Hi, I'm Kelsey, and this is Mia.
In this video, we're going to prepare you to sharpen your reading comprehension
skills before you get started on our reading comprehension exercises. Are you ready? Let's go!
Throughout this course, you'll practice your reading comprehension skills by reading
fiction passages, which are stories made up by the author, informational passages, which are giving
you facts and telling you about things that really happened, and poetry, which is a type of writing
with its own form and style. You know by now that good comprehension is based first on understanding
words and phrases in the context in which they're written. As you read more and more complex texts,
not only does your vocabulary expand, you realize that words have the power to shape ideas.
Reading comprehension also involves recognizing text structure, or how the author constructed the
passage. Most of the stories we read are told in chronological order. That means they are in order
based on time. You know, this happened first, and then this happened next, etc. When an author is
writing an informational piece about a specific topic, sometimes they start with a central idea
and then they present details that support it. Or sometimes they put the details up front and
end with the central ideas. Authors sometimes present a problem and then offer solutions,
pose a question and then answer it, or write to compare and contrast two different topics.
Recognizing an author's text structure will help you comprehend the author's meaning.
While we're talking about authors, it's also important to understand the author's
purpose in writing a particular piece. Did they write it to inform the reader about a topic?
To persuade the reader to think a certain way? Or did they write it with the purpose of
simply entertaining the reader? Are they trying to instruct the reader,
like how to make cupcakes or how to build a rocket? Or are they trying to describe
something, like a poem about a lovely rose, or a paragraph that describes a beautiful sunset.
Understanding why the author wrote a particular piece will help you comprehend the author's
meaning. To have good reading comprehension, you also need to pay attention to details.
Those details form the basis of the author's evidence and reasoning to support a big idea,
and those details also lead you to make inferences and predictions while you're reading. There's so
much thinking involved in unraveling the meaning of a passage. Pay attention to those details!
Good reading comprehension also involves understanding central ideas and themes.
A central idea can be something like a butterfly undergoes a metamorphosis
and emerges from a chrysalis. However, a theme is bigger than a single topic and may apply to
a lot of different situations, like true transformation takes time and patience.
There's one more thing it's important to pay attention to when you're reading,
and that's point of view. Some pieces are written from first person point of view.
That means a character within the story is telling it, or the writer of an informational
piece is speaking directly to you. First person point of view uses pronouns like I, me, and my.
Then there's second person point of view, which means the author is addressing the reader with
pronouns like you and your. Like in a recipe that says, now you need to add your dry ingredients.
And finally, there's third person point of view, which means an outside voice is telling
the story or information. You'll find pronouns like he, she, and they in third person point of
view. But the authors or narrators will not use pronouns to refer to themselves or the reader.
Throughout this course, you'll be sharpening your reading comprehension skills by answering
questions that deal with words and phrases in context, text structure, author's purpose,
details, evidence, and reasoning, inferences and predictions, central ideas and themes,
and point of view. You'll get lots of practice, and you can watch your skills grow.
Your parent or teacher will set a schedule for you to work on these comprehension exercises. You'll
be given a passage to read, and after you've read it, you'll answer six questions about the passage.
Here are some tips for getting the most out of your reading. First, read the passage
carefully. Be sure you're thinking about what you're reading and not about something else.
Next, as you read, try to imagine what you're reading about by making pictures in your mind,
or imagining that you can hear the sounds, smell the smells, and feel the textures.
And finally, think beyond the words you're reading. Put clues together, and figure things
out that might not be written on the page. Ask yourself questions and make predictions
about what's going to happen next. These are tips that all good readers know and practice.
And here are some tips to help you after you've read the passage, when you're answering the
questions about it. First, read the questions carefully. Make sure you know what they're asking
you. Next, be sure to read all the answer choices before you select one. And finally, go back and
re-read the passage if you need to. This isn't a memory test. It's fine to go back and look
at the passage again. The goal is to work those reading comprehension muscles, so that they'll get
really strong. Let's review. You're going to be reading one passage at a time, and you'll answer
six questions about the passage. Your goal is to become a strong reader by practicing your reading
comprehension. All of the passages in unit one are at about the same level of difficulty. So you'll
get plenty of practice. You are now ready to begin with your first passage. Just remember all
those tips for reading and answering questions, and of course, remember to always be clever!