The document discusses various reading strategies that can help students increase their reading abilities. It explains that strategies are activities used to make reading more understandable for struggling readers. Some key strategies discussed include taking notes, using concept maps or graphic organizers to understand connections between ideas, identifying the main ideas and rhetorical patterns, reading in detail, and summarizing or paraphrasing the text in your own words. The document encourages readers to choose and mix strategies that work best for their reading purpose and to think actively about what they are reading.

1. Basic Reading Strategies USB ID1-101 Prof. Patricia Murillo Oct 2008

2. What is a Strategy? A strategy is an activity used to help students increase their reading abilities.

3. Why Are Strategies Used? We use strategies for the following reasons: Reading makes more sense for struggling readers when strategies are used Good readers use strategies naturally Strategies make reading more fun!

4. Before You Start… Before you start: Decide the purpose of your reading –this will determine what strategy will work best for you. Ask questions before you start reading –this facilitates understanding. Approach your reading armed with a pencil or highlighter . Underline key words and ideas that you need to remember.

5. Basic Reading Strategies Try and try again Zoom in on the text Note taking Concept maps & Graphic organizers Identify the main ideas Identify rhetorical patterns Reading in detail Summarize and Paraphrase

6. Try and try again If you cannot understand a text, try and try again using all available sources such as: guessing using contextual clues using the knowledge of parts of speech

7. Zoom In on the Text What if a word, a phrase or an entire sentence caused a breakdown in understanding ? Go back and reread a sentence or part of a sentence that was confusing. Once you have identified the part or parts, you can refer to other sources such as guessing from context .

8. Note Taking Try to note down in the margin, at the end of the paragraph or on a piece of paper, the point the writer was making . Take good notes that will be useful to you now, and also intelligible in a few months time (specially for books).

9. Concept Maps & Graphic Organizers Mind maps and concept maps are good ways to understand complex material and the connections between ideas . Mind maps connect ideas together visually . Graphic organizers help you classify and structure ideas . Timelines help you highlight key events .

10. Identify the Main Ideas Identify the main idea of a paragraph by locating the topic sentence . The topic sentence often comes at the beginning of a paragraph . Use graphic organizers to determine the main idea.

11. Identify Rhetorical Patterns Rhetorical Patterns are ways of organizing information that are commonly used in technical writing, such as: Classification Cause / Effect Fact / Opinion Problem / Solution

12. Reading in Detail Sometimes it is important to read every word carefully and every example , and to read the whole article, chapter or book. You may need to do this if it is particularly relevant to some writing you are doing , or clearly presents a concept with which you are having difficulty.

13. Summarize and Paraphrase Summarizing is how we take larger selections of text and reduce them to their bare essentials : the gist, the key ideas, the main points that are worth noting and remembering. Webster's calls a summary the "general idea in brief form" ; it's the distillation, condensation, or reduction of a larger work into its primary notions. Paraphrasing is putting ideas into your own words .

14. In Sum… Use one, all, or a mix of strategies of your choice . Think actively as you are reading about the significance of the text and the connections between it and other things you have been reading. Enjoy reading and learning!

15. References http://www.readingquest.org/strat/summarize.html http://tlu.ecom.unimelb.edu.au/pdfs/reading3ed.pdf