Reading is a solitary act. It’s just you and the page, and that page, if it’s filled with words, can be quite intimidating. There are strategies, however, and it’s best to learn how to use them as best you can because the stronger your reading becomes, the easier and faster you’ll get through your school work.
Here are some resources:
Reading Between the Lives is a documentary that shows what happens when students at Chabot Colelge in Hayward, CA are asked what happens when an instructor asks you to read? In some classes, I show this video if I have time and in others I assign it for extra credit.
KWL+ Worksheet (click the link for the worksheet): I teach people how to use this worksheet in most of my classes because it forces students to do what most advanced readers do quickly:
- Predict the Content of a Reading: If you look at the first paragraph or line and the last paragraph and line of a reading, you can guess what it’s going to be about, where it’s headed, and a sense of the language and style. Even though they say don’t judge a book by its cover, you can BEGIN to judge it by reading the beginning and end.
- Make Your Mind Sticky: If you can get your mind more prepared to absorb the information to stick in your mind, then you’re making it sticky. Here are two methods:
- Check in With Self: Ask yourself: “What do I already know about this topic?” Even if you’re off topic, or you only know things that seem “kinda” connected, it’s waaay better than nothing at all.
- Ask Questions: If you know the topic of the article or book, then you can write down what you hope you will learn in the form of questions. This also makes your mind sticky because you’ll be trying to find the answers.
- Read and Annotate: As you read, write ON THE PAGE! Students often think that writing on the book is bad, but it will actually improve your reading. Here’s a link to a page shows annotation of a poem and a reading.
- What Did You Learn?: After you read, this is the first thing that you should ask yourself. You don’t have to understand every part of the article right away, but you should be able to jot down some notes on what you learned, especially anything that surprised you. Once you do this, then you can….
- Write Down the Main Points: The best way to demonstrate that you understand a reading is NOT to answer multiple choice questions, but to write a summary of the article. When you write down the main points, you’re basically writing an outline of a summary of the article. By putting it into your own words, it means that you’ve digested the information and can share it with someone else.
- Draw a Picture! I’m not positive if this works for everyone, but I know that for some people, drawing activates a different part of the brain. Pictures help capture information
