This document discusses obstacles to comprehending college-level reading assignments and provides strategies for overcoming them. The main obstacles are unfamiliar vocabulary, context, genre, and lack of background knowledge. To comprehend texts fully, readers should look up unfamiliar words, research context not provided, understand the genre, and fill gaps in background knowledge. Expert readers take time to thoroughly understand texts through repeated readings, note-taking, and considering all available context and information.

1. COMPREHENSION
of College Level Reading Assignments
A slide presentation based on Chapter 5 of
The Allyn & Bacon Guide to Writing, 6th
ed. (Reading Rhetorically: The Writer as
Strong Reader)

2. What makes a reading assignment difficult
to understand?
• Vocabulary
• Unfamiliar context
• Unfamiliar Genre
• Lack of background knowledge

3. Obstacle to Comprehension:
Unfamiliar Vocabulary
• an obstacle is something that gets in the way of progress
• comprehension is understanding
• vocabulary refers to words or terms used by a speaker or author
• Understanding the meaning of words used in a text is essential to
understanding the text.

4. Consider the following passage:
• French toys: One could not find a better
illustration of the fact that the adult
This passage comes from frenchman sees the child as another self. All
Annette Laver’s
translation of the essay the toys one commonly sees are essentially a
“Toys” by Roland Barthes.
It was first published (in
microcosm of the adult world; they are all
French) in 1957 You can
. reduced copies of human objects, as if in the
find the full text on
SlideShare. eyes of the public the child was an
homunculus to whom must be supplied
objects of his own size.
• The author communicates the same point in three ways:
• toys...are essentially a microcosom of the adult world
• they are reduced copies of human objects
• the child [is seen] as an homunculous to whom must be supplied objects
of his own size

5. • If you don’t comprehend the precise meaning of
the passage, look up the definitions of any
unfamiliar words. Take the time to unpack the
meaning of the passage.
• microcosm and homunculus are words that reveal
the precise meaning of the passage

6. • microcosm means miniature world or little
world
• homunculus means tiny human being

7. Once you understand the terms used, it is
easier to state the ideas in your own words:
• All you have to do is look at the toys kids in
France play with to see that the culture views
children as miniature adults: the toys they play with
are just toy versions of adult objects (like cell
phones, tool belts, vacuum cleaners, and car keys).
How helpful are the
specific examples in
making the meaning
clear? VERY.
SHOW; DON’T TELL.

8. Obstacle to comprehension:
unfamiliar context
• Context is relevant background information
that helps you comprehend a particular
text.
• The meaning of the prefix con- is together;
context refers to information that should
be considered together with the text to
better understand its full meaning.

9. Consider this painting carefully. Close your eyes and open them again. Find a focal
point in the painting. Move your eyes from point to point until you have carefully
viewed the whole painting. Write a sentence that summarizes your interpretation of
this painting.

10. Consider the painting’s context:
‣ The name of the painting is Landscape with the Fall of Icarus.
‣ It was painted in 1558 by Belgian painter Pieter Bruegel.
‣ Icarus is a figure from Greek mythology who, with his father, made wings out
of wax and escaped from the prison where they had been unjustly held.
Though his father warned him not to fly too close to the sun because his
wings would melt, Icarus did not listen. He is seen drowning in the bottom
right corner of the painting. Do any of the other figures in the painting notice?
‣ Do you see how this background information helps you understand the
meaning of the painting?

11. Comprehension Obstacle: Unfamiliar Genre
• a genre is a category • blues, folk, and electronic
are genres of music
• genres of writing are
categories, styles, or • action-adventure,
kinds of writing romantic comedy, and
film noir are movie
• detective, fantasy, sci-fi, genres
and horror are genres of
fiction

12. • In this class, you are asked • Whereas you don’t have to
to consider personal essays, question where a thought
analytical essays, speeches, begins and ends when you
poems, informative podcast read an analytical essay full
transcripts, and textbook of clearly separate
chapters sentences, you have to
know to read a poem with
• Whereas you might scan a the goal of identifying each
individual thought since this
grammar podcast transcript
or textbook chapter genre of writing is written
searching quickly for in lines rather than
essential information, you sentences.
should read each line of a
poem slowly and carefully. • Take the time to figure out
what kind of text you are
being asked to read. It will
help you to understand it.

13. Comprehension Obstacle: Lack of
Background Knowledge
• Realize that authors make assumptions about what their
readers know about and don’t need to have explained to
them.
• Consider when and where the text was written. When
you are reading a text written in 1895, it is not likely that
the author who wrote it in 1895 anticipated students
reading it in 2013. Therefore, you may need to look up
references to events the writer would assume everyone
reading knows all about. This is just one example of the
many reasons you may not know all a writer assumes his
or her readers know.

14. • Consider a passage from an essay I frequently assign in this course.
The essay is called Finding the Strength to Fight Our Fears. It was
written by Terry Ahwal and published as part of the This I Believe
series on National Public Radio in 2007.
When I was 11 years old and living under the Israeli
occupation, I took a chance and after curfew I ran to visit
my grandmother who lived two blocks away from us. On
the road, I had to hide under a truck to avoid soldiers who
were coming my way. For 20 minutes I lay there in utter
fear watching their boots walk back and forth in front of
the truck. My heart was pounding so fast and loud that I
was afraid one of the soldiers would hear it and I would be
killed instantly.
• The author assumes that the reader is familiar with the Israeli
occupation. Many of my of my students are not.
• To overcome this obstacle, when you find unfamiliar phrases in texts,
you should take the same approach as when you find an unfamiliar
word: look it up. Use Google or your preferred search engine to locate
a simple overview or definition of the unfamiliar phrase.

15. Solutions to the problems:
• Unfamiliar vocabulary: Get into the habit of using a dictionary when you read.
• Unfamiliar context: Read everything provided with the reading assignment and
seek out information if it is not provided.
• Unfamiliar Genre: Take notice of the type of text you are being asked to
consider and approach it with an awareness of the purpose, audience, and
characteristics of the genre.
• Lack of background knowledge: Look up unfamiliar phrases to fill in the gap
between what you already know and what the author assumes you already
know.

16. Read like an expert:
‣ Expert readers are not walking dictionaries or speed readers. Experts take
their time, often reading slowly.
‣ They use dictionaries to clarify meaning.
‣ They consider any background information offered with the text (from the
date and place of publication to information about the author to previews of
the text’s content to questions following the text) and, if not provided with
any context for the reading, they seek it out.
‣ Expert readers are not experts in everything. They search unfamiliar
phrases, names, references to events, etc. to acquire the background
knowledge the writer assumes they have.
‣ Expert readers consider the kind of writing they are reading and do not
approach a textbook chapter in the same way that they approach a poem.

17. Read like an expert:
‣ Expert readers take notes and question the text. They approach a text as if
they are entering into a conversation with the author and allow themselves
to speak back by writing notes of response or questions in the margins.
‣ They read a sentence, a passage, or an entire work as many times as they
need to in order to fully understand it.
‣ Expert readers want to understand complicated texts. This may be the key
factor to becoming an expert reader. You have to want to understand, which
requires believing that you will benefit from it. Believing or even suspecting
that there is nothing worthwhile to be learned from reading a given text is
the biggest obstacle of all. Expert readers realize that you can learn from
authors with whom you completely disagree or from reading about
something that you are not personally interested in before you started
reading.
‣ Reading like an expert is more time consuming than you would like it to be,
but real learning involves struggle, and comprehending a text is often the key
to success in the college classroom.