How much of the reading do you have to do in college courses?

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  • čas přidán 9. 06. 2024
  • I am writing a book! If you to know when it is ready (and maybe win a free copy), submit your email on my website: www.jeffreykaplan.org/
    I won’t spam you or share your email address with anyone.
    This is another lecture that is part of a series on 'How to Do Well in College.' This series is intended for first-year college students. In this lecture, I go through four types of courses (Philosophy, History, Science and Social Science with textbooks, and Science and Social Science with articles) just as an illustration of how different types of courses have different understandings of what it means to "read" an assigned text. Often, they just mean 'skim.' But nonetheless, doing the reading before class is one of the most powerful things that students can do to improve their grades and make their courses easier.

Komentáře • 58

  • @veganphilosopher1975
    @veganphilosopher1975 Před 2 lety +107

    Studying computer science I felt doing any reading was a waste of time. As much as I like having a conceptual understanding. The focus was overwhelmingly on "solve problem", "follow algorithm", "submit code that doesn't crash". Professors cared about results only

    • @abim677
      @abim677 Před rokem +6

      Same, except for knowing quiz/test material haha

    • @shanjok
      @shanjok Před rokem +1

      Vegan for life

    • @mattlivingston2192
      @mattlivingston2192 Před rokem +20

      That's because Computer Science is treated as vocational education. Philosophy in particular, and the humanities in general, are typically treated as liberal education.
      People typically study computer science because they want a job working with computers in some manner (Programmer, sysadmin, DBA, etc.)
      People typically study philosophy to improve the way their mind works, regardless of what they do with their mind.

    • @DigsWigs2022
      @DigsWigs2022 Před rokem +3

      @@mattlivingston2192 What a great answer!

    • @undeniablySomeGuy
      @undeniablySomeGuy Před 9 měsíci +1

      This works but only in courses where written content exams with mostly conceptual information takes up 50+% of the grade lmao

  • @leroybrown4797
    @leroybrown4797 Před rokem +28

    As a English literature and philosophy major, I know that it depends on the teacher and the material in the English Literature class. For Example my English Seminar on Adrienne Rich we read some of her collection of poems and essays. However, It turned out you didn't have to do the readings since there were topics that would always be able to be discussed during the Socratic seminars. In my experience with philosophy doing the reading is a must.

  • @Thelordmagedon
    @Thelordmagedon Před 2 lety +14

    I watched all your lectures on Philosophy, and not having the text for those classes to read alongside them felt detrimental to my ability to retain a lot of that information. I still got a lot better sense of a lot aspects of philosophy, but I can tell that I could have gotten much deeper understanding of it all.

    • @jeffreykaplan1
      @jeffreykaplan1  Před 2 lety +20

      Sorry that you didn't have the texts. I have now put up the reading lists and some of the readings themselves on my website: www.jeffreykaplan.org/youtube

    • @Thelordmagedon
      @Thelordmagedon Před 2 lety +1

      @@jeffreykaplan1 thank you, I really appreciate that!

    • @Paraselene_Tao
      @Paraselene_Tao Před 2 lety +2

      Thankfully, a lot of these reading materials (or possibly all of them) can be found for free online.

  • @ShinMadero
    @ShinMadero Před 11 měsíci +3

    By the end of college I was reading almost nothing. This was for poli sci and philosophy classes. I watched a lot of youtube and familiarized myself with the major schools of thought on whatever topic we were studying. I would look at the intro to the readings, find out generally which view an author was espousing, and find one or two examples/methods of argument they were using. That along with being attentive during lectures was enough to get me to graduate summa cum laude at a decent school. Maybe not the best way to do it but if you study smart you need to read like 10% of the assigned material.

  • @jimyt5713
    @jimyt5713 Před rokem +3

    I love you, Professor! This is life saving for students like me..

  • @michellena2863
    @michellena2863 Před rokem +10

    와..이 교수님 너무 멋지다..이렇게 하는 거였구나

  • @anonymoususer4356
    @anonymoususer4356 Před 9 měsíci

    These videos are incredibly valuable, thank you.

  • @derekbos1944
    @derekbos1944 Před rokem +3

    2023 graduating student from NIU, 3.953, awarded best in my program, in 4 years i only ever read my introductory chem textbook

  • @sterlingherrera1792
    @sterlingherrera1792 Před 10 měsíci +2

    I’m now a graduate student in a field that is in both the social sciences and history and this video is funny to me because of how totally necessary it is.
    I remember in undergrad I had an excellent history professor who basically had us read entire books in between class sessions. However, skimming wasn’t good enough because she actually required us to take notes on the books (including page numbers). Obviously you do still end up skimming, but in a closer reading way. She said her reasoning was that if you ever do real research or do a PhD or something, this is a thing you will absolutely need to do, so she wanted us to learn it in undergrad.
    Something else that one of my favorite anthropology professors in undergrad told us (I was a triple major in undergrad) was exactly what you say now. She was quite open about how to “read” a research article. She told us basically verbatim to read the abstract, intro, conclusion, and then some stuff from the middle. That’s generally enough to have an intelligent discussion about the topic.
    Indeed these things from some of my undergrad professors were actually very helpful for grad school and just generally for my research that I do.

  • @15_anandamuliaputrimaharan8

    I'm so thankful for your effort to making this video! I had several problem during my college bcs i can't understand+memorize the material

  • @onlyonecjb001
    @onlyonecjb001 Před rokem +7

    Absolutely brilliant video especially about the textbooks. I so wish I had this advice when I was growing up.

  • @baharrezaei5637
    @baharrezaei5637 Před rokem +1

    Brilliant, thanks for sharing 🌷

  • @user-sz5dt9ih7f
    @user-sz5dt9ih7f Před 10 měsíci +1

    Exceptional advice!!!

  • @JamesGarner-dn2mk
    @JamesGarner-dn2mk Před rokem +1

    Thank you for this video professor.

  • @adamnugroho7496
    @adamnugroho7496 Před rokem +1

    It is really helpful. Thanks for your effort in making this video.

  • @DeutschMitAndrey
    @DeutschMitAndrey Před rokem +3

    I'm so in love with those videos 🙈

  • @jimhendrickson5553
    @jimhendrickson5553 Před rokem +2

    Decades ago,before tech, I studied to be a geologist. Maps and drawings abound. I found the easiest way to learn and memorize the geology of an area was to color in the maps and X-sections..

  • @fanuluiciorannr1xd212
    @fanuluiciorannr1xd212 Před 2 lety +2

    Nice one professor.

  • @edc614
    @edc614 Před 10 měsíci

    Great video lectures. Wish someone had shared this info with me when I was in High School 60 years ago. 😊

  • @estercabrera1908
    @estercabrera1908 Před 2 lety +3

    wow, holding back on droppin a thesis here (being concise is ~naht~ my forte.) but uhh, yeahh- just wanted to say that your input is so, SO invaluable dude! I definitely caught myself making a number of the mistakes you've mentioned in your playlist thus far, haha. I've noted the patterns and failures, tho I did try repeating said mistakes.. I thought if I just changed this or that, then X might work out, but nope ^__^ I've accepted that I just can't procrastinate and that cramming doesn't work for me. It just took me an entire semester :S
    anyway, back to the playlist for me ^_^ ohh, and totally looking fwd to the following part of ur ethics video! I found it to be both interesting and amusing so definitely hoping that you see that one thru ^__^

  • @timmiller9559
    @timmiller9559 Před rokem +5

    Law is absolutely fascinating but its also very difficult to absorb on one pass of any one paragraph. Although im confident that I have certain disabilities that make it more difficult, I would imagine others wouldn't need to read that paragraph and sentence 10 to 15 times followed by reflection on what I believe the language is saying. This im not sure of and it would be interesting to know if this is standard or if my struggles where more isolated.

  • @lionelshrapnel9361
    @lionelshrapnel9361 Před rokem +12

    I think 'How To Read A Book' by Mortimer J. Adler is a really good book that tackles this topic. Nice video!

  • @DiseaseBadVaccineGood
    @DiseaseBadVaccineGood Před 10 měsíci +1

    Thank you!
    I immediately found a lockbox for my phone.
    Thank you!

  • @Name-ot3xw
    @Name-ot3xw Před rokem +2

    I'm in a technical course, and honestly our textbooks are unhelpful at best for 3/4 of topics covered.

  • @timstevens3361
    @timstevens3361 Před 11 měsíci +1

    first yr physics i wrote extensive notes.
    we had the walker text book for physics.
    i started to study for tests n exams from this text book
    because it was the Best Text Book i ever read !!!!!!!!
    to this day, i never once read those notes i wrote !

  • @stapedium
    @stapedium Před rokem

    As an engineering major forced to take philosophy and literature, my strategy was read enough to make a couple points during each seminar.
    If your points are well received use those as your jumping off point for the papers you have to write.

  • @kasturiritika5166
    @kasturiritika5166 Před 2 lety +1

    Can you tell me about LLM courses. How to read through them?

  • @entrainson7208
    @entrainson7208 Před 2 lety +7

    Let’s not underestimate how dry, esoteric and boring the readings can be. Especially in philosophy. If only more scholars were more thoughtful about *who* they should be writing to.

    • @pinecone421
      @pinecone421 Před 2 lety +1

      I’m not sure I agree completely. What kinds of texts / authors are your talking about?

  • @jameslincs
    @jameslincs Před rokem +4

    How much of this video do I need to watch 🤔

  • @paladinsorcerer67
    @paladinsorcerer67 Před rokem +4

    How do you gauge the amount of time needed to do the reading ahead of class, especially if its a science text?

    • @1337flite
      @1337flite Před rokem +1

      Do the reading as early as possible and re-read if you have time closer to the day?

  • @TheSastrikal
    @TheSastrikal Před 10 měsíci

    👍video....

  • @Sawkieeie
    @Sawkieeie Před 8 měsíci

    Should reading be made compulsory for college students?!

  • @hiradvl174
    @hiradvl174 Před 2 lety +2

    which one did you like more? cam or ox?

    • @jeffreykaplan1
      @jeffreykaplan1  Před 2 lety

      Honestly, I did not strongly prefer one over the other. Enormously enjoyed my time at both. They are massively more similar than they are different. I definitely have opinions about the relative quality of various universities that I have attended and worked at, but between Oxford and Cambridge I don't have much.

    • @hiradvl174
      @hiradvl174 Před 2 lety

      @@jeffreykaplan1 thanks sir.

  • @love-wisdom
    @love-wisdom Před rokem +3

    A book about history of swimming pools in USA...ooookayyyyhhhhhhhh

    • @colbyboucher6391
      @colbyboucher6391 Před 21 dnem

      Yeah? Swimming pools are big social spaces and were segregated for the majority of U.S. history, and it's kind wild that they exist at all. It's not like a library where there's a financial incentive in the form of education, it's _literally_ just a public work for the sake of it.

  • @vireshanurag7659
    @vireshanurag7659 Před 2 lety +2

    There should be a reading material recommended, before watching this video.

  • @EmptyAngelo
    @EmptyAngelo Před 8 měsíci

    you don't really write with your left hand backwards do you?

  • @WendyMarieMedia
    @WendyMarieMedia Před 9 měsíci

    Leave it to a philosophy scholar to get through to me.

  • @Otsuguacor
    @Otsuguacor Před rokem

    I watched several of your videos... You really love to talk... To explain a simple thing you use so many words that is almost funny... But much of your explanations about people thinkings and behavior lack deep understanding of the human mind... You only see logical ideas and racional thinkings... You omitt feelings, emotions, ... People are racional and emotional... You only care the racional part and your ideas about people are incomplete and lacking understanding.... You are a bit childish.

    • @xT..
      @xT.. Před rokem +3

      Lol, I completely disagree with you, he communicates perfectly and is really thoughtful about everything he says, I don't want to be judgmental but from what you typed/how you typed it, I'm assuming English isn't your first language?? And your comment shows a bit of hypocrisy...we can talk it out, can you elaborate?

  • @daniellejames3270
    @daniellejames3270 Před rokem

    So with the textbook do we read the whole chapter or only into and conclusion like philosophy? @jeffreyKaplan