reading skill

Reading skill

During reading a text, if you read it as you like, you will make no effect. So, some good reading skills are of great importance when we are reading. Here are some skills you can make use.

Firstly, that is using the dictionary. As a student of English, to look up the English-English dictionary is so essential. The dictionary provides much information, such as the spelling, the pronounce and the English system of grammar, etc. Knowing the use of a word is beneficial to understand the exact meaning of it in a sentence.

Secondly, we should deal with synonyms and antonyms well. To know more synonyms and antonyms may help us speak or write in more interesting ways, which is very important in using context clues. Besides, homonyms are also important because we may easily mix up its meaning when we deal with word meanings. So two ways are put forward to help to deal with them. One is to figure out homonyms, the other is to learn homonyms.

Thirdly, skimming and scanning , which are both important reading skills, mean very fast reading. Skimming not only improves our reading speed, but also helps us to get the main idea of a text. In order to skim, we must move our eyes quickly and attempt to get the main idea of every paragraph. As for scanning, once you are sure what you want to find, you must move your eyes fast. Moreover, we should pay attention to the details and find out the arrangement.

In addition, while we read, we should notice our reading speed. Reading speed is divided into three levels: slow, normal and fast. So we should choose our reading

speed as needed. Besides, we must find the steps to choose it, such as setting goal for reading, choosing the speed you are going to try for and making adjustment if necessary. In short, to choose a suitable reading speed is good for our reading ability. But sometimes, writer may give facts and opinions in his writing. Facts are different from opinions. So we should learn how to distinguish them. Consequently, readers should know some types of opinion clue words like stupid, kind, etc.

In some cases, we should make inferences for the article. According to some details, we can guess the rest of the article. Making inference is an attempt to understand the text fully. But most importantly, we mustn’t make some ends on the basis of our thought. However, when we are reading a text, if we want to pick out some important points, the best way is to underline it. It helps to reread and remember what you read. After underlining the words, in order to write down the main idea, we can make a list to help to catch the points. In the end, after we read the text completely, maybe we will write the summary. Summarizing usually concludes the main idea and the major details. However, we should do some preparations for summary. For example, it is important to familiar with the material that you are reading and write down the main idea.

All in all, those reading skills should be practiced every day. A good reading skill can help to improve our reading ability.