Effective reading for academic purposes

1. Effective reading for academic purposes

2. Your own reading style • In groups of three or four, discuss your own reading ability. • What makes a ‘good’ reader? • Are you a good reader? • What is your main problem when reading? • What strategies have you developed for reading?

3. Your own reading style (cont.) • Also consider the following questions: • What sorts of reading material do you enjoy most? Why? • What attracts you to start reading a book or other text (e.g. cover, pictures, font size, topic etc.)? • What are the best conditions for your reading? • Do you use the same place? • Do you need to be alone? • Do you read at the same time each day?

4. Reading (English) quiz For each of the following items, indicate whether the statement is true or false. • I never read (in English) for pleasure.  True  False • Reading is a tedious task that I do only because I have to.  True  False • The best way to read academic texts is to just read the abstract or summary and then pretend to have read the whole thing.  True  False

5. Reading (English) quiz (cont.) • A good strategy to understand difficult vocabulary is to use an electronic translator.  True  False • If I could read faster I would be a ‘good’ reader.  True  False • I know I can’t read all the material assigned to me in my program, so I don’t even try.  True  False • I have some well-developed reading strategies which have worked very well in my study experience to date.  True  False

6. Reading (English) quiz (cont.) • I find that talking about the main points of a difficult text with a classmate really helps my comprehension.  True  False • I never write notes as I read. I just keep the information in my head.  True  False • I always use a highlighter or pencil when reading academic texts.  True  False

7. Critical reading • Students need to take individual responsibility for learning. • Much more reading is needed than just the lecture notes or course guide. • Developing your reading skills is of paramount importance.

8. Critical reading (cont.) • ‘…it is not simply what you read or how much you read but how you read that will crucially affect your level of reading skill’ (Boddington and Clanchy 1999, p. 1). • How you read will impact on your understanding of source material and the way you incorporate these sources into your own writing on a topic.

9. Critical reading (cont.) • To develop critical thinking and reading you need to interrogate both the writer and the text. Use the following questions to help you gain a critical perspective: • What is this document about? • Is it accurate? How do you know? • Who wrote it? Is the writer an authority in this field? • Is the writer trying to persuade you of a particular position? • Is this argument based on a broad or narrow view of the issue?

10. Critical reading (cont.) • More questions: • What evidence is offered to support the argument? • What hasn’t been included in the argument? • What would a totally opposite point of view look like? • Do you agree/disagree with the positionpresented by the writer? • How did you come to this view? • What do other writers have to say about this topic? • Does this text add anything ‘new’ to the topic? • Is this document useful for your present research?

11. Text A text may be: • a book • a textbook • a newspaper article • a journal article • a report • an online document • a graphic/table/illustration • even a comic!

12. Reading strategies • Speed reading • Scanning by key words and phrases • Skimming by paragraphs • SQ3R method: • Survey • Question • Read • Recite • Review

13. SQ3R method • Before you read, SURVEY (SCAN) the text: • title, headings, subheadings • captions under pictures, charts, etc. • introduction and conclusion • summary or abstract.

14. SQ3R method (cont.) • QUESTION while you are surveying: • Turn the title/headings into questions. • If reading a textbook, read the questions at the end of the chapter. • Ask yourself, ‘What do I already know about this subject?’ • Ask yourself, ‘What did the lecturer say about this topic?’

15. SQ3R method (cont.) • When you begin to READ: • Note all the underlined, bold or italicised words. • Reduce your reading speed for difficult passages (but try not to do this all the time). • Check your dictionary only when you cannot determine the meaning from the context. DO NOT check every word. • Give yourself permission to ‘miss’ the meaning of some words. Aim for overall comprehension. • Look for answers to the questions you first raised.

16. SQ3R method (cont.) • RECITE after you read each section: • Orally ask yourself questions about what you have just read. • Write a one-sentence summary at the end of each section. • Underline/highlight key points. • Make notes in the margin (or on a separate piece of paper with the full reference included in your notes).

17. SQ3R method (cont.) • REVIEW your reading: • After you have finished the whole article or chapter, write a short summary. Keep this summary with the text. • Never finish an article without doing some form of oral and written review. • If studying for an exam, go back through the text and ask yourself questions (flash cards work well).

18. Skimming by paragraphs • This approach is based on the following understandings: • The paragraph is an idea unit, coherent in itself but also part of a whole argument. • Signposts (single words or phrases) show the internal connections and the overall development of an argument and usually occur at the beginning of paragraphs. • Opening sentences of each paragraph usually provide an outline of the argument being presented.

19. Skimming by paragraphs (cont.) • Four steps in this approach (Clanchy and Ballard 1997): • Step 1: Look for signposts (in the title or section headings). • Step 2: Read just the first section in full. • Step 3: Summarise the key points in this section. • Step 4: Read the first sentences of each paragraph. (You will notice that if you put these first sentences together they will be similar to your summary of the first section.)

20. Application:1. Summarizing and extracting the thought in sentences2. Read each paragraph and make a summary in one or two sentences.

21. Helium’s future up in the air IELTS Academic Reading test.vol 2 British Council A) In recent years we have all been exposed to dire media reports concerning the impending demise of global coal and oil reserves, but the depletion of another key non-renewable resource continues without receiving much press at all. Helium – an inert, odourless, monatomic element known to lay people as the substance that makes balloons float and voices squeak when inhaled – could be gone from this planet within a generation.

22. B) Helium itself is not rare; there is actually a plentiful supply of it in the cosmos. In fact, 24 per cent of our galaxy’s elemental mass consists of helium, which makes it the second most abundant element in our universe. Because of its lightness, however, most helium vanished from our own planet many years ago. Consequently, only a miniscule proportion – 0.00052%, to be exact – remains in earth’s atmosphere. Helium is the by-product of millennia of radioactive decay from the elements thorium and uranium. The helium is mostly trapped in subterranean natural gas bunkers and commercially extracted through a method known as fractional distillation. 

23. C) The loss of helium on Earth would affect society greatly. Defying the perception of it as a novelty substance for parties and gimmicks, the element actually has many vital applications in society. Probably the most well known commercial usage is in airships and blimps (non-flammable helium replaced hydrogen as the lifting gas du jour after the Hindenburg catastrophe in 1932, during which an airship burst into flames and crashed to the ground killing some passengers and crew). But helium is also instrumental in deep-sea diving, where it is blended with nitrogen to mitigate the dangers of inhaling ordinary air under high pressure; as a cleaning agent for rocket engines; and, in its most prevalent use, as a coolant for superconducting magnets in hospital MRI (magnetic resonance imaging) scanners

24. D) The possibility of losing helium forever poses the threat of a real crisis because its unique qualities are extraordinarily difficult, if not impossible to duplicate (certainly, no biosynthetic ersatz product is close to approaching the point of feasibility for helium, even as similar developments continue apace for oil and coal). Helium is even cheerfully derided as a “loner” element since it does not adhere to other molecules like its cousin, hydrogen. According to Dr. Lee Sobotka, helium is the “most noble of gases, meaning it’s very stable and non-reactive for the most part … it has a closed electronic configuration, a very tightly bound atom. It is this coveting of its own electrons that prevents combination with other elements’. Another important attribute is helium’s unique boiling point, which is lower than that for any other element. The worsening global shortage could render millions of dollars of high-value, life-saving equipment totally useless. The dwindling supplies have already resulted in the postponement of research and development projects in physics laboratories and manufacturing plants around the world. There is an enormous supply and demand imbalance partly brought about by the expansion of high-tech manufacturing in Asia.

25. E) The source of the problem is the Helium Privatisation Act (HPA), an American law passed in 1996 that requires the U.S. National Helium Reserve to liquidate its helium assets by 2015 regardless of the market price. Although intended to settle the original cost of the reserve by a U.S. Congress ignorant of its ramifications, the result of this fire sale is that global helium prices are so artificially deflated that few can be bothered recycling the substance or using it judiciously. Deflated values also mean that natural gas extractors see no reason to capture helium. Much is lost in the process of extraction. As Sobotka notes: "[t]he government had the good vision to store helium, and the question now is: Will the corporations have the vision to capture it when extracting natural gas, and consumers the wisdom to recycle? This takes long-term vision because present market forces are not sufficient to compel prudent practice”. For Nobel-prize laureate Robert Richardson, the U.S. government must be prevailed upon to repeal its privatisation policy as the country supplies over 80 per cent of global helium, mostly from the National Helium Reserve. For Richardson, a twenty- to fifty-fold increase in prices would provide incentives to recycle.

26. F) A number of steps need to be taken in order to avert a costly predicament in the coming decades. Firstly, all existing supplies of helium ought to be conserved and released only by permit, with medical uses receiving precedence over other commercial or recreational demands. Secondly, conservation should be obligatory and enforced by a regulatory agency. At the moment some users, such as hospitals, tend to recycle diligently while others, such as NASA, squander massive amounts of helium. Lastly, research into alternatives to helium must begin in earnest.

27. Let us answer some questions?

28. Questions 27–31Reading Passage has six paragraphs, A–F.Which paragraph contains the following information?Write the correct letter, A–F, in boxes 27–31 on your answer sheet.27 a use for helium which makes an activity safer28 the possibility of creating an alternative to helium29 a term which describes the process of how helium is taken out of the ground30 a reason why users of helium do not make efforts to conserve it31 a contrast between helium’s chemical properties and how non-scientists think about it

29. Questions 32–35Do the following statements agree with the claims of the writer in Reading Passage 98?In boxes 32–35 on your answer sheet, writeYES if the statement agrees with the claims of the writerNO if the statement contradicts the claims of the writerNOT GIVEN if it is impossible to say what the writer thinks about this32 Helium chooses to be on its own.33 Helium is a very cold substance.34 High-tech industries in Asia use more helium than laboratories and manufacturers in other parts of the world.35 The US Congress understood the possible consequences of the HPA.

30. Questions 36–40Complete the summary below.Choose NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS from the passage for each answer.Write your answers in boxes 36–40 on your answer sheet.Sobotka argues that big business and users of helium need to help look after helium stocks because 36 ……………….. will not be encouraged through buying and selling alone. Richardson believes that the 37 ……………….. needs to be withdrawn, as the U.S. provides most of the world’s helium. He argues that higher costs would mean people have 38 ……………….. to use the resource many times over.People should need a 39 ……………….. to access helium that we still have. Furthermore, a 40 ……………….. should ensure that helium is used carefully.