SQ3R – Learning how to study

SQ3R – Learning how to study
The Ten minute Guide on how to study
You’re not sure if you’re studying in the most effective way? But you don’t
have time to read through a ‘How to Study’ book of scores of pages? Here’s a
4 page guide on how to study that can improve your studying efficiency!
SQ3R stands for five possible steps in studying a book or text:
 Survey
 Question
 Read
 Recall
 Review
The SQ3R approach can be a useful way of learning from a book or study text,
whether on paper or online. It’s not the only way but it can be worth trying it
out as part of finding out what study methods work best for you. The five
stages are:
1. Survey
When presented with a book or text many of us
tend to ‘begin at the beginning, go through to the
end and then stop’. This may not always be the
best way to read. We don’t know where we are
going so we can get bogged down in detail and fail
to see the wood for the trees..
So instead we could get a bird’s eye view of the wood before we begin trampling
through the undergrowth. We could survey the whole before we try to
understand the parts.
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For instance start your survey with the title page. You may not think you’ll get
much from it but it’s always worth a glance. It can tell you:
1. The general subject area – from the title
2. The level of approach – from the sub-title
3. The author’s name and qualifications – is he or she going to be worth
reading?
4. The date of publication – is this text going to be reasonably up to date?
The Preface, Table of Contents, Learning Objectives (if any) and Index similarly
all have various items of information worth a look.
The last step in the survey is to leaf or surf through the book or text. While
leafing through:

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
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Read chapter and section headings
Read end–of chapter summaries if any
Look at any charts or pictures
Glance at the occasional sentence.
Spend just a few minutes on this.
2. Question
I suggest you begin the detailed reading of the text with a
set of questions you want answered in your mind.
Questions will often give you a sense of purpose and keep
you alert.
For instance headings and sub-headings could bring questions to mind – let's say
when reading this text you might ask “Why has the author used the heading
‘Question’?” “Who questions who?” “What part do questions play in study?”
If there are questions in the text itself such as ‘self-assessment questions’ then
try to resist the temptation to skip them! This is especially important if you are
studying a math or science text where there may be examples in the text trying them will give you valuable feedback on how well you’re doing. Research
says that ‘knowing how well you’re doing’ is the best single learning activity there
is.
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3. Read
It is important to read actively and interact with the text,
looking for the important ideas behind the text. There will be
a main idea behind each chapter section and paragraph.
However there are two things which are worth considering.
Should you:
1. Take notes on the first reading? – decide if this is
worth doing. It may be helpful or it may slow you down
and distract you
2. Underline or highlight things first time through? – ok, but you may find
you’ve highlighted the wrong things.
You can do both these things on a second reading if you like or wait until the
Recall activity (next).
4. Recall
Perhaps the most important part of
study is transferring your learning from
your short term or working memory (the
memory that enables you to remember a
phone number whilst you’re tapping it
out) to your long term memory (the
memory that keeps it permanently).
Psychologists have found that the best
way to do that is to try to recall what you’ve read. If you make regular
attempts to recall you’ll improve your learning four ways:
1. You’ll help transfer your learning from your working memory to your long
term memory
2. You’ll concentrate better
3. You can remedy any misunderstandings and lapses of memory
4. You’ll be kept actively involved with the text.
You probably won’t get these benefits by just re-reading. So once you have
started reading, pause frequently (about every section within a chapter is about
right) and tell yourself the main ideas in what you have read. This might be the
best time to start taking notes about the ideas and concepts that you think are
important.
Perhaps up to 50% of your time could be spent in recall.
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5. Review
The final step in the SQ3R study method is the review
section. Here your aim is to check the truth of your recall.
The best way to do that is to do a quick repeat of the previous
four steps:
1. Survey the text again
2. Question – remind your self of which questions you
asked
3. Re-read the text to see that you've remembered everything of
importance.
4. Recall by filling in any holes and correcting notes.
Remember that the SQ3R method is just a suggested method of study. You
might find some parts of it more helpful than others or find other methods of
study entirely. But give it a try on the next thing you study!
Below you’ll find a quiz to test your memory on this reading - see how well you
remember what you’ve read.
Questions on this text - look back for the answers!
1. What does SQ3R stand for?
2. What four things might you learn from a survey of the title page?
3. What are the two purposes of asking questions?
4. What are the two don’ts when first reading a text?
5. When should you first attempt to recall (choose one)
(a) at the end of a text
(b) at the end of each chapter
(c) at the end of each section within a chapter
(d) at the end of each paragraph
(e) at the end of each sentence
Ormond Simpson (after Derek Rowntree)
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