Critical Reading Exercises http://www.esc.edu/esconline/across_esc/writingresourcecenter.nsf/5208e99c0b33e79a852 56b350067a359/123037c297f4ff6e85256f4a006b9926?

OpenDocument The handouts and worksheets listed here are intended to help students learn to read critically and thoughtfully. For General Reading:

Overview: What Is Critical Reading?

Learning how to read critically involves becoming actively engaged in what we read by first developing a clear understanding of the authors ideas, then questioning and evaluating the arguments and evidence provided to support those arguments, and finally by forming our own opinions. Reading this way requires that we develop skills that arent necessary for more passive forms of taking in information. However, it also allows us to get more from what we read. Steps in critical reading:

Before you read Scan the piece to get an idea of what it is about and what the main argument is. This may include reading an introduction if there is one, or the subheadings. While you read Keep a running dialogue with the author through annotation by recording your thoughts, ideas, and questions. Underline, highlight, or circle important parts and points, and write comments in the margins. After you have read Look over your annotations to get an overall idea of the text. You may also choose to write a summary to solidify your understanding. Responding to the text After you have developed a clear sense of the authors argument and line of reasoning, you are able to analyze the authors argument and methods. Then, you can develop your own ideasperhaps into an essay of your own. To read actively, it helps to think of reading consisting of a three-stage process: before you read, while you are reading, and after you have read. At each stage, there are important tasks. This worksheet focuses on the second stageduring reading. Reading actively means making connections between your current knowledge and what you are reading, and asking yourself questions as you read. As you read, you are having an ongoing internal dialogue with the author in which you reflect on, postulate and form opinions about, examine, and assess the authors arguments. This ongoing commentary and analysis helps you, the reader, to understand and focus on the text.

While you read, use a pencil or highlighter to mark key ideas and supporting examples or evidence. Choose four main ideas from the text and respond with your feelings, interpretations, and assessments. My Responses 1.

Main Ideas in the Text 1.

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While You Read: Two Modes of Reading (Worksheet: Exercise for While You Read)

Effective Reading: Taking Notes To read effectively is not easy. It requires focus and attention. When you read actively, you will be participating in an ongoing conversation with the author in which you respond to and question the text. The notes that you take while reading document this dialogue. Your active involvement through note taking will keep you from getting distracted and missing important points. Its also nice to have something to show for your hard work when you are finished reading! Marking Your Text Dont be afraid to write in your book (as long as you own it)! Mark your text by highlighting, underlining, or circling important parts that you might want to return to later. These may include main ideas, examples used to support the argument, illustrations of important points, or sections where the focus of the argument shifts. For more ideas on how to mark your text, see the handout, "While You Read: Strategies for Close Reading."

Understanding a work that is challenging requires a close readingone in which we make decisions about what the text means as we read it, keep track of the authors ideas and points, and connect these new ideas with what we already know. Marking up the text while we read facilitates this process. Here are some suggested marks for things you should look for while you are reading (but you should try to think of your own): Look for . . . The main question or issue in each chapter or section Fundamental concepts and their explanations or descriptions Important conclusions. (You may use more than one to rank the importance) Unclear or confusing parts, faulty logic Supporting data or information used as evidence Author voicing an opinion Problematic assumptions being made Greater implications of the argument or discussion Mark it with . . . aim / objective / main highlighting / underlining */ /X

Q/? evidence viewpoint / VP problematic/ prob implication

You may also keep track of your own ideas as you are reading in a separate journal or on the blank pages or half pages of the book. Making diagrams to visualize how the important ideas are related is also a helpful technique.

Commenting on the Text: Taking It a Step Further Your involvement as a reader is not limited to just highlighting and underlining the authors words. Writing your own comments in the margins as you read is a process called annotation. This is your chance to reflect on and challenge the meanings of what you read: record your questions and objections. Draw comparisons and comment on discrepancies. Annotation also includes writing down definitions of words or terms that you come upon that are not already familiar to you. You may also choose to rearticulate or summarize an idea or argument to clarify it. Why Annotate? Annotating helps you to remember and internalize the material you read. It also encourages you to reflect on the text, and come up with your own ideas, perhaps for future essays. Remember Try to put the authors ideas into your own words when you refer to them. This will help you to really understand and remember what you have read.

Effective Reading: Taking Notes While You Read: Strategies for Close Reading Interpreting Texts Critically: Asking Questions (Worksheets: Authority of the Writer | Logic of the Writer's Argument | Ways in Which the Writer Gets Your Interest | Writer's Use of Language and Style | Ideology That Informs the Text)

What does it mean to interpret a text critically? It means being a discerning reader. It means questioning what you read: thinking about what the author wants you to believe, how the author works to convince you, and then deciding if the authors views are worthy of agreement. Asking questions about what you read requires your careful examination of the writers claims, as well as the use and quality of the writers supporting evidence. As you interpret the text, you inevitably draw upon your own experiences, as well as your knowledge of other texts. However, the basis of your analysis must be rooted in the text itself. Learning how to examine texts critically is an essential skill, especially in college. You will need to use the knowledge you acquire from texts for your own projects. In order to do that, you must interpret or analyze them. Here are some things to consider in your analysis:

Consider the Authority of the Writer (Go to worksheet) Using both the information that you have about the writer as a person (training, political affiliation, life experiences), as well as clues from the language, tone, and approach of the text, decide whether the writer is credible. Is the writer knowledgeable? What biases or values may be playing a role in his/her argument? Authority of the Writer

Commenting on the Text Information about the writer (training, political affiliation, life experiences, etc.)

What does the language, tone and approach of the text tell you about the writer?

Is the writer knowledgeable? why? /why not?

What biases or values appear to have a role in the writer's argument?

Consider the Logic of the Writers Argument (Go to worksheet) It is important to ask yourself what the writer wants you to believe and whether the reasons and supporting evidence convince you of this viewpoint. Examine the credibility of the facts as well as the line of reasoning that ties the facts to the main assertion.

What does the writer want you to believe?What reasons/supporting evidence does the writer provide? Do they seem credible? 1.

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Expose the Ways in Which the Writer Gets Your Interest (Go to worksheet) A writer may use one or more of the following strategies to get the reader intellectually and emotionally involved in the text: 1. Trying to get the reader to identify with the author or evoke respect for the authority of the author (for example, through the tone) 2. Trying to get the reader to care about a subject, cause, or problem (perhaps by appealing to their emotions by using shocking statistics, anecdotes, or detailed descriptions) 3. Trying to get the reader to align him-/herself with a greater class of readers (e.g. the educated, women, environmentalists)

4. Using the assumed interests and values of the reader as a foundation for another argument

Ask yourself which of these techniques the writer is using and how. Are they effective? Does the writer use any of the techniques listed below? Are they effective? Does the writer try to get you to identify with him/her (for example, through the tone? shared experience? something else?)? How? Cite examples.

Does the writer try to evoke respect for his/her authority? How? Cite examples.

Does the writer try to get you to care about the subject, cause or problem? How -- appeals to emotion? statistics or other facts? anecdotes? detailed descriptions? something else? Cite examples.

Does the writer seem to assume you have particular interests and/or values, and use them as the basis for argument? How? Cite examples.

Consider the Writers Use of Language and Style (Go to worksheet) The writer makes many decisions concerning language and style that serve to influence your responses as a reader. Examine the following aspects of the writing: overall tone, sentence formation, choice and connotation of words, use of punctuation, and brevity or length of passages. How do the writers choices about language and style aid their argument? What do these choices reveal about the writers argument?

Aspect of the WritingEffect on the argument What seems to be the overall tone?

How are the sentences formed?

What words does the writer choose? what is the connotation of those words?

How does the writer use punctuation?

Are passages long or short?

Consider the Ideology that Informs the Text (Go to worksheet) Try to uncover the ideology -- the system of beliefs, values, and ideas about the world--that underlies the text. A simple way to do this is to write down words and ideas that are valued in the text or represented by the author in a positive way. Then write down the opposite of each word. These binaries, or pairs of opposites, will reveal the ideology that informs the text. What seems to be the ideology -- the system of beliefs, values, and ideas about the world--that underlies the text?

What words and ideas are valued in the text or represented by the author in a positive way? 1.

What are the opposites of those words/ideas?

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After You Read: After Reading: Evaluating What You Have Read

After reading the article, answer these questions to help you to reflect upon and analyze what you have read.
1. What is the authors main argument? Use your own words to rearticulate the main

idea.

2. List and explain the reasons the author provides for his/her main argument.

3. What kind of evidence is presented to support the authors argument? Is it fact or opinion? What is the source of the informationdoes it come from an informed authority in the field?

4. What is the purpose and tone of the article?

5. Is the author objective or does he/she try to convince the reader to have a certain opinion? If so, what viewpoint does the author try to convince you of? What reasons does the author provide for choosing this viewpoint?

6. Does the authors argument assume that the reader thinks in a particular way or has a particular world-view? What are the major underlying assumptions that the author makes, and do you think they are reasonable and acceptable to most people?

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Examining Your Reactions After Reading: A Three-Part Exercise (worksheet)

Part One: Answer the following questions freely (write whatever comes to mind) to gauge the extent to which the text influenced your views. (A printable worksheet is available.) 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. What does the author want me to believe or agree with? What were my beliefs about the subject before I read this? What are my beliefs about it now? What has the text convinced me of specifically? What do I still have doubts about? What questions does this text raise for me? What insights do I have now that I didnt have before I read this?

Part Two: Now, although you may firmly agree or disagree with the authors views, you will take turns writing from each perspective. First you will write freely in support of the author, looking at the world through the authors perspective. We can call this writing with the author. You will look to your own personal experiences, memories, and knowledge for anything that is in line with the authors argument. Next, you must think of all the problems, contradictions, and weak points in the authors argument. We can call this writing critically about the authors ideas. Either one of these roles may be harder for you, depending on whether you have a strong opinion about the subject. However, this is a very important exercise for critical readers, because it teaches you to explore unfamiliar perspectives. Part Three: Think of questions you would ask the author if you could. These may include ideas that came up during the first two parts of this exercise, your doubts about or problems with their argument, or a request for clarification or expansion on a point.

Stages Involved in Summary Writing

What is a summary?

It is a shortbut thoroughobjective restatement of the main idea and key points of a passage. A summary may also mention some of the examples the author used to illustrate key points. What does not belong in a summary? Your opinions and thoughts, as well as the details of the passage. Why write a summary? It will help you to fully understand and remember what you read. It also is a useful guide for responding critically to the material in your own writing. Stages of Summary Writing

First reading: As you read, look out for to the main idea and points. Second reading: 1. Divide the passage into thought progressions (looking at paragraph divisions will help you to identify these stages). You may indicate each new progression by using brackets in the margins, or highlighting. 2. Underline or highlight main ideas and terms. Summaries: Write a summary sentence for each thought progression. Thesis statement: Write a summary of the entire passage that is one or two sentences long and includes the main idea of the passage (the who, what, where, how, and when).
For a persuasive passage, this should include the authors conclusion. For a descriptive passage, this should include what is being described and its

important characteristic(s). First draft: Combine your thesis statement with the one-sentence summaries of each thought progression. Take out repetitious partsuse as few words as possible. Take out minor details, or rewrite them in more general terms. Third reading: Make further adjustments by comparing your summary to the passage. Final draft: Check to see that transitions between sentences are smooth, and make sure the summary is coherent as a whole. Lastly, check grammar, spelling, and punctuation.

For Reading Literature:

Ideas for Writing and Thinking About a Text RESPOND freely to an idea from the text without censoring yourself, as you write whatever comes to mind.

CHOOSE and DESCRIBE an idea, event, or character that you found especially interesting or significant. Explain why you chose it.

ASK QUESTIONS about what you have read, and record them.

COMPARE and CONTRAST an event or episode in the reading with your own experienceslook for similarities. Then think of differences.

ILLUSTRATE an idea from the reading with examples from your own life.

ANALYZE the why and how of the way the plot unfolded, including the characters motives and actions.

RELATE this reading to other readings in order to connect it with what you already know. Points of comparison may include the authors main idea and goal, the style of the writing (e.g., amount of description), and the way the reading is organized.

FORM OPINIONS about the significance, accuracy, originality, and relevance of the work to our time.