Chapter - 4 - Reading Fluency (Topic - 1)

Introduction

It is a universally accepted phenomenon that “one who reads is the one who leads”. Reading has not received attention as much as it should have. Reading is receptive skill however, it demands plenty of effort from the reader. Reading refers to the ability to understand information presented in written form. If we understand the language, we can read and if we can read, we can comprehend. A good reader is not only a fast reader but also the one with complete understanding or information. 

Reading Strategies

   ü  Reading General Articles

   ü  Reading Essays

   ü  Reading Journal Articles

·     Reading General Articles:

When we read general articles in newspaper, our aim is not to absorb the whole text but to get an idea about the topic and its application areas. The writer of the general articles also know this aim and hence they write in an easy to understand style. The following are a few tips for reading general articles:

(1)  Pay attention to the title, visuals and the introductory paragraph to know the topic.

(2)  Try to connect the ideas to understand the content. In order to create a dramatic impact, some authors may not present the ideas in a logical sequence.

(3)  Think how you can use the ideas from the articles you read in your everyday life.

(4)  Enjoy the language, subtle humor and the examples used by the author.

·     Reading Essays:

Essays are generally written from the author’s own point of view. As a part of the application process, anyone wishing to pursue higher studies is asked to write essays about their objectives. Similarly, students or professionals write such essays to get financial assistance for attending an event or as a part of recruitment tests. Only when we are able to read, understand essays in terms of their objective, language, style etc, we may able to write such essays. The more and more essays we read, the better we will be able to enhance our knowledge. The following are few tips for reading essays:

(1)  Pay attention to the title, and the introductory paragraph to know the topic.

(2)  Identify the purpose.

(3)  Find out the author’s point of view about the topic.

(4)  Infer the unstated assumption.

(5)  Decide whether to agree or disagree with author’s definition of particular terms.

(6)  Analyze carefully the examples the author use.

(7)  Understand the structure.

(8)  Use the cue to understand the relationship between ideas.

·     Reading Journal Articles:

The structure of a particular journal is generally determined by its editors. All journal articles have more or less similar structure beginning with an abstract, introduction, method, result, discussion, conclusion and references. While reading a journal article we need to pay attention to each of these parts. The following are few tips for reading journal articles:

(1)  Read the abstract first in order to get an overview about the whole article.

(2)  Read introduction to know the objectives of the article.

(3)  Know the findings of the author from the results section.

(4)  Read the discussion section to interpret the results.

(5)  Read the conclusion to understand the key issues related to the research paper.