The document provides tips for improving reading skills in 3 areas: preparation, active reading strategies, and review. It recommends setting aside distraction-free time, previewing materials, taking notes, asking questions, and reviewing what was read. Specific active reading techniques include skimming, identifying main ideas, making connections, and analyzing arguments. The overall goal is to fully engage with the text.

1. Reading
• Of all the skills necessary to
succeed , the two most important
are:
• Reading – the intake of information
• Writing – the production of
information
• In this presentation, we deal with
how to make your reading
skills work for you…

2. Take Charge of Your Reading
• Before all else, if you don’t like to read,
accept the importance of the skill and work on
it. This is CRITICAL to your success!
• Commit to reading goals
• Plan time and space to concentrate
• Capture and connect
• Know how to read primary and
secondary sources.
• Preview and Review…

3. Commit to Reading Goals
• Stay positive, reading can be enjoyable.
• Break chapters into “chunks.”
• Preview each chunk before you start.
• Pace yourself according to difficulty level.
• Take breaks.
• Read other sources if the reading is confusing.
• Keep building your vocabulary.
• When necessary, skim readings for key points
• Make understanding the material of prime
importance.

4. Plan Time and Space to Concentrate
• College reading takes a great deal
of concentration.
• Schedule time to read in a place
where you won’t be interrupted.
• Find an environment in which you
can concentrate best.
• If you must read in a noisy
environment, consider wearing
headphones with familiar
instrumental music just loud
enough to block distractions.

5. Capture and Connect
• Capture the supporting details; connect
them to the main idea.
• Capture what you don’t know and connec
it to what you do know.
• Elements of Your Reading Plan
– Preview
– Skimming
– Active Reading
– Analytic Reading
– Review

6. Developing Your Vocabulary
• Consider the context around new Learn to read
“outside the
and challenging words. box!”
• Jot down unfamiliar terms and find
the meaning using a dictionary.
• Analyze terms to discover the most
meaningful part of the word.
• Take the opportunity to use new
terms in your writing and speaking.

7. A Reader’s Glossary
Cause-effect How one thing causes another to happen
Compare-contrast How things are similar and how they are different
Draw a conclusion To make up your mind about an idea
Context clue Getting the meaning of a word from the words around it
Implied Suggested without being directly stated
Inference To guess or speculate to draw a conclusion
Main idea The primary subject of a passage or paragraph
Objectivity Not influenced by personal feelings or prejudice
Prior knowledge What you already know
Supporting details Specific items that elaborate on the main idea

8. Preview
This is a lot of work!
Who needs it?
• Scan the material to see what lies
ahead.
• Consider the context for the
assignment.
• Consider the length of the reading
assignment and estimate how long
it will take.
• Consider the structure and
features of the reading to help you
digest the material.
• Consider the difficulty and plan
your time accordingly.

9. Reviewing
• Review to remember the main points
of the material.
• Test yourself on your comprehension.
• Some ways to review:
– notes
– study questions
– flash cards
– visual maps
– outlines
• Make reviewing every week a study
goal.

10. Skimming
• Skimming covers the content
at a general level.
• It involves reading at about
twice your normal rate.
• Focuses on introductory statements, topic
sentences and boldface terms.
• Provides the chance for you to see what kind
of information the assignment contains
• Enables you to gather the surface ideas if you
don’t have enough time to read deeply.

11. Right!
Read us the Get involved
story about the in reading!
wolf
Active Reading
• Use it to avoid empty reading—reading then
realizing that no information has come across.
• Identify yourself completely in what the author is
trying to say: throw yourself into his mind!
• Focus on identifying the main ideas and on
understanding how supporting points reinforce
those ideas.
• In other words, get really interested & involved!

12. Analytic Reading
• Reading at a more intense level.
• Involves breaking ideas open and digging
underneath their surface.
• Enables you to try to spot flaws in the writer’s
logic.
• Promotes a comparison of the work to other
works.
• Should involve questioning the author and
yourself.
• In other words, active skepticism with a purpose

13. Take a book
Tips for Improving
to lunch this
week! Reading Ability
• Find a quiet study location.
• Read in 50-minute blocks with
breaks in between.
• Take notes, recite key ideas or
jot down questions in the
margins.
• Experiment with your reading
Show them we’re a rate.
regular bunch this
week! • Focus on key issues in the text.

14. Highlighting Text
• Highlight:
– Topic sentences, Key words, Conclusions
• But watch out!
– Highlighting too much can cause you to re-
read everything because you don’t know
what’s important.
– Highlighting doesn’t show you why you
highlighted something
– You need to have the entire text with you to
review.

15. Important Points About
College Reading
• You are expected to read the material
and understand it on your own.
• Successful students complete
assigned readings before class to
help them understand the lecture.
• Connections and overlaps between
lecture and reading reinforce
learning.
• Also, reading ahead prevents you
from being embarrassed when you
are called Instructors do NOT always
cover the reading material in lecture.

16. A Summary of Strategies to
Improve Reading
• Practice a positive • Shift gears when you do
attitude. not make progress.
• Make the author your • Read other sources if the
companion. reading is confusing.
• Build your vocabulary.
• Pace yourself
according to difficulty • Work on reading faster.
level. • Increase your
accountability for reading.
• Take breaks to restore
concentration.