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Q1+Q2 2008, 10 ECTS
Guide to reading scientific articles and answering the handins
Throughout this course we will read scientific articles about the topics that we discuss at the lectures. There is two reasons for this, namely that no good introductionary book exists on the topic of this course but also that we want you to see some of the latest developments in this area. Many of you are not used to reading such articles, but you will also need this skill for other courses and for your master's thesis. Here is a little guide to reading.
It is important to remember that articles are not text books and there are some important differences. Articles are written by scientists for scientists and they represent a new idea so there is a few things you should keep in mind:
- Most articles present only a few important points. It is a good idea to identify these points in a first read and to try to expand your understanding of them in subsequent reads.
- You may not understand everything. Articles may contain some points that are hard to understand or require knowledge in an area where you have limited understanding. For example the article about maps does not require you to know anything about SELF except that it is a prototype based language much like JavaScript. You should read it to understand maps not to understand SELF.
- Be critical. Scientists are very much like used-car salesmen. They will try to sell you the idea by only explaining the good things about it. The cons of the idea are something you must think about. This is the reason why we ask you to do this in the handins.
- Skip details you do not need. Some articles may contain a lot of information about technical details or discuss related topics that you are not interested in. You may want to skip this in the first go and return to it in a later read.
There are as many techniques for reading articles as there are scientists but for most people it does not make sense to read an article back-to-back and never look at it again. The details may be lost because you did not identify the main point or the main point may be lost because you spend all you effort on the gory details. A way of reading an article may be this:
- Read the article quickly and skip the details. Write the main points on a piece of paper as you go along.
- Read the article for real and concentrate on relating the details to the main points you have identified. Sometimes to fully understand you will need to find additional information in referenced articles or on for example wikipedia.
- Read again to get the understanding of all the tricky details and read parts of the relevant referenced articles. Some of it simply may not be interesting, so you may never do this for parts of the article.
The handin excercise represents our take at identifying the key points in the article. Use it as a key to read the article and to get the main points straight. By answering these questions you are helped reading and understanding the articles before the lecture, so you get as much out of it as possible. If you think that there are other important things in the article you wish to discuss you should include these also.
Remember that we are here to help you learn, so if you get stuck in the articles or you need help answering the questions you are very welcome to ask your questions to the TA or to the lecturers. If you use the webboard everybody will benefit from the answer to your question. If you were in doubt many of the other students are probably also.
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