One day many years ago, it was my first day (along with many other new students) in a new school. It was also our first day in a new grade. As such days usually go, it is easy to make new friends.
A boy was looking around for a seat inside our new class. So, I invited him to sit with me.
It wasn’t long before we started discussing. And I soon realized we shared something in common: love of reading good stories. I also realized our interests transcends just stories though, it is a general love for books.
So that day, between me and him, a friendship was formed; and a reading partnership that will last eleven years was born!
It’s now over fifteen years since I first met that boy, and during that time, I have been able to keep track of my reading fortunes. Of course, I have also had many other reading partners after him.
In fact, the benefit of hindsight have now made me know I have unwittingly had reading partners long before that boy himself – superb reading partners. But because I don’t fully understand what I was doing then, I can’t give them a name. I assume those before him were not my reading partners in the strict sense of the word, but rather people playing an altogether different role in my life. I was wrong.
The experience I have gathered over the years from keeping various partners in reading have been very helpful. And it is a practice I will gladly recommend to everyone – In fact, it is the reason why this article is on Infovore Secrets today!
In this article, we are going to tell you about the various kind of reading partners around and how to choose the one that will best fit your needs.
But before we do that, who is a reading partner?
So what are the kinds of reading partners around? And how can you choose the best reading partner for yourself that will help you in maximizing your reading experience?
Check out these reading partners, and see the one that will work best for you:
1. The Pally and Gang reading partner:
This is probably the most common type of reading partnership. It is a partnership based on an existing friendship or relationship with someone. Hence the name “Pally” or “Gang” reading partner. It is a reading partnership that is formed with someone based on an existing shared interest or goal outside of reading.
It was how the reading partnership between me and the boy I mentioned earlier was started. We became reading partners by becoming friends first. If we didn’t become friends, maybe our reading partnership would not have happened.
Pally or Gang reading partners are very easy to form. And they are highly beneficial because the reading process (and delights) is shared with someone you already know.
Of course, they are usually most easily formed in a school setting, but they can be formed in any situation:
For example, two or more unsuccessful gardeners in a gardening club might decide they want to learn new gardening skills so that they can win their club’s next floral show. So they may decide to jointly read some books about gardening and compare their notes afterwards.
It is clear this kind of method will quickly help these gardeners to detect where they are getting it wrong in their gardening. This is also an example of a Pally or Gang reading partnership because they are brought into the reading partnership because they shared a common endeavor.
But the classic example of this kind of reading partnership is the type that exists between people who are already friends, and the partnership is formed to read for leisure.
So how do you start a Pally reading partnership?
It is simply by trying out existing friends or colleagues to start it with you. You might also attempt starting it with a new friend too, but that path is not guaranteed to be as smooth as doing it with an old friend.
2. The Sage Guide Reading Partnership:
This is the kind of reading partnership that existed between us and our parents when they used to read us bedtime stories at night!
In other words, it is the reading partnership between someone more older and more experienced, and a younger, lesser experienced person.
As the name implies, the more sagely the older partner is, the better!
This reading partnership is advantaged to the younger partner in the sense that the younger partner learns while reading along with the older, more experienced partner.
The older or more experienced person serves as a guide while reading the text concurrently with the learner, or he/she may select parts of the text for the learner to read then he/she will make further explanation on what the learner has understood from the text.
However, it requires active participation of both.
This kind of reading partnership has been existing since ancient times between teachers and their students. And it can still be found in our classrooms today.
While the advantages in this kind of reading partnership are numerous, the most important of them is that it can help to guide a new, young reader into understanding a difficult or unfamiliar text.
Moreover, there is evidence that this kind of reading partnership promotes healthy development of brain cells, especially in young children. According to a study on toddler’s cognitive development, serving as a Sage Guide to children in reading of texts makes some brain cells to be “‘turned on’, triggered by this particular experience. Many existing connections among brain cells are strengthened. At the same time, new brain cells are formed, adding a bit more definition and complexity to the intricate circuitry that will remain largely in place for the rest of these children’s lives” [1].
Probably, adults can benefit too…
If you are trying to break into reading more advanced level of text, try to form a Sage Guide partnership with someone. It will certainly give you a softer, softer landing!
3. “We Mustn’t Fail” Reading Partnership:
Exams! Tests! Exams!
Above are the situations that bring up this kind of reading partnership. It is a reading partnership borne out of the pressure of an incoming examination or test.
It is also known *mildly* as “Group Study”, but it is only a reading partnership.
A “We Mustn’t Fail” reading partnership is usually done in a group setting, and is characterized by tension.
It has benefits though. Especially if you want to assimilate a huge amount of information in a very short time!
In this kind of reading partnership, the focus is on reading a set number of texts simultaneously together with members of a group within a given time, then members of the group will quiz one another on what they have understood from the text afterwards.
It can be a successful reading partnership if well conducted.
However, it can also turn to a farcical situation where members do everything in their group except read sincerely!
I have witnessed many such examples during my college days (where we called it Group Study) where unserious members derail the purpose of the group. Situations also arises where some members are slow in catching up with the tempo of the group.
The tension and general air of busy activities that permeates a “We Mustn’t Fail” reading partnership is what makes it unique. A true “We Mustn’t Fail” reading partnership always have that restlessness in its activities that will strongly suggest to observers that the participants truly do not want to fail in their tests!
Participants in this kind of reading partnership can work very hard!
It also have the benefit of giving you access to people who can help you clear up your confusion over study materials, rather than the longer time it would have taken if you are trying to figure out difficult concepts by yourself alone [2].
4. Fight Club Reading Partnership:
This might be funny, but there are actually reading partnership created to instigate intellectual fights or discourse!
At Infovore Secrets, we call it the Fight Club Reading partnership.
They are usually intentionally created by its participants.
Fight Club Reading Partnership is among the most sophisticated reading partnership around. This is because it is usually organized by highly learned, intellectually-inclined individuals among themselves.
They are reading partnership that usually ends with intellectual discourse or even arguments among the participants based on what has been read. Usually, the participants have a good foundational knowledge of the subject matter before even reading their texts.
If you are intellectually inclined and have such people as your friends, this kind of reading partnership is highly recommended for you.
You will enjoy the benefit of rubbing minds and seeing issues from another point of view; especially pertaining to what you read with your reading partners.
1,2,3 Fight!
Arguments have its use though. According to a study published by an American organization, National Academy of Sciences, intellectual argument have a good use in “establishing agreement about the truth of symbolic objects.” [3]
“Symbolic objects” might mean what you read or what was in your mind!
5. Pathfinder Reading Partnership:
This is a reading partnership a person forms with someone less experienced so as to guide them through a text they are not familiar with. It is the inverse of Sage Guide reading partnership.
In a Sage Guide partnership, you are guided. But, in a Pathfinder reading partnership, you are the guide.
For example, it relieves you the monotony of revising past texts alone on your own: by giving out the text to fresh readers, while you act as a guide because of your prior familiarity with the text.
Alternatively, when you decide to offer to read a text on behalf of others, and give feedback to them about what you read, you are still enacting a Pathfinder reading partnership with them.
The second description above – of this kind of reading partnership – has been especially popular throughout history, especially in places where important books are scarce. In such places, it is usually not unusual to see a group of people learning from a single copy of a text.
Thousand of monks and priests in Medieval Europe learned from only a handful of copies of books, while guided by their superiors.
And of course, it is now clear they were Pathfinders to many modern knowledge of today – think of Copernicus! [4]
Pathfinder reading partnership is also the type you find between corporate CEOs and their armies of analysts and brokers.
And nothing is more sweeter than forming a Pathfinder reading partnership with your dad – Which I did!
6. The Environment as a reading partner:
The environment we are reading in wields a great influence on the outcome of our reading endeavors – it is the reason why many of us have strong personal preferences when it comes to our preferred reading environment.
Our environment are our uncelebrated reading partners.
Do you know you can choose an environment as a reading partner and be successful with it?
Yes, you can.
If you have tried any of the reading partnership outlined above and things are not working well, then you might try to change your reading environment – there is a great chance that was where you got it wrong.
In fact, any kind of human-human reading partnership where consideration is not given to the physical environment where the readings are going to take place already has an element of failure in it.
Some of us prefer reading in quiet environments, while some read better in environments that are everything but quiet!
It is just human nature.
But the bottom line is that the air blowing around you, the ambient sound reaching you and the people near to you where you sit down reading have a big role in the outcome of your reading exercise.
We therefore think your environment should be your first reading partner…
Find your space!
Cheers!
References:
1. Fact Sheet on the Importance of Reading to Infants and Young
Children – www.getcaughtreading.org/literacy-reading-to-children.php (Retrieved 05-3-2019)
2. Benefits of Group Study – https://www.angelesinstitute.edu/thenightingale/benefits-of-group-study (Retrieved 05-3-2019)
3. Taking Science to School: Learning and Teaching Science in Grades K-8 – https://www.nap.edu/read/11625/chapter/9#202 (Retrieved 05-3-2019)
4. Nicolaus Copernicus – https://www.catholic.com/magazine/print-edition/nicolaus-copernicus (Retrieved 05-3-2019)
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