Wallace and Wray CFA

One aspect of the Wallace and Wray book that I really enjoyed reading was the transition they discuss between critical analysis and writing a critical review. I like what my colleague Les wrote about moving from critical reading to critical writing, that we need to read a multitude of works. However, I think the transition from critical analysis and critical review is even more important. I was hit by the line in the Wallace and Wray text that said, quite bluntly, "avoid the mistake of just moving chunks of material around - a Critical Analysis of a text is not identical to a Critical Review of it" (p. 158) and even more poignant was this "ensure that everything you write in your Critical Review is doing its job in contributing to answering your review questions." 

I find that when I read a scholarly article that I will make notes and underline passages that follow many different lines of thought. If I see an aspect on the sample size I don't think is valid, or if I see that the author has made a leap in logic that is not supported enough by the facts that they might have presented, I'll write it up. If I were to write about each one of these however, I might be too far afield for a reader of my review for them to make much sense of it. I try to live by the rule of threes, the idea that breaking stories in presentations into threes is more memorable to the audience. I have changed that a bit to think that my critical review questions must be answered in threes. What three facts support answering my critical review question? If I can present three arguments, then I think I've done a decent job of answering that question. The other benefit of this is that it serves as a reinforcement mechanism. By having three arguments in the critical review then I'm sure to reinforce that subject to the reader to a point that they will remember it. If I am able to do it throughout the writing, then it becomes almost a spaced reinforcement mechanism. 

Finding that balance of being pointed in the subject matter and answering the critical review questions, not allowing myself to go too far afield, and breaking the argument into threes are things I think would be beneficial. 

Wallace, M., & Wray, A. (2016). Critical reading and writing for postgraduates (3rd ed.). Los Angeles: SAGE.