Explain the difference between reading a textbook using experiential processing and reflective processing; and describe how using self-reference and critical thinking can help students to become more reflective when reading their textbooks

What will be an ideal response?

Answer will include that individuals are exhibiting experiential processing when they more or less passively, effortlessly, and automatically soak up the experience, such as passively "reading" their textbooks without stopping to actively think about what they are reading. By reacting "mindfully" and actively and effortfully controlling your thoughts, you are engaged in reflective processing. Reflective processing can help you better understand and remember details about what you have read or studied. In memory terms, the consequence of reflective processing is called elaborative processing. Two powerful ways to be more reflective involve the use of self-reference and critical thinking. Self-reference, a form of self-reflection, would involve relating the new facts, terms, and concepts that one reads to his or her own experiences and to information already well known. Critical thinkers pause to evaluate, compare, analyze, critique, and synthesize what they are reading. These two ways to improve learning can be combined into the reflective SQ4R method.