If you are a university student, chances are the words ‘reading lists’ strike some sort of fear and dread in your heart. Being at university though means that readings are inevitable. Whether it’s journal articles, textbooks, reports, cases or just your own research, reading is something every student will have to do.
Now, with me being a law student, I feel like I have a LOT of experience with readings. Today’s post is going to be about the types of reading you will do and how you can approach them and complete them. Now, people like to approach and complete readings differently. Everyone in my friend group at university does things differently. This is just from my perspective but I hope it helps you out in some way. Let’s get to it.
Why should you do the readings?
It is very easy to be a university student and think ‘why?’ ‘Why do I need to do the readings?’ Well, there are a variety of reasons.
Firstly, readings are a good way to maximise the time you have in your lectures. Quite often, readings will be set for you to complete before a lecture and these tend to be in core textbooks. If you complete the readings before the lecture, you will be able to maximise the time in lectures. Instead of worrying about making sure you copy everything and anything down, you can really focus on listening to what your lecturer is saying to get additional information.
Secondly, additional reading will allow you to expand on your knowledge. I quite often get assigned readings on different journal articles. Journal articles are brilliant sources to note down and get information from as they are written by commentators with their own opinions. This means you can get knowledge on a topic from different points of view, which leads me on to my next point.
Reading is essential for your assignments and exams. If you don’t do any readings for your assignments, you won’t do well. Critical analysis is an important part of any assignment and can really help with getting a better grade. I always try and do journal article readings in order on the reading list as it means I need to do less reading when it comes to the assignments.
Different sources of reading – from a law student point of view
There are various sources of reading that you will encounter at university. They are:
- Textbooks
- Books
- Journal articles
- Reports
- Cases
- Primary Legislation
- Secondary Legislation
- Websites
- Treaties
- Blogs
- and more
How do you do the readings?
Like I mentioned before, there are different ways that you can approach readings at university. What I’m about to share is how I like to do it.
At the beginning of a semester, you should have access to a full reading list made by your lecturer. This will include the core recommended textbook that will see you through your course. If you are in a position whereby you can purchase it immediately, do it.
Core textbooks are what I like to use to get the background knowledge before a lecture. They are very descriptive in comparison to a journal article, so they are great at explaining each topic and concept. I like to take brief notes from the textbook and I will tab as I go along for future use.
In terms of the journal articles, I will always read this in a critical way. This is because these articles are great for assignment purposes. Within an assignment, you should always use critical analysis when using journal articles as this enables you to get the best grades.
In terms of legislation and cases, I will always summarise when taking notes. This is because when I’m writing about both of these sources in my assignments and exams, there’s only so much I can write about. It’s better for me to be able to summarise the legislation and cases to help with revision purposes too.
I hope this helps in some way! Thank you for reading.
Beth
Beth Olivia 