Reading Strategies

    The most important component to being successful in a course, in my opinion is reading. Without reading information you have nothing to learn or study. You might have the best strategies in the world to use for studying for a test but you won't be able to apply them if you have not read the content. Reading is one of those things I find very important and tend to take very seriously.
    However, I noticed that I never had any developed strategy that helped me get through my readings in an organized and timely fashion. I have mentioned before that I am a HUGE procrastinator so although I do get through the reading it takes me a very long time. After reading through the chapter in the textbook I was relieved to find many ways that could help me.
    The strategy that I found to be the most useful was NSAS or No salt and sauce. This stands for Notes, Scan, Attend, and Study Sheets. The first step, notes allows you to download and read lecture notes before class. Scan allows you to scan the assigned chapter and look for information identified in the notes for example key terms. Attend means go to class! Finally, study sheets suggests you create a study sheet/flash cards for the information in the text, covered in class, and in the online lecture notes. The reason why I found this to be the most useful was because majority of my professors post their lecture notes prior to the class period. Therefore, this strategy allows you to scan these notes before the class period in order to ensure a lasting maximum information affect.
   The first course I used the strategy in was SOC-101. Prior to the class period I signed onto blackboard and downloaded that weeks powerpoint. Concurrently, I pulled out my SOC textbook and began looking for similarities between the two. Every time I saw something similar or that elaborated on the other I wrote it down in my study sheet. In addition, I attended class and had the study sheet I began to put together and filled in any information that my professor elaborated on in class. This strategy was helpful in that I felt I had covered all grounds of possible content and when it comes time to studying for a test I know I will have all the information to feel fully prepared.
     The next course that I used the No Salt and Sauce strategy in was IST-195. The reason I decided to use it for this class is because it heavily content based. Every assignment given is based on the information we have to read. The textbook for the class must be over 1000 pages leaving each chapter with 50-60 pages to cover. This is not something I handle well. When it comes to reading such large amounts of information I tend to get very distracted. I incorporated a characteristic from one of the other reading strategies and broke up my reading based on my attention span. I continued to write down only key facts and phrases that I had also seen in his power points posted online in order to ensure I had wrote down the information that we will most likely be tested on.
    The only thing I feel this strategy is missing is allowing yourself to chunk time and read everything in steps. This way it doesn't make reading seem like an impossible task.
     I really enjoy the NSAS strategy and I look forward to using it in the future. I believe that it will help me cover all aspects of the content I need in my classes to ensure that I am successful.

NOTE: Attached is a partial view of the online power point notes and the study guides I then created.