5.4 Reading ahead
You don’t have to do any subject-specific reading before you arrive, but students sometimes ask whether we have any suggestions so they can feel better prepared for their first classes.
Whether you’re about to start an undergraduate or postgraduate course with us, any new programme of study will require new types of reading and research. The activities you’ve just worked through should have got you thinking about how you evaluate the information you find on the internet. Eventually, though, you’ll get used to accessing high-quality academic literature from the many journals and other publications that give you cutting-edge insights into the subjects you’ll be studying.
You’ll be expected to use this literature to access some of the most reliable information on a topic, and to help you to develop your ideas and analysis in assignments. The library induction activities you’ll be shown next week are really important - you don’t want to be relying on random internet searches when you begin your first assignments!
If you’re beginning a Master’s degree, this is probably something you’re already used to doing at undergraduate level, and for you it’s all about taking the next step towards developing a deeper appreciation of how to evaluate and integrate others’ information and ideas into your own work.
The best advice we can offer you right now is to become more familiar with how to discover what’s going on in the world around you, and to practice your digital literacy skills by thinking more critically about everything you read and watch. Whatever the level or subject of your course, becoming more engaged with the world around you and how it relates to your studies is a really important aspect of being a good Exeter student. It’s also the route to the highest grades!
Activity
Pick a couple of the suggestions below and while reading or watching, start thinking about whether there are alternative viewpoints to be taken into account. Who is the writer or presenter? What’s their background? Do we trust them? Do you agree or disagree with their views? What are you basing your own views on?
Use the Forum at the bottom of the page to start exploring these questions with your peers. To post, simply click 'REPLY.'
- The Guardian - Future of AI
- Oxford Internet Institute - No need to wait for the future, the danger of AI is already here
- BBC - New AI systems collide with copyright law
- BBC - Latest AI News
- BBC – Digital shift creating health barriers
- TED Talk - The surprising habits of original thinkers