Skills: Handling Information

Developing the skills to find things out for yourself, evaluate the quality and relevance of different types of information and build your understanding of a new and challenging topic is really important to maximize your impact in the world. The following skills are critical in this area:

• asking good questions
• close reading
• accessing a variety of sources
• evaluating the quality of different sources
• analysing data
• evidencing an argument
• respecting and understanding the ideas of others
• generating your own data using appropriate methods
• performing library research
• performing and designing your own empirical research

Focus on … asking good questions

The basis of any type of research or of building an understanding of a new topic is being able to ask the right questions. And more than that, you need to phrase those questions correctly so that you can answer them effectively:  – If you ask the right question, you’ll be able to find the right type of information – If you ask the right question, you’ll be able to formulate the best response – Many types of writing start with asking a good question – no matter how good you are at writing, if your question is flawed, your argument will not be properly formed and you will not maximize your potential in your writing

Last Updated 23rd September 2023