Reading... Does it really matter how you read???

Reading.  I can’t say that I have ever paid very much attention to “How I read” or “What I did to read attentively.”  I never annotated the “text,” what I was reading.  To be honest, I never had any desire to read anything due to the fact that all the works that we were forced to read in High School and Middle School were all just pointless stories that we would get shoved into our mind by a crazy English teacher who was OBSESSED with reading and books.  I would read just enough to get a good grade if there was a quiz the next day, although most of the time I would not even read that much.  The thought of “active reading” is very intriguing.  I can definitely see how reading and then annotating would help ingrain what you read about further into your brain.  One thing for sure that I do realize in literature is the fact that once you start reading one thing, you will not understand the full meaning until you have a working knowledge of many other forms of literature.  It seems as though writers love to “cross reference” each other and by doing so it seems as though a graduate level understanding of reading is required to understand even the most basic of prose.  As far as the statement, “What you get out of what you read is determined by how you read,” goes; I have always read, except on occasion a children’s book, because I was forced to.  I have always struggled with reading.  I have never read to “gain some great understanding” or to “answer life’s great questions.” As a result of that, I really have not got anything out of it.  I guess that the statement is true.  I suppose if I tried to enjoy reading more or had something better to read I would be in a different position. But that is not the case and I will always respect my literature teachers for doing something that I have never seen a point in and doing something that they truly do enjoy. There is something to be said and I am glad that there are literature teachers that do what they love doing aside from the negativity from students that are like me and are so negative about reading.