University Centre Salhi Ahmed Naama

Faculty of Letters and Languages

Department of Foreign Languages
English Section

Dr. Nadjia BOUSSEBHA-FARHI

 A. Study Skills

Research skills refer to the collection of several separate skills that help
you find and review information and arrive at a decision.

• Develop key points of study skills

• You will develop your own personal approach to study and learning
• This will increase your awareness and self-confidence.
• Study skills are generic and can be used when studying any area.
• Study skills will be beneficial throughout your life.
• Study skills are transferable - you will take them with you beyond your
education into new contexts.
 Study Skills Include:

• Time Management to Study

• Makes you more productive and reduces stress and anxiety.

• Styles of Writing
• By understanding different writing styles, you can put what you
read into perspective.
• Effective Reading
• Learn how you can engage with your reading, form links,
understand opinions, put ideas, and research into perspective.
 Taking Notes

• There are plenty of ways to take notes, both in terms of

the tools you use (pen and paper or computer), and the
style of notes.
• They may either be more effective or a matter of choice
and personal preference.

• Paraphrasing and summarizing what you read in your own

words is far more effective in helping you to retain
information. (whether you are using a computer or a pen
and paper).
 Organizing Skills

1. Be clear about what you need to do.

2. Decide when you are going to do it.
3. Give yourself time and space.

4. Decide what is important and urgent.

5. Break down and delegate tasks.

6. Don’t get frustrated by extra tasks.

 Planning

• In both work and life, it is easier to see progress if you

can break tasks down into more manageable chunks.
• The aim of your action planning is to identify those
manageable chunks.

Breaking down the Action Plan into Steps

• Break each broad action down into smaller tasks
• Take a long look at what is in the organization and
its contribution to the strategy.
• Stop work that is not contributing to the desired strategic
outcomes
 Critical Thinking

• Critical thinking is the ability to think clearly and rationally,

understanding the logical connection between ideas.

• With critical thinking skills the researcher can:

• Understand the links between ideas.

• Determine the importance and relevance of

arguments and ideas.
 Importance of Critical Thinking

• use it as the starting point in all future situations and, further decision
making.
• discipline yourself to keep on track until changing circumstances.
• The more you are aware of yourselves, the more your critical thinking
will be productive.
• It is aimed at achieving the best possible outcomes in
any situation
• It involves reviewing the results and implementing change where
possible.
 Critical Reading
• Critical reading means being able to reflect on what a text says, what it
describes and what it means by scrutinizing the style and structure of the
writing, the language used as well as the content.

• Critical reading means engaging in what you read by asking

yourself questions such as,
• ‘what is the author trying to say?’
• ‘what is the main argument being presented?’
 Developing a Reading Strategy

• Formal learning situations require reading and critically thinking about

a lot of information from different sources.

Become selective.
• Know what you are looking for.
• Examine the contents page and/or index of a book or journal
• Ascertain whether a chapter or article is worth pursuing further.
 Research Skills
• A skill is the learned capacity or talent to carry out pre-
determined results often with the minimum outlay of time,
energy, or both.

• Talent or learned capacity?

• Some talent is needed, but alone it is not enough

• People with great talent and no skills obtain much less than what they
could do

• Most of the skills can be learnt or improved over time, if one wants
 Research Skills
Curiosity
• Intellectual curiosity
• How does it work? What if you change this? Why did you do this? …
• Ask questions to everybody (and to yourself) and in all circumstances
• Look at what others do
• Can be very helpful in learning how to recognize the interesting questions
Patience
• Good research needs time
• Don’t expect great results immediately
• Experiments need to be tuned to show interesting results and lessons
• Allow ample time to do either theoretical or empirical research
• .Review existing work
• Being able to find and evaluate previous work
• Look for what others have done before starting your research
project
• May give your ideas on how to solve it
• Avoids reinventing the wheel and wasting time

Problem solving and adaptability

• Be able to adapt yourself to the context
• Turn a problematic situation into an interesting research problem
• Read, read, read
• Don’t get discouraged, a solution can always be found
 References

• Akogun, O. B. (2004). The Researcher’s Manual. First Edition. Paraclete

Publishers, Yola,
• Nigeria. 186p.
• Kothari, C. R. (2008). Research Methodology, Methods and Techniques, 2nd
revised edition, New Age International (P) Limited, New Delhi.
• George, D. & Mallery, P. (2000). SPSS for windows step by step: a simple
guide and reference 9.0 update (2nd ed.). Boston: Allyn and Bacon. 760p.
• Fellows, R. R. & Liu, A. (1997). Research Methods for Construction, Wiley-
Blackwell Science, London.
• Creswell, J.W. (1994) Research Design: Qualitative, Quant