The document discusses six active reading strategies: visualize, clarify, question, predict, connect, and evaluate. It provides guidance on how to implement each strategy when reading a text. Visualize involves creating mental images of what is described. Clarify aims to firm up understanding by defining unfamiliar terms. Question prompts asking questions about the text. Predict involves guessing what will happen next. Connect relates parts of the text to one's own experiences and other texts. Evaluate forms opinions and reflections on what was read.

1. Active Reading
Strategies

2. Six Strategies
 Visualize
 Clarify
 Question
 Predict
 Connect
 Evaluate
These strategies can be used to engage with writing of a variety of
forms – scientific, persuasive, fictional, technical, etc.

3. Visualize
 Associate the author’s words and descriptions with
vivid images.
 Use the details from the text to create the “movie
in your mind.”
*Important things to note when visualizing are details.
 Visualization is associated with improved memory
and retention – especially if the mental image that
you create is striking and unique.

4. Visualization: Charts and
Infographics
 Visualization can also be used to make scientific or
theoretical writing more easy to comprehend.
 Try summarizing ideas or concepts by drawing them
as flow charts or other visuals.
 This can also help clarify your understanding of how
various factors or variables are related to one
another.

5.  For example, here is a visual
depiction of the
Elaboration Likelihood Model,
a theory that explains two
different methods of engaging
in persuasion.
 The model itself may be a bit
complex, but a striking image
can help summarize
information and concepts after
you’ve encountered them.

6.  Visualization may also include imaging individuals, locations, or
experiences described in the text you are reading.
 In fiction, creative nonfiction, and even some persuasive writing,
it may be easy to imagine the people and settings being
described. In scientific writing, flow charts and other visuals may
be more helpful
 What do you look for in the text to help you visualize?

7. Find Visuals
 You may also wish to actively seek out visuals to pair with your
reading.
 For example, if a Chemistry text describes alkaline hydrolysis, it may
be helpful to conduct an image or video search online, so you can
determine what alkaline hydrolysis looks like.
 It is often easier to comprehend complex topics when you have a
visual schema and some familiarity.

9. Clarify: Firm Up Your
Understanding
 As you read, underline unfamiliar words or phrases.
 At the end of every section (or every couple of
pages), pause to look up these unfamiliar terms and
write their definitions down.
 Review what you have read. Has your
understanding changed or deepened in light of this
information?

10. Clarify Through Summary
 At the end of every section (or, every couple of
pages), pause to write down a brief summary of
what you have read.
 Make sure to use your own words, not quotes from
the text, to summarize your understanding.
 Gauge how confident you feel in your
understanding. What points or ideas are you
“muddiest” on?

11. Clarify
 STOP AND PAY ATTENTION.
 Summarize/explain what you have read. This is a great way to stop
and check whether you understand the text. Read on (and
sometimes even reread) and your understanding may change and
develop. When you find the answers to any questions you have
had, note them in the text.
 *Important things to note when clarifying are sequencing, inferring,
and determining vocabulary in context.

12. Clarifying by Inferring
 Making an educated guess about something based
on clues you are given. This is sometimes called
"reading between the lines.”
 What can you infer from the author’s writing?
 What is the author leaving unsaid?
 And, how confident are you in those assumptions?

13. Clarifying by Vocabulary in
Context
 Determine an unfamiliar word's meaning based on
the words around it and the way it is used
OR
 Looking up the definition in the dictionary
Keep in mind that different disciplines may use words in
different ways. How a psychologist defines “passion”
in a relationship is very different from how you might
conversationally refer to “passion” in a relationship.

14. Question
 Ask questions about the text. What are you confused by? Why is
the author discussing a particular topic? How do ideas connect?
 Don’t just try to remember the questions you have; write them down!
 When a question is answered later in the text, record your answer.
 Pause every few pages to reflect on your questions, write down any
newfound answers, and consider what is unclear or unconvincing.

15. What Questions Do You Have
About This Passage?
It is obvious to anyone thinking logically that minimum wage should be
increased. The current minimum wage is an insult and is unfair to
the people who receive it. The fact that the last proposed minimum
wage increase was denied is proof that the government of this
state is crooked and corrupt. The only way for them to prove
otherwise is to raise minimum wage immediately.

16. Look carefully at the red
phrases for help…
It is obvious to anyone thinking logically that minimum
wage should be increased. The current minimum
wage is an insult and is unfair to the people who
receive it. The fact that the last proposed minimum
wage increase was denied is proof that the
government of this state is crooked and corrupt. The
only way for them to prove otherwise is to raise
minimum wage immediately.

17. Example Questions
 It is obvious to anyone thinking logically that minimum
wage should be increased. The current minimum wage is
an insult and is unfair to the people who receive it. The fact
that the last proposed minimum wage increase was
denied is proof that the government of this state is crooked
and corrupt. The only way for them to prove otherwise is to
raise minimum wage immediately.
1. Who is anyone and how is it obvious?
2. What is the current minimum wage?
3. Is the fact that the last proposed minimum wage increase was denied the
only proof that the government is corrupt?
4. Is raising minimum wage the only way for the government to prove they aren’t
corrupt?
5. What should minimum wage be raised to?

18. Predict
 Try to figure out what will happen next and how the selection
might end. Then read on to see how accurate your guesses
are.
 This can include:
 Anticipating plot events before they happen.
 Asking questions that will be answered in the next section.
 Guessing at real-world implications of a scientific finding.
 Inferring what the author’s next point or subsection will be.

19. Prediction and Logic
 When a scientific paper is very well organized and
developed, the reader should generally be able to guess at
where it’s going and what comes next.
 This is partly accomplished through a strong introduction:
the author should tell the reader what their larger point is
 This is also accomplished by structuring the paper in a
predictable, logical way that helps lead the reader along
the author’s train of logic.

20. A Well-Organized Paper is Easy
to Predict

21. Try it Out!!
 Directions: When the film is stopped write down your
predication as to what will happen next.
 The Black Hole
 Dangle

22. Connect
 Text to Self: Refers to connections made between
the text and the reader’s personal experiences
 Text to World: Refers to connections made between
a text being read and something that occurs in the
world.
 Text to Text: Refers to connections made between a
text being read to a text that was previously read.

23. How Do You Connect?
 Line Game!
 While listening to this song, write down text to self,
text to text, and text to world connections to the
lyrics.
 Runaway Love- Ludacris ft. Mary J. Blige

24. Evaluate
 Form opinions about what you’ve read, both while
you’re reading and after you’ve finished. Develop
your own ideas about characters and events. Make
a logical guess (infer) or come to a conclusion
based on the story or text.
 *Important things to remember about evaluating
are theme and tone.

25. Things to Evaluate:
 Reflect on the tone of the writing. Is it forceful? Delicate?
Bombastic? Humorous?
 Reflect on the themes of the writing, or the recurring motifs: what
topics or ideas come up again and again?
 Contemplate the author’s position: What do they believe? What
are they taking for granted?
 Find points of disagreement or challenge: what do you wish the
author had talked about? What points do you find
unconvincing?
 Consider what’s missing: what information would you like to have
seen? What doesn’t make sense in the text?

26. Muddiest Point Papers
 A great way to practice reflecting on your reading is to
engage in Muddiest Point Papers.
 At the end of a reading, take one minute to write
down a summary of what you have read, with a
specific focus on the topic that is least clear to you.
 This is your “Muddiest point”.
 If by the end of the writing the point still does not make
sense, it may be time to seek out help from an
instructor.