AnnotatingBeyond the Yellow Highlighter

annotate: verb [-tating, -tated] to add critical or explanatory notes to a written work.

•Annotating is a writing-to-learn strategy to use while reading and rereading. •It helps the reader to think critically and it promotes active reading by close reading.•It is important to develop a habit of annotating as it helps build analytical skills, KEY to writing stellar essays, understanding sophisticated literature, and preparing you for college!!

•As you work with your text, consider all of the ways that you can connect with it.

How to Annotate—Before Reading

•Examine the title and subtitles •Examine any illustrations that are included

•As these components are being examined write questions and make predictions or connections on the text

How to Annotate—While Reading •Mark the text:

• Vocabulary • Important information• Significant quotes• Author’s word choices

•Write in the margins:• Summarize• Predict• Inferences • Formulate opinions• Make connections to self, text, and world • Ask questions• Analyze the authors craft• Write reflections, reactions or comments• Look for patterns or repetition

Use Post-Its when you can’t write on your text!

How to Annotate—After Reading •Reread annotations – draw conclusions•Examine the characters, setting, tone, imagery•Analyze any motifs, symbols, figurative language•Determine what the title might mean

•How do your observations help you better figure out, and support, the author’s purpose, or theme?

Interactive Notes

• Interactive Notes are your annotations written out.• You should break your paper into two halves; on the left

side should be your passages and quotes of the text we are working on, on the right should be your notes.

• Let’s practice together with the two excerpts

How do we analyze literature?

What passages should I highlight?

Connections:• Consider our class discussions. Does a passage seem to connect to something that we’ve

discussed?• Does a passage seem to connect to something else we’ve read?• Does a passage seem to connect to a text you’ve encountered on your own?

Inferences:• Can you make a prediction about where the story is going?• Do you see that the narrator is implying something beyond what he/she is literally saying?

Questions:•     Do you have a question about a section?•     Do you feel like a passage is important, but don’t fully know why? •     Don’t include all questions.

What is literary or critical theory?

The terms “literary theory” and “critical theory” refer to essentially the same fields of study. They both address ways of looking at literature beyond the typical plot-theme-character-setting studies.There are several benefits:• One of the views is likely to affirm your perspective and speak to what you see in the literature you are studying.•Studying a view different from yours—not to disagree with it, but to understand it—helps you understand those who hold that view.• Studying a work from more than one view gives you a deeper understanding of the author’s work and a better appreciation for the richness of it.•There are hundreds of different “lenses”—we will study some of the most popular ones

Popular Criticisms

• Reader Response Criticism (you already know this)• New Criticism/Formalism Criticism (you already know this)• Archetypal Criticism (you already know this)• Feminist/Gender Criticism • Psychoanalytical Criticism • Marxist Criticism • Post Colonial Criticism • Historical Criticism• Biographical Criticism