Reading can sometimes be challenging.
Here are 5 tips to help your motivation:
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Determine your reading purpose.
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Choose the right reading environment.
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Read something you like.
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Break it up.
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Focus on what you understand.
Using reading strategies helps readers find meaning in the text and improve their reading skills.
The main reading strategies are:
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Meaning |
How to use it |
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Using what you already know about the topic. Any past experiences and knowledge that could help you understand the text by making connections. |
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Meaning |
How to use it |
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Using clues in the text to figure out what will come next. |
Anticipate the logical next step in a text by looking at the context. |
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Meaning |
How to use it |
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Finding out what the text’s implied meaning is: reading between the lines. |
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Meaning |
Questions to ask |
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Asking questions about the text |
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Meaning |
How to use it |
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Saying what a text is about in a few sentences, in your own words. |
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Meaning |
Ways to do it |
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Making a mental picture and arranging elements in meaningful order. |
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Meaning |
Ways to do it |
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Looking for and choosing the right information in the text. |
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Meaning |
Ways to do it |
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Making connections with the text. |
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Meaning |
Ways to do it |
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Identifying what is not understood and trying to figure it out. |
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Meaning |
How to do it |
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Getting a general idea of the text by giving it a quick look. |
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Skimming advantages
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It’s fast.
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It quickly provides the main idea of a text.
Skimming disadvantages
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It gives minimal information.
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It gives no details.
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Important information can be overlooked.
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Meaning |
How to do it |
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Looking for specific information without reading the whole text. |
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Scanning advantages
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Specific information can be found quickly.
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Can point the reader to the right place in a text.
Scanning disadvantages
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Only focuses on details.
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General text meaning will be missing.
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Meaning |
How to do it |
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Reading audibly. |
Read the text with your voice so that it can be heard. |
Reading out loud advantages
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Can help understand certain words.
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Practise pronunciation.
Reading out loud disadvantages
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Can be disturbing to people around you.
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Slows down reading speed.
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Taking notes advantages: |
Taking notes disadvantages: |
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Slows down the reading process. |
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Meaning |
How to do it |
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Writing down interesting and important elements. |
Note down important elements. |
Taking notes advantages
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Helps organize information.
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Makes it easier to remember.
Taking notes disadvantages
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Slows down the reading process.
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Meaning |
How to do it |
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A series of steps used to help understand a text. |
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Meaning |
How to do it |
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A visual organizer for narrative text elements |
Organize story elements. |
Visit the Plot Diagram concept sheet to find out more.