Why should we identify academic reading strategies?

“Reading is fundamental” — you may recall hearing this phrase as a child.  A series of somewhat cheesy television ads emphasizes this point, such as this one featuring basketball superstar Shaquille O’Neal:

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However, as college students, reading can often seem less like fun and more like work.  The purpose of it changes.  Instead of reading for enjoyment, we read for information, for deeper understanding, and for challenging what we thought we knew.

“Reading” in this course doesn’t only mean the act of putting letters together to make words, and words together to make sentences.  “Reading,” now, means a set of skills we can practice and deepen, to make our college experience both easier and more meaningful.

This module will help you become familiar with steps you can take to better understand any assigned college reading.

Learning Outcomes

• Identify and differentiate between different types of texts
• Identify reading strategies for academic texts
• Identify specialized reading strategies for specific types of texts, including content in disciplines and visual information
• Identify techniques for strengthening vocabulary
• Identify thesis statements in texts
• Identify supporting claims in texts
• Identify logic and structure in texts
• Identify summary strategies for reading comprehension