The SQ3R Reading Method

You will find that you will have to read a lot of sources at university. Fortunately you will not have to read them in the same way as you would read a book for pleasure – you don’t have to read the whole book, or read every word or sentence. One of the main skills you will learn at university is how to read selectively, i.e. finding the bits of books, articles, websites, etc, that you need and ignoring the irrelevant parts.


There are plenty of strategies for reading, this post is about the SQ3R method.

SQ3R stands for Survey, Question, Read, Recite, Review. Each word corresponds to a step in the process.

Firstly you should Survey the chapter/book/article/etc which you are about to read. Look for clues as to what it’s about, titles, headings and subheadings, visual elements like pictures and graphs plus their captions, footnotes (if you see it references other sources you have found useful then it might also be useful), etc. At this stage it is also a good idea to skim read the introduction and the conclusion as these should tell you what the piece discusses and concludes.

The next step is to Question the piece. Ask yourself questions about the piece. Why are you reading this piece? Has your tutor asked you to do so, and if so why? Did you find it yourself, and if so how? Did another source recommend it? From step one, Surveying the piece, have you formulated any questions? You can use the headings or other points of interest to construct questions – if you find one section has the heading ‘Cognitive behavioural therapy’ then you can create the question “What is cognitive behavioural therapy, and how is it useful to my work?”. These Questions can form the basis of your note taking as they give you a framework to work with as well as helping you concentrate your efforts on answering relevant questions.

The next step is to Read. Thinking about the Questions you have set yourself, read the parts of your piece which you think will answer them. Use the cues from the Surveying step to work out where to Read, but use this step in the process to Read the piece more carefully, ensuring you can answer your questions. Re-Read any section which proves difficult or unclear.



After you have Read the piece you must Recite what you have Read. This is a very important step as it is here that you begin to reinforce what you have learned. Summarize the answers to your Questions. You can do this verbally at first, but it is recommended that you write down your summaries in the form of notes. Use your own words as much as possible as this will help you to understand what you are writing, rather than simply copying it out which will not aid learning. Arrange your notes in ways which will help you remember – different people have different ways of approaching this, so use a style which you know will help you.

Finally you must Review your work. This means going back to the notes you have made in order to refresh your memory of the piece. Do this at regular intervals as the more your Review your work, the more you will remember in the long term. As a general guideline Review your notes the day after you have made them, and a couple of days after that, then do so regularly for as long as you need to remember the information. Reviewing the notes does not have to be a passive activity, you can turn your notes into flashcards (see our post on this topic from last month), or a spidergram (something else we covered recently), anything to make you engage with the information, rather than simply reading over it. You could even do something as simple as try and explain it to a friend.