Reading Comprehension and
Memory
University Counseling Center
Study Skills Seminar
Memorial Hall, First Floor
UCC
Memorial Hall 102
Hours:
M-Th: 8:00 a.m.-5:00 p.m.
Friday: 8:00 a.m.-4:30 p.m.
(309) 298-2453
www.ucc.wiu.edu
UCC services
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Individual Counseling
Group Counseling
Career Counseling
Academic or learning skills
assistance
• Outreach Programming
• Academic Instruction
• Assessments
▫ Psychological
▫ Vocational
▫ Learning Disabilities
▫ Standardized tests
• Consultation
• Training of Graduate
Students / Interns
Today we will discuss:
• Guidelines for improving college reading and
studying
• SQ4R method
• Identifying main ideas
• Types of Memory
• IPS Model
• Memory Enhancement Techniques
3 Guidelines for Improving your
College Reading and Studying
• Read all the assigned material in all your classes
• Read ahead in all your courses
• Read to understand the material
Read all the assigned material
• If instructors assign it, they expect you to read it
• Can be tested on lecture or book material
• Textbooks are independent sources that you are
responsible for learning
Read ahead in all your classes
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Use your syllabus
Ask your teacher when readings are due
Read ahead
Don’t procrastinate!
Read to understand the material
• Not just a task to “cross off”
• Be an active reader
• Go for meaning rather than memorization
SQ4R method
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Step 1: Survey
Step 2: create your own Questions
Step 3: Read and Reflect
Step 4: Recite and Review
Step 1: Survey
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Read the title of the book or chapter
Read the preface of the book
Read the chapter objectives or purpose
Read the introduction to the chapter
Read the section headings and subheadings
Read the review questions or the glossary at
the end of the chapter
7) Pay attention to visual aids
8) Examine any boldface or italicized items
Step 2: Create your own Questions
• Help you become more active while reading
• Take information from the text to create queries
• Helps to focus because you have purpose
• Developing good questions
Step 3: Read and Reflect
• Answer questions while reading
• Reflect and put material in your own words
• Write or highlight answers
Tips on Highlighting
Tips on Highlighting
• Record and highlight or star what the professor emphasizes
• Write down ALL key terms and definitions and underline them
• Underline words, phrases, or sentences that signify supporting
material or your professor emphasis
• Highlight words, phrases, sentences that signify the main idea
• Use asterisks (*) to indicate importance
• Placing a question mark (?) in the margin opposite the lines or
paragraph which you do not understand
• Disagree: Write the word disagree in the margin alongside the idea
or paragraph with which you disagree
• Use the top and bottom margins of the book to write in your own
thoughts and concepts
• Jot in the margins next to paragraphs or sections, brief summaries
Step 4: Recite and Review
• Review each major section
• Review your reading immediately upon finishing
• Review within one day after your finish your
reading assignment
• Review at the end of each week
Understanding the “Big Picture”
• Pay attention to introductory and concluding
remarks
• Pay attention to the text that is boldfaced,
italicized, indented or otherwise made
prominent
• Pay attention to items in list form
• Look for “in summary” “in conclusion” etc.
• Pay attention to the visual aides
Also will need to notice the details!
What is Memory?
• Mental ability to recall or recognize experiences
or information that you have been exposed to in
the past
• Memory is more complex than this though
IPS Model
• 3 independent but interrelated systems
▫ Sensory memory
▫ Working memory
▫ Long term memory
• Information enters through senses
Sensory Memory
• Gateway to memory system
• Very brief & will rapidly decay; being pushed out
by other incoming sense memory
• Attention is key to the cognitive process
▫ Our brains connect certain memories to others,
allowing us to remember one thing as we
remember another.
Working Memory (Short Term Memory)
• Limited by capacity and duration
• Need to either actively rehearse or transfer to
long-term memory
• Another kind of short-term memory?
• 3 things generally happen to information
transferred to Working Memory
Long-Term Memory
• Permanent storage place
• Storage
• Retrieval
Rehearsal and Recitation
• Recitation requires you to think about what you
are taking in by reading material in small
segments, converting it to your own words, &
testing yourself for recall
Association
• Often occur naturally
• Link new material to what you have stored in
memory
• Importance of FYE and Intro courses
Categorizing
• Grouping
• Find a concept, theme, or feature that pulls
together the terms or items you need to
remember
Chunking
• Natural process that occurs when taking many
individual bits of information and combine them
into larger units or chunks
• Decrease the # of items to remember, but
increase the size
Acronyms
• Words formed by using the beginning letters of
several words to form a new word
• Can be actual words or nonsensical
QUIZ TIME!
• Do you know what these mean??
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AIDS
SCUBA
AKA
ROYGBIV
Pictures & Analogies
• Visual aides such as graphic organizers
• Pictures can be drawn or just visualized in the
mind
• Relate new material to common concepts and
situations
• Take the abstract & make it concrete and
understandable
Contact the University Counseling Center at 309-298-2453