Write down a question before opening an article or a book. It gives the reading a purpose and a way to judge whether the material is useful. You may change the question as you discover more, but begin with something you want to understand.
Look over the structure. Is the writer explaining a process, making an argument, reporting research or describing an experience? Those purposes call for different questions. A personal account may illuminate what happened to one person without showing how common that experience is.
Explain before evaluating
After a section, close the text and state its main point in your own words. Reopen it to check whether your explanation is fair. Before disagreeing, make sure you can describe the claim the writer actually made.
Keep a short note containing the claim, the support offered and your remaining question. Record the source and its relevant date. Mark direct quotations clearly so you do not later mistake someone else's sentence for your own.
Compare another source on the same question. Are the writers using different evidence, defining a term differently or valuing different outcomes? Identify the disagreement before deciding whose explanation is stronger.
Finish by answering your starting question in a paragraph. Include what you can support, what changed your view and what remains uncertain. A useful reading session may end with a narrower question rather than a confident conclusion.
Return to the note later and see whether you can explain the argument without reopening the source. If the reasoning has disappeared, reconstruct it. Reading becomes more useful when you can carry an idea into another conversation or apply it to a new example.