<p>I use it to study and review for tests, but not in place of reading. Unless you still count middle school book report projects… ;)</p>
<p>I use SparkNotes… a lot. One year I had a teacher that encouraged us to go there. Not for complete assignments, just to help us understand the text better.</p>
<p>I had summer work and part of it was explaining themes of the 2 books I read. The teacher got every question from SparkNotes. :)</p>
<p>I read the novel, then read sparknotes to make sure that i caught everything, or to refresh/study. I also use sparknotes for impossible-to-get-through introductions, such as the one in The Scarlet Letter <em>shudders</em>.</p>
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<p>But you’re missing Shakespeare! What’s the point of getting into literature if you’re only going to read to answer teacher-based questions?</p>
<p>Based off of these answers, I’m guessing not many people actually enjoy reading.</p>
<p>^^ I enjoy reading books that I find intresting (mostly Tim O’brien books) but when I have to read hemingway or melvile for class, I can’t really get into the story. To me at least, all these famous works of literature are just plain boring…they aren’t narratives that u can really get into and want to keep reading.</p>
<p>I think the shakespeare mention has a good point. In my AP lit class (so pretty sharp readers) there were some things that students just didn’t pick up. Like when I picked up some sexual subtleties in one section between Ophelia and Hamlet, and no one else did, I was like “dang! I actually understood that!” Good feeling. Anyways, Shakespeare’s text are complex and hard to understand. Same with other authors’ works (like Faulkner). This is where sparknotes is a great resource, imo. To fill in the gaps. </p>
<p>Like mortar is great for connecting the bricks and building a solid, complete house. But mortar can not build such house alone. </p>
<p>That’s the analogy I liken sparknotes to.</p>
<p>I’ve been using it for a long time, and I’ve read few books due to it. I guess it doesn’t really help in increasing my comprehension skills, but oh well, I don’t like to read books much.</p>
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<p>I read all the time, both serious/classical literature, fun and modern stuff, poetry, and so on. But I think school and the way it goes through exegesis (or pretends to) sucks most of the joy out of reading and doesn’t allow for different reading styles. Most of the people I know who are serious readers hate English classes.</p>
<p>The main problem I run into when I don’t look at sparknotes is that I end up with vastly different interpretations on things, which really hurts me for reading quizzes and tests.</p>
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<p>Way to take on the stereotypical classics-loving/sparknotes-shunning personality. While I do understand that reading the actual text is important with Shakespeare, the modern translation does nothing other than to put it into language that people can actually understand. Do you think that Shakespeare’s work was intended to be struggled over by scholars/students for centuries to come? No, it was intended to be enjoyed in cinematic form by the masses and nobility alike. I still don’t understand why we insist on reading the plays rather than going to performances of them.</p>
<p>Also, I disagree with the notion that using sparknotes=dislikes reading. I would say that this is analogous to saying that using a calculator=dislikes math. Sparknotes is a tool to allow students to more effectively understand the subtleties and overall concepts of difficult literature. I see no problem with its use, except when it starts to be used completely in the place of reading.</p>
<p>I use SparkNotes, but only when I’ve actually read the book and am either confused about something or prepping for a test.
Lots of people in the AP/Honors English classes I’ve taken read just SparkNotes and still do okay on the tests, though. I think I was the only one who actually read all of Great Expectations freshman year, or Beloved junior year.</p>
<p>Ironically enough, one of my teachers said sparknotes hindered your ability to comprehend things, find and analyze symbols blahblahblah. The irony is that when it came to discussions, every single point we discussed (as in the teacher talked and all of us agreed) was exact with every single point mentioned on sparknotes (like there are a lot of general themes that everyone can pick up, but i mean like those tiny, insignificant details supposedly meant to symbolize the world and such.) plus the fact it followed the same order that sparknotes wrote it LOL</p>
<p>Very. I read the book, but I usually go back over it with sparknotes.</p>
<p>I think a lot of teachers are opposed to sparknotes because they use it for their lesson plans and reading quizzes.</p>
<p>I always wondered how they knew what the author, assuming the author is no longer living and never discussed the following, meant in their books. How do they know the setting sun represents the imprisonment the protagonist felt? Maybe it’s just a setting sun.</p>
<p>But I’m weird.</p>
<p>^^ Hi again!
You’re not weird, I think the same thing too.</p>
<p>Sparknotes obviously doesn’t compensate for actually reading the book if you go to a school that’s remotely academic. But I use it if I need clarification, or just as another source of interpretation than my (usually crappy) teachers. Sparknotes can get you through a Socratic seminar/discussion on the book, though, just not a test.</p>
<p>Sparknotes makes life that much easier.
I usually have to annotate books though.
So what I do is I go to sparknotes, read the plot of the story.
So I know what happens.
I then go back and actually read the book. I find it MUCH easier to find literary elements, and it is so much easier to be able to concentrate on that rather than the plot (which may or may not be confusing). It allows me to read for analysis (if you will), and not be distracted by the plot.
I almost never read the analysis on Sparknotes, I only do when I personally see a motif or symbol that seems irrelevant to the plot. The analysis sparknotes has is not always right either, or thats what one of my English teachers told me. as it is written by college kids.</p>
<p>Ah, hell yes it’s helpfully.
Who questions it? >< pmg.</p>
<p>Sparknotes is the reason I never have to read.</p>
<p>Eh all English teachers know about. So it’s kind of pointless when it comes to essays. A lot of people in my school have been caught using the same ideas. And then there are those infamous quote quizzes in which Sparknotes doesn’t help at all…</p>