In fact, writing a paper is not easy, but it is not that difficult. After the preliminary work is done, the article will be written naturally and smoothly. The preliminary work includes several parts, the most important of which is reading and sorting out the literature, that is, reading and using the literature effectively.
Reading literature seems to be just looking up information, but it is not difficult, especially some long, rich and difficult documents, which are very painful to turn over, let alone use effectively. At this time, some special methods are needed to improve the efficiency of reading literature.
Our freshman extensive reading teacher is more interesting. He didn't use textbooks or read English classics in class, but let us read documents, saying that this was to lay the foundation for studying and writing papers in the next few years. Facts have proved that teachers are far-sighted.
The teacher did this at that time: print an English document and an important report in a certain field every week, and send it in class. First, give us a general background of this article, and then let us read it ourselves. Write a summary after reading it and hand it in before class. The exam is to send us a diary of nearly 100 pages, so let's take advantage of the review week to have a good look. The articles in the exam will come out from it, and the content of the exam is summary except some extensive reading skills.
At first, everyone was very painful, because each article involved different fields, from food industry and medical care to meteorology and environmental protection, and there were many new words in professional papers. A paper of more than ten pages is simply painful to read, and a summary of about 200 words will be written after reading it. If you don't understand this article, you can't write an abstract.
However, I also slowly explored some methods. At least for me, reading English literature is enough.
1. Learn to use titles, abstracts and keywords.
When we get a document, the first thing we see is these three parts. Although the text is short, it is absolutely crucial. By understanding these three parts, we can basically grasp the core content of this paper, which can help us to choose information and mark key paragraphs when reading the text. For a relatively standard paper, the title can let us know the problems to be discussed in this paper, the abstract can help us understand the general structure of the article, and the keywords can let us grasp the main contradictions. In addition, titles, abstracts and keywords can also help us roughly judge the relevance and usefulness of the article and the issues we want to discuss.
2. Look at the introduction and conclusion
After browsing the literature, the first thing to look at is the introduction and conclusion. Introduction can help you quickly understand the research background, research ideas and literature review of this paper, and help you grasp the literature from a macro perspective. Literature review can also provide some ideas for the following literature review. The conclusion part mainly involves the research results, and some articles will also briefly talk about the conclusions drawn from various parts, and finally lead to the general conclusion. Of course, studying this part is also for macro-control.
3, master the frame structure
One of the characteristics that distinguishes the thesis from general writing is its rigorous structure, which is also very helpful for us to read the literature. After all, the framework is the result of the author's careful conception, and grasping the framework can naturally help us better understand the author's intention. In fact, the framework is very easy to get. I usually write all the titles and graded titles of each part on paper first, and then sort out the article structure and the author's writing ideas according to these titles. As long as it is a carefully written article, this method can basically be done.
4. Summarize the main points of each part.
When reading literature, I generally carry out the principle from macro to micro, from whole to detail. When the overall framework is clear, you can see the contents of each part according to the framework. Taking notes is to summarize the core points of each part, that is, what this part says, which can be summarized in your own words, or you can directly outline key sentences and keywords, depending on the article. Besides, depending on how you define this part, it can be divided into paragraphs or natural paragraphs. Before reading some difficult articles, I usually write a few keywords on the edge of each natural paragraph to prevent me from forgetting what this paragraph has written after reading it. If I am not sure about the paragraph, I can use this method.
The emphasis has turned to the details.
After defining the general contents of each part, we can grasp the key details, mainly some data and the like, which can be directly used in writing papers later, so it is recommended to mark them with colored pens.
Step 6 write a summary
This was the teacher's request at that time, but it makes sense to think about it carefully. The process of writing a summary is actually the process of thinking and internalizing the content of the article. It is also helpful for writing papers in the future. However, since this summary is written for yourself, it can be personalized. For example, in addition to summarizing the article itself, you can also write your own understanding, and whether and how to use it in future writing, and extract some available materials by the way. The head teacher of our university said that these contents can be written on self-made small cards. A card is the content of a piece of paper. After slowly accumulating classification, you can form your own material library. However, remember to mark the paper information in the format of reference for future use.
The whole process is like this. It seems complicated, but it's actually easy to get started, and it really doesn't take much time. Because the first four steps are extensive reading, the speed will be faster, and the fifth and sixth steps are intensive reading and summary, which are time-consuming, but the effect will be very good and helpful for paper writing, so don't be lazy in these two steps.
Thirdly, reading literature should follow the principle from the whole to the details. First, make clear what this article mainly talks about as a whole, so as to screen out which ones are more important and which ones can be skipped.