Reading Assessment

Developed by Marian Helms Reading Assessment Funded by Title III

This is a self-administered, self-scored reading assessment, which will help you identify any basic reading weaknesses. For some good readers, these reading problems create difficulty in reading textbooks, annotating effectively, and remembering information learned through reading.

PART IThis section of the basic reading skills self-test involves finding the main idea. As you read each selection, identify the main idea by the number that precedes the sentence.

In finding the topic sentences of these paragraphs, you may return to re-read the paragraph by selecting the arrow button that sends you back ( ).

Selection 1 1At the turn of the century, fewer than 20 percent of women worked outside the home. 2Over the past several decades, the employment picture has changed appreciably. 3In 1960, some 35 percent of American women were working outside the home. 4Today the figure is 55 percent (the percentage of men is 76 percent). (Continued on next slide)

5Women hold 44 percent of all available jobs, and since 1980, they have taken 80 percent of the new jobs created in the economy. 6Less than 11 percent of women today are the stereotyped “housewife”- a married woman, not in the labor force, with children at home. 7Indeed, most women prefer to work.

Selection 2 1 Greek and Roman orators used a topical system of mnemonics to memorize long speeches. 2 They would visit a large house or temple and walk through the rooms in a definite order, noting where specific objects were placed within each room. 3 When the plan of the building and its contents were memorized, the orator would (Continued on next slide)

go through the rooms in his mind, placing images of material to be remembered at different places in the rooms.4 In order to retrieve the material during speech, he would imagine himself going through the building and, by association, would recall each point of his speech as he came to each object and each room.

Selection 3 1Five years ago, how did you feel about nuclear power? about South African apartheid? about your parents? 2If your attitudes have changed, are you aware of the extent of the change? 3To answer such questions, experimenters have asked people whose attitudes have been altered to recall their pre-experiment attitudes. 4The result of the study is unnerving: People often insist that they have always felt much as they now feel. (Continued on next slide)

5For example, Daryl Bem and Keith McConnell (1970) took survey among Carnegie-Mellon University students. 6Buried in it was a question concerning student control over the university curriculum. 7A week later the students agreed to write an essay opposing student control. 8After doing so, their attitudes shifted toward greater opposition to student control. 9When asked to recall how they had answered the question a week previously, they “remembered” holding the opinion that they now held and denied that the experiment affected them.

Selection 4 1Sociologists use three different models to explain how societies operate. 2The “functional” model regards a society as a system that brings people together to accomplish needed tasks. 3A functional sociologists, for example, sees our educational system as a means of providing people with the variety of skills needed to keep our society working. 4In contrast, the “conflict” model sees a society as a system, in which some people take advantage of others. (Continued on next slide)

5A conflict sociologist sees our educational system as designed to make sure that the children of the privileged get the best schooling and the most opportunities. 6Finally, the “interactionist” model in sociology looks not at society as a whole, but at how individuals and small groups deal with one another. 7 An interactionist sociologist looks at the whole educational system, but at how different students cope with school.

Selection 5 1In one tribe in New Guinea, aggression is encouraged in boys from early infancy. 2The child cannot obtain nourishment from his mother without carrying on a continuous battle with her. 3Unless he grasps the nipple firmly and sucks vigorously, his mother will withdraw it and stop the feeding. 4In his frantic effort to get food, the child frequently chokes-an annoyance to both himself and his mother. 5Thus the feeding situation itself is “characterized by anger and struggle rather than by affection and reassurance” (Mead, 1939). (Continued on next slide)

6The people of another New Guinea tribe are extremely peaceful and do everything possible to discourage aggression.7They regard all instances of aggression as abnormal. 8A similar tribe-the Tasaday of the Philippines-has been discovered. 9These people are extremely friendly and gentle. 10They possess no weapons for fighting or food-gathering; in fact, they are strict vegetarians who live off the land. 11Evidence of this sort suggests that, rather than being basically aggressive animals, human beings are peaceful or aggressive depending upon their early childhood training.

Selection 6 1Unlike many lower animals that use their noses to detect mates, predators, and prey, humans do not depend on their sense of smell for survival. 2Nevertheless, the sense of smell in humans is incredibly sensitive: only a few molecules of a substance reaching the smell receptors are necessary to cause humans to perceive an odor. 3Certain substances that give off a large number of molecules that dissolve easily in the moist, fatty tissue of the nose can be detested in especially small amounts. 4Decayed cabbage, lemons, and rotten eggs are examples.

Selection 7 1An old saying has it that”Many hands make light work.” 2Thus we might expect that three individuals can pull three times as much as one person and that eight can pull eight times as much. 3But research reveals that whereas persons individually average 130 pounds of pressure when tugging on a rope, in groups of three, they average 351 pounds (only 2.5 times the solo rate) and in groups of eight only 546 pounds (less than 4 times the solo rate). (Continued on next slide)

4One explanation is that faulty coordination produces group inefficiency. 5However, when subjects are blindfolded and believe they are pulling with others, they also slacken their effort. 6Apparently when we work in groups, we cut down our efforts, a process termed social loafing.

Selection 8 1A century ago, medical practice left much to be desired. 2In the late 1800s, surgeons still operated with bare hands, wearing the same clothes they had worn on the street. 3Their shoes carried in the debris of the street and hospital corridors. 4Spectators were often permitted to observe operations, gathering around the patient within touching distance of the incision. (Continued on next slide)

5Surgeons used surgical dressings made from pressed sawdust, a waste product from the floors of sawmills. 6Surgical instruments were washed in soapy water, but not heat-sterilized or chemically disinfected. 7The mortality rate following operations in many hospitals was as high as 90 percent.

Selection 9 1Without doubt, our moods color our thinking. 2To West Germans enjoying their team’s World Cup soccer victory and to Australians emerging from a heart warming movie, people seem goodhearted, life in general seems wonderful. 3But in a happy mood, the world seems friendlier, decisions come more easily, good news more readily comes to mind. 4When we feel happy, we think happy and optimistic thoughts. (Continued on next slide)

5Let our mood turn gloomy, and our thoughts switch into a different track. 6Off come the rose-colored glasses; on come the dark glasses. 7Now the bad mood primes our recollections of negative events. 8Whereas formerly depressed people recall their parents the same as do never-depressed people, currently depressed people recall their parents as having been rejecting and punitive. 9When a black mood strikes, our relationships seem to sour, our self-image takes a dive, our hopes for the future dim, people’s behavior seems more sinister.

Selection 10 1Dr. Elisabeth Kubler-Ross has identified five stages in the reactions of dying patients.2The first stage, she says, is denial. 3Patients will at first deny the seriousness of their illness, claiming that some error has been made. 4Then patients become angry. 5They ask, “Why me?” 6Their anger may be directed against God, fate, or even their doctors. 7Next comes depression. 8During this stage, patients feel hopeless and lose interest in life. 9After depression (Continued on next slide)

comes bargaining-patients try to bargain for their lives. 10They may promise God or their doctors that they’ll be good, stop smoking, give up alcohol, or do whatever is necessary if only they can survive. 11The fifth stage is that of acceptance. Patients finally resign themselves to the inevitable. 12They are not joyful, but they gain a sense of inner peace. 13While there has been some criticism of Kubler-Ross’s stages, her work has contributed much to making death a more comfortable and better-understood subject.

The following slides show you the correct answers. Score your own responses.