READING SKILLS Efficient Reading Strategies Scanning to find

READING SKILLS Efficient Reading Strategies • Scanning to find certain information • Skimming to get the gist • Careful reading of important passages to understand a text well

Important Skills • Guessing Unknown Words (Use context & own knowledge of the subject to guess the meaning of unknown words) • First refer to the immediate context (the sentence) • Next refer to the wider context (other sentences/ paragraphs)

1. Previewing the text to get an overview • The title & author details • Main headings & sub-headings, chapter summaries, any highlighted text • Examine any illustrations, graphs, tables or diagrams & their captions • The first sentence in each paragraph

2. Skimming • Note any bold print & graphics • Start at the beginning of the reading & glide eyes over the text very quickly • Do not actually read the text in total • Read a few words of every paragraph, perhaps the first & last sentences

3. Scanning • Sweeping eyes (like radar) over part of a text to find specific pieces of information • To quickly locate specific information from a large quantity of written material • Identify the section(s) of the text that needed to read * Upon noticing an important word or phrase, slow down to read the relevant section more thoroughly.

4. Intensive Reading • Start at the beginning • Underline any unfamiliar words or phrases, but do not stop the flow of the reading • Underline, highlight or make brief notes • If the text is difficult, read it through at least once before making notes * Be alert to the main ideas. Each paragraph should have a main idea, often contained in the topic sentence (usually the first sentence or the last sentence).