a Concept

• Definition: clarifying a term's meaning. Explication: interpreting a text's meaning in detail.
• Clarification: organizing ideas from general to specific with examples.

Identifying Themes, Debates, and Gaps

• Identify trends in the literature and examine relevant or reoccurring themes
• Identify conflicts of interest and studies that have changed the direction of the field.
• Identify any gaps that need to be addressed in a literature.

Writing the Methodology

• Explain the approach used whether it's qualitative or quantitative.
• Describe the methods of data collection to provide the tools
• Evaluate justify how any choices will contribute to the new knowledge.