1 Read with a Purpose (SQ4R)
SQ4R Reading Method: A Guide to Purposeful Reading
At this stage in your academic career, you are an emerging Human Resources professional. Because this course is deeply connected to your career path, you will want to consider how the information you encounter is useful for your learning in this course and beyond. Not all information is used in the same way, or for the same purpose. The SQ4R method is designed to help you read purposefully and extract important information from your reading.
In this exercise, you will use the SQ4R method to work through one of your course readings: Employee vs Independent Contractor (Does it Really Matter?) by Fogler.
Survey (also called skimming and scanning)
This step involves determining why you will do this reading, and what you expect the main points/takeaways to be.
Determine your purpose: Ask yourself, why am I reading this?. Your course presentation or Moodle site may provide clues as to how this reading fits with your learning as a whole. Why did your instructor assign it? Why might it be useful to you now and in the future?
Survey the title: Think about what you may already know about that topic.
Survey any introductory material: It gives you an idea about how the chapter/article is organized, and what you will be learning.
Survey anything in bold: Subtitles are labels. Other bolded items may be definitions that you will need to know.
Survey the pictures, charts and graphs: Glance at these to pick out things that seem interesting or informative.
Survey any summary material: This will review and give you the key points in the chapter.
Survey your course syllabus/course presentation and see what topics the Instructor is focusing on.
Question
Write “Who, What, Where, When, Why, and How” questions for each subtitle or definition (you can do this as you progress through the reading).
Read
Read to answer the first question (this answer will become your notes). Look for keywords.
Recite
Recite the answer to your question out loud. Do this as if you are explaining to a study partner.
Write this down in your own words – these are your notes.
Repeat for each question that you created.
Review
Stand back and look at the reading as a whole.
How do the ideas and facts you learned from each subsection fit together?
Review your notes to be sure they make sense to you.
Reflect — the final “R”
In an upper level university course, you are expected to do more than memorize facts and information. Reflection on how you apply what you are learning is a key part of your process. After each reading, you will want to write a few sentences about why this is important to you in your current and/or future work as an HR professional. This will become key content for your ePortfolio later on.
