Review of “Reading with Purpose” by Tracy Linderholm

Review of “Reading with Purpose” by Tracy Linderholm

 Name   : Fikri Baihaqi

NPM    : 2010631060080

Class   : 4C – Critical Reading

    In this article, Linderholm discusses the vast majority of students in college-level courses that read expository textbooks with one goal in mind: to memorize and, hopefully, understand enough information to receive a specific grade on a course exam. Intuitively, this type of situation should be avoided. Reading is not the same as the type of reading that these students do when waiting for a friend in a coffee shop while reading a novel. As obvious as it may seem, empirical evidence has only recently supported the idea that reading proceeds in different ways depending on the person. the reader's motivation for reading. To give readers an example, they have been shown to show various inference-making patterns that influence what is said recalled from a text as a function of their reading purpose (e.g., 2001; van den Broek, Lorch, Linderholm, and Gustafson).

    Empirical research has shown that the particular purpose for reading influences readers’ cognitive processing of texts in terms of time spent reading and strategies employed, which in turn influences the amount of text information recalled (e.g., Brannon, 1998; Lorch, Lorch, & Kluse[1]witz, 1993; Narvaez, van den Broek, & Ruiz, 1999; van den Broek, Lorch, Linderholm, & Gustafson, 2001).

She mentioned practical application such as:

    Practical applications:

1. Recommend to students that they do not read in front of the television, computer, or in a social setting as this may auto[1]matically prime the kinds of cognitive processing normally used for entertainment or leisure reading purposes, which leads to lower recall. Theory to Practice 75

2. Recommend students use a specific study area associated only with serious reading to help prime the kind of cognitive pro[1]cessing that is associated with reading for study purposes and better recall. That is, ask students to set the stage for learning by designating an area in their dorm room or apartment that is strictly used for study purposes

Explicit instruction on how to tailor cognitive processing for different reading purposes will enhance learning if made available to study and reading skills instructors and their students, which makes further investigation on this topic critical. One suggestion for further research is to continue to investigate reading purposes that are specific to school learning. As outlined by Lorch and colleagues (Lorch et al., 1993; Lorch et al., 1987), there are several subcategories of reading for school purposes, such as reading for exam preparation, reading for class preparation, reading for research, and reading to learn. Additional research must be conducted to pinpoint how specialized cognitive processing must be in each subcategory in order to maximize reading comprehension and to determine where students make mistakes in their cognitive processing when reading for school purposes. This additional research will, in turn, arm study and reading skills instructors with more tools to help students read in a highly effective and targeted manner.