Reading Summaries and Discussions
Part of the capstone course involves reading articles, writing summaries and discussing them. We will use D2L to post reading summaries and discuss them.
Eight papers will be assigned throughout the quarter. As noted in the syllabus, you should post summaries and discuss at least 7 of them (5 points per article; 3 points for summary; 1 point for each discussion post).
Process
- Read the assigned article
- Write a summary of the article.
- Post your summary on the associated D2L forum. Note that you will not be able to see the other summaries until you have posted your own. The summary should be posted by the Wednesday of the assigned week.
- After you post your summary, I encourage you to review other summaries. I have enabled "Up Vote" ratings for the summaries. If you see a summary that you find particularly helpful, I encourage you to give it a vote.
- I will set up another heading for the reading discussion. Here you can post questions, comments and answers. Review other postings and join the discussions! Posting discussion questions is encouraged if few or no questions have already been posted. Discussion posts should be submitted by the Monday following the assigned week.
Summary contents
A summary should be one or two paragraphs and include the following:
- The major claim(s) of the paper
- How (and how well) the claim is supported
- Any additional comments and observations
When stating the major claims of a paper, don't try to state all of the claims. Instead, prioritize the claims and carefully explain one or two of them. When deciding which claims to present, select among claims that are
- Consistent with the overall theme of the paper.
- Not obvious
- Well supported in the paper
- Useful
As an example, consider this short article on the current state of interaction design. First read the article and then note its major claims. You can then see how your notes compare to a summary that I wrote for it.
I selected this example because it is short and easy to read. However, you will find that the assigned readings will be longer and typically have an academic perspective.