In this free course you will focus on how to be a critical reader. Reading critically is an essential skill at university. It means being aware of your own purposes and opinions as you read and being able to recognise the writer's purposes and opinions in their writing.

After studying this course, you should be able to:

• consider the importance of examining attitudes to texts
• understand the organisation of argument texts
• distinguish between facts and opinions in texts
• examine hedging as a technique used by writers to express opinions and avoid making unsupported generalisations
• consider the importance of reliable evidence to support claims.