How to read your textbook Read actively, not passively. "Passive" means you're just a spectator, an onlooker, a bystander.

Passive reading is how you would read a popular novel: you just read page after page to find out what happens ne t. !f you read te tbooks this way, your rate of retention will be very low, according to studies on learning behavior. ""ctive" means getting involved with the material, processing it in some way. #ou are a participant, not a spectator. $elow you will find several ideas on how to read actively. !f you force yourself to develop the habit of active reading now, while you are in college, it will profit you throughout the rest of your life. Before reading a chapter. %irst, read the chapter's introduction. &any te ts list the chapter's learning objectives at the beginning of each chapter '' read them. (hen, read the heading or title of each section and subsection in the chapter) this will take only about two to five minutes *unless the chapter is horribly long+,. (hen read the chapter's conclusion or summary. -oing all of this takes maybe ./ minutes, or even less. !f you do this first, then read the chapter from start to finish, you will derive several benefits: you'll know what the chapter is about, what are the main issues it addresses, and you'll know in advance where the chapter is going. "s you're reading the chapter from start to finish, you'll understand the details better since you'll have a sense of how and where they fit in. (his techni0ue also makes it easier to read the chapter, and often makes the reading go a little more 0uickly. "nd it alerts you in advance to the important things that you need to get out of the chapter. !f something comes up and you just don't have time to read the whole chapter when it is assigned, it is far better than nothing to take ./ minutes to do what ! just described: read the intro, read the chapter's section headings, then read the summary and conclusion. (his is a very efficient way of getting a 0uick feel for the material, or at least an outline of it. "lso, doing this *rather than not reading the chapter at all, makes you much less likely to feel lost in class when your professor covers this material or subse0uent material that builds on it. Write in the margins. &ost introductory econ te ts *and many other te ts, have nice wide margins. 1se them. 2rite notes in the margins. %or instance, when you really start to understand the logic behind something and can e plain it in your own words, write down your e planation in the margin. *!f you want to sell your book back at the semester's end, the book buy'back people probably won't notice your marginal notes, and the student who buys your book ne t year will benefit+, Read with pencil and paper. "s you read through the chapter, every time a new term or concept or definition is introduced, copy down the term and its definition. (hen leave some space in your notes. (hen as you read more about this term later in the chapter, you can add a few sentences about the importance or relevance of this term, or other related concepts. 3conomics uses lots of models, which are usually represented with a graph. 3very time your te t introduces you to a new model, write in your notes the following things:

(he name of the model. (he purpose of the model *for e ample, the supply and demand model shows us how the market price and 0uantity are determined,. -raw a copy of the graph or diagram that goes with the model. 4arefully label the a es and the curve*s,. %or each of the curves, write down what that curve shows and e plain why it has a positive, negative, hori5ontal, or vertical slope. %or e ample, the demand curve shows the relationship between consumer demand for an item and the price of that item. !t has a

negative slope because, other things being e0ual, an increase in the price of an item makes that item less attractive or affordable to consumers, causing a decrease in the 0uantity that consumers demand. %or each curve, write down a list of things that will shift the curve, and briefly e plain how each of these things shifts the curve. %or instance, the demand curve for most goods will shift to the right in response to an increase in consumer income. Reason: at any given price, consumers are willing and able to buy more of the item.

!t's also a good idea to go through these steps when models are introduced in your lecture notes. !t's a thorough system for studying models, and will prepare you for a variety of test 0uestions on the model. Throw your highlighter away. $elieve it or not, highlighting the important parts in your book is a passive activity: all you are doing is pushing a marker over the page. If you think something in your book is important, then write it down in your notes! !f you just highlight it, then you'll forget what it means or why it is important five weeks later when you are reviewing for the e am. "lso, if many different things are important, you'll soon find that the color of the page has changed from white to yellow, and how does that help you6 7ot much. "nd finally, studies show that for many students, highlighting is actually worse than doing nothing: it gives a false sense of security and accomplishment, but all students have really done is pushed a colored marker across the page. Make bulleted lists. &ost te tbooks, especially principles books, give you various clues that something is important. %or instance, they typically put important terms in boldface or color, put definitions or key ideas in the margin, and highlight the importance of an e0uation by centering it on its own line, with space above and below the e0uation. 2hat happens when you come to a section in your te t that has none of these features, just paragraph after paragraph of plain old words6 -oes this mean the section is unimportant6 Probably not. !t means that you have to find the clues yourself: you have to figure out what's important. (his is not hard to learn to do, and it is an incredibly valuable skill. 8ere's a good way to do it: Read the section. %igure out what is the section's main point, and write it down in your notes. (hen write a bulleted list of the supporting points or related informational points. 8ere's an e ample from Principles of Macroeconomics, a te tbook by 7. 9regory &ankiw that's widely used at 17:; and elsewhere. !f you happen to have this book, take a look at the section of chapter ./ entitled "9-P and 3conomic 2ell'$eing", which starts at the bottom of p.<./. !f you don't have the book, all you need to know is that chapter ./ is about the definition and meaning of 9-P) you'll pick up the rest from the following discussion. (his section of chapter ./ has no bells or whistles, no terms in boldface, no definitions in the margin, etc. !t just has two and a half pages of words and words and words. =ne of my students read this section and came up with the following bulleted list of the section's important points: GDP AND ECONOMIC WELL-BEING (pp210-212) This section disc sses !hethe" GDP is # $ood %e#s "e o& # n#tion's !e((-)ein$*

e(o+ ent ,enned- + ote c"itici.es GDP &o" not di"ect(- %e#s "in$ + #(it- o& (i&e/ non-%#te"i#( !e(()ein$/ etc GDP e0c( des the 1#( e o& (eis "e2 i& peop(e t#3e %o"e ti%e o&& !o"3 to spend !ith &#%i(-/ GDP $oes do!n ) t !e((-)ein$ %#- $o p GDP e0c( des the + #(it- o& the en1i"on%ent2 !4o "e$ (#tions/ &i"%s %i$ht )e #)(e to p"od ce %o"e (!hich "#ises GDP) !hi(e !o"senin$ the en1i"on%ent* GDP e0c( des the 1#( e o& non-%#"3et #cti1ities/ e1en tho $h these #cti1ities #"e p"od cti1e #nd i%po"t#nt* E0#%p(es2 chi(d-"e#"in$/ 1o( ntee" !o"3* 5o!e1e"/ )i$$e" GDP %#3es it e#sie" to #&&o"d the 3inds o& thin$s (ed c#tion/ $ood he#(th c#"e) th#t i%p"o1e non-%#te"i#( !e((-)ein$ C#se st d- (p212) sho!s th#t co nt"ies !ith hi$he" GDP pe" pe"son tend to h#1e hi$he" (i&e e0pect#nc- #nd (ite"#c- "#tes (!hich #"e t!o non-%#te"i#( indic#to"s o& !e((-)ein$) )otto% (ine2 GDP is not # pe"&ect o" co%p"ehensi1e %e#s "e o& # n#tion's !e((-)ein$/ ) t it's sti(( p"ett- $ood*

2hen studying for your e am, which you do think would be easier to remember: a bulleted list such as the above, or the te tbook's two and a half pages of paragraph after paragraph of plain old words6 ! rest my case. "s you continue through college, and on into your professional career, there will be countless occasions on which you must read various materials and determine the most important points. %or e ample, in your junior and senior years in college, you will probably have to write research papers using newspaper articles as sources. (he last time ! checked, the Wall Street Journal did not put important items in boldface or provide any of the other clues that are often found in te tbooks. >o what do you do6 &ake a bulleted list about each article. Practice with end-of-chapter problems !n my years of teaching economics, !'ve made an important observation. >tudents enjoy the class more, learn more, and get better grades when they are re0uired to do weekly homeworks. &aybe you think this sounds insane''why would anyone be happier when they are forced to do more work6 2ell, it's not that students are particularly thrilled about having to do homework all the time. $ut these homework assignments force them to keep up, to practice, to work actively with the material. "s a result, they come to class with a deeper understanding of the material, which makes class more interesting and makes it easier to understand new material as it's introduced. "fter the semester is over, student feedback is always more favorable if ! re0uired homeworks than if ! didn't. 8ere's why homeworks are so beneficial: (he homework problems actively engage you with the material. ;irtually every e pert on teaching and learning techni0ues will shout at the top of his or her lungs that the best way to learn is to actively engage yourself with the material. *>ee the section how to read your te tbook effectively for more on active learning., !f your instructor is already assigning regular homeworks, great+ $ut if regular homework assignments are not part of your course grade, then try to carve out two hours a week *or however much time you can afford, to work on the 0uestions and e ercises at the end of each chapter as it's covered in your course. ! know it's not easy to find the time to do this, especially when you have tons of other work and important non'school demands on your time. $ut if you really want to get more out of the class *and improve your grades,, you have to be willing to make a commitment to work toward this goal. Practicing with those end'of'chapter problems will be time well spent. *$esides, some professors use those end'of'chapter problems to get ideas for e am 0uestions.,