58 Annotating Sources

Why do we need to annotate? Think of annotation as a way of personalizing a text to your reading style. You get to engage with it by underlining parts that you like and think are important, or circling words and adding a question mark as a note to yourself to look into the definition and meaning of this word. You get to write in the margin of the text and apply your own understanding, questions, or add an argument or response to what you’re reading. Regardless of what career or profession you intend on pursuing, being able to take in information and break it down in a way that you will be able to engage with it is a vital skill to have.

In this section, we will first look at what annotation is and why it works. We get to look at a few examples to note how others may have used annotation but more importantly, you get to practice annotation on your own. Practice will help you to figure out your own annotation style and see what works for you. Once you understand its purpose and see how beneficial annotation can be, you will be able to (and want to) annotate texts from any discipline or field of interest.

What is annotation and why does it work? The act of annotating a text is truly for personal benefit, and here’s why:

• Annotating a text often involves highlighting or underlining unfamiliar words or phrases and defining them
• Summarizing an important point in your own words to check for understanding
• Writing any questions or comments either in the margin or separately but keeping a reference point for the question or comment (called marginal writing or marginal commentary)

There are other methods of annotation, and the more you read the more you will develop your own style of annotating. Let’s look at a few examples of common methods.

1. 1. Identify the BIG IDEA
   2. Underline topic sentences or main ideas
   3. Connect ideas with arrows
   4. Ask questions
   5. Add personal notes
   6. Define technical words

Like many skills, annotating takes practice. Remember that the main goal for doing this is to give you a strategy for reading text that may be more complicated and technical than what you are used to.

What Notes to Make

1. Scan the document you are annotating. Some obvious clues will be apparent before you read it, such as titles or headers for sections. Read the first paragraph. Somewhere in the first (or possibly the second) paragraph should be a BIG IDEA about what the article is going to be about. In the margins, near the top, write down the big idea of the article in your own words. This shouldn’t be more than a phrase or a sentence. This big idea is likely the article’s thesis.
2. Underline topic sentences or phrases that express the main idea for that paragraph or section. You should never underline more than 5 words, though for large paragraphs or blocks of text, you can use brackets. (Underlining long stretches gets messy, and makes it hard to review the text later.) Write in the margin next to what you’ve underlined a summary of the paragraph or the idea being expressed.
3. Connect related ideas by drawing arrows from one idea to another. Annotate those arrows with a phrase about how they are connected.
4. If you encounter an idea, word, or phrase you don’t understand, circle it and put a question mark in the margin that indicates an area of confusion. Write your question in the margin.
5. Anytime the author makes a statement that you can connect with on a personal level, annotate in the margins a summary of how this connects to you. Write any comments or observations you feel appropriate to the text. You can also add your personal opinion.
6. Place a box around any term or phrase that emphasizes scientific language. These could be words you are not familiar with or will need to review later. Define those words in the margins.

Annotation Basics and Practice

Again, annotating takes practice, but it is a useful skill to possess, and one worth investing time in. Below are two videos that explain the active art of annotating different works and shows different methods for annotation:

Literary Annotation Practice

Rhetorical Analysis Annotation Practice

Additionally, this is a wonderful resource for annotation strategies:

Annotation and Connection in Texts

This particular source explains the purpose of annotating scientific texts. Knowing strategies from all disciplines is important. Each one will offer a different perspective and insight into the purpose of annotations.

Other Resources

Scientific Approach to Annotating

• Annotating Literary Texts, CC BY SA
• Annotation is a system for remembering what you read, CC BY NC SA
• How to Write an Annotation, CC BY