Name:_______________________________________
Reading Strategies
Reading strategies are things we do that help us understand what we are reading.
Active Reading:
 Trying to understand what you are reading (words, characters and plot)
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Being focused and paying attention
1. Making Connections:
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Helps you understand what you are reading
Helps you remember what you are reading
Helps you be an active reader
3 Types of Connections:
1. Text-to-Self (TS): a connection between the text and something in your own
life experience.
 The easiest kind of connections

Good connections: EX. character can’t learn to ride a bike and it took me
a long time to learn how to ride a book too.
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Bad connections: EX. character has brown hair and so do I.
2. Text-to-Text (TT): a connection between the text and another story or text
that you have read previously.
 Good connections: EX. like the Ugly Duckling the main character feels
ugly in the clothes that she has to wear.
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Bad connections: EX. I’m reading a book with a duck and I’ve read the
Ugly Duckling.
3. Text-to-World (TW): a connection between the text and something that is
occurring or has occurred in the world.
 Good connections: EX. character worried about oil spill and there was an
oil spill in Alaska that we are still cleaning up 20 years later.
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Bad connections: EX. character was worried about oil spills and there
have been oil spills in real life.
2. Questioning:
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Two Types of questions:
o Thin Questions: questions that are right there answers
 I can point to the answer in the text
 who? where? what? how many?
 You can answer in one sentence
 Example: What did Bob buy? Bob bought a loaf of bread.
 Basic answers
o Thick Questions: think and search
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put pieces of information together so that the answer makes
sense
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takes longer to answer
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you need more than one sentence to answer
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why do you think….? would you….? how would you feel if…?
what if…?

they are the better questions; the questions that will make
you read and better understand your text.
3. Visualizing
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A way to help you understand what you read
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A tool we can use for fiction and nonfiction
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Making a picture in your mind
How do we visualize?
 Use the words in the text to make a picture in your mind
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It’s like seeing a “movie in your mind”
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We use our background knowledge to help us visualize what is in the text.
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Different people bring different background knowledge, and so they
visualize differently.
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Because each person has unique background knowledge, everyone will
visualize differently
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You need to make sure that you are using the text clues to visualize
Why visualize?
 Three reasons:
1. Visualizing helps us to process text more actively. We have to use our
prior knowledge to visualize, therefore, we are reading more carefully.
2. Visualizing helps us figure out what is going on in the story.
3. Visualizing is fun! Reading becomes more enjoyable.
4. Inferencing
Using Schema to make inferences
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Schema is what you already know about a topic.
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Think about schema as file folders in your brain.
Activating your Schema
 When you start to read a text, you need to open up the file folder about the
topic.
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This is called “activating your schema”.
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If you don’t have a schema for a topic, you will not be able to make good
inferences.
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Building your schema is important to learn all that you can from what you
read.
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The more you read the more you know!
Using Text Features
 Even when text has no pictures, you can still activate your schema.
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If no pictures, you can use the title to create a picture in your mind.
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You can use other text features such as headings, gold print, and captions to
activate your schema
How can we find out what the text will be about?
We can look at the pictures, read the title and use text features.
5. Determining Importance:

Identifying the main idea and key points within a text.
4 Secrets to Finding the Main Idea:
1. Put yourself in the author’s place.
2. Examine the words and phrases (details) for clues as to what’s important.
3. Ask questions about what the clues combined seem to say about what is
valued.
4. Decide what the main is by asking yourself, “If I had written this, what
would I think is the most important idea I want people to understand?”
6. Synthesizing:
Information in the text + Information from your head (Schema) =
Deeper understanding of the test
When you synthesize:
 Your mind is changing
 Your ideas are changing
 Your thinking is changing
When synthesizing use the Three-Minute Pause:
1. Summarize key points
2. Add your own thoughts (schema)
3. Pose clarifying (clears it up) questions
“Synthesizing is like baking a cake. All the different ingredients mixed together
make a whole new thing.” – a new idea or a new point of view