This document outlines reading strategies that will be used in an online course. It defines reading strategies as how readers make meaning from text, understand messages, evaluate information, and comprehend how it relates to the real world. Specific strategies that will be taught include identifying purpose, previewing, predicting, asking questions, checking predictions, connecting to background knowledge, summarizing, relating different parts of text, and rereading. Each strategy is then defined in more detail.

1. Reading Strategies
Week 1
ELI 182 Online
Courtney King

2. What are reading strategies?
• How we make meaning out of words.
• How we figure out the message of a text.
• How we evaluate a text.
• How we understand the text in relation to the
outside world.
• How we make the most of our time when reading.
• How we know when to read carefully and when
to read quickly.

3. Strategies We’ll use
• Identifying purpose
• Previewing
• Predicting
• Asking Questions
• Checking predictions and answering questions
• Connecting text to background knowledge
• Summarizing
• Connecting one part of the text to another
• Rereading

4. Identifying a purpose
Reader defines a purpose for the given text and
understands why he/she is reading it.
• Why are you reading this text?
• Why was this text written?
• What will you gain from this text?

5. Previewing
The reader examines a text before reading. Looks at small
parts of the text (images, headings, subtitles, publication
date). Used in conjunction with predicting.
• Look at the text quickly.
• Look at the pictures.
• Read the captions and subtitles.

6. Predicting
The reader predicts what the text will be about based on
what he/she previewed and his/her knowledge on the topic.
• What will happen in this text?
• What will it be about?
• What will you learn?
• What kind of tone will the author use?

7. Ask questions
The reader asks questions about the text, the
topic, him/herself, or the reading task itself.
• Make a list of questions.
• What questions does this text make you think of?
• What questions do you hope to have answered in
this reading?

8. Now read!

9. Checking predictions &
answering questions
The reader reads the passage and then identifies whether
or not the predictions were correct or if his/her questions
were answered in the text.
• Try to find the answers to your questions. Can you?
• Are your predictions correct?
• What did you guess incorrectly?
• Why?

10. Connecting texts to background
knowledge
The reader connects background knowledge from her/his
life to the text, looking for connections between what is
known and what was learned in the reading.
• How does this text compare to your experiences?
• Have you had an experience that connects to the reading?
• What do you know about the topic already that was
proven by (or disproven by) the reading?

11. Summarizing
The reader restates the main ideas from the text into a short passage.
This is a good way to see if readers understand the reading or can
identify the main ideas in a text.
• Write a brief (1-3 sentence) summary of your reading.
• Make sure you include the following:
 All the major ideas
 The central message of the text
 The type of text
 The author’s name

12. Connecting one part of the text to
another
The reader connects the text being read to a text he/she has read before. This
can be a text read in class or a text outside of class. The two texts can agree or
disagree.
• Think about other texts you have read.
• Is this like any of those other texts?
• Is it the same or different? How?
• What made you connect these texts?

13. Rereading
The reader reads the text again, this time to answer any unanswered
questions and to make sure that understanding is accurate.
• Read again.
• What did you miss?
• Did you gain anything from this reading?
• What are you reading for this time?

14. References
• Grabe, W. (2004). 3. Research on teaching reading. Annual review of
applied linguistics, 24, 44-69.
• Janzen, J., & Stoller, F. L. (1998). Integrating Strategic Reading into
L2 Instruction. Reading in a foreign language, 12(1), 251-69.
• Murphy, J. M., & Stoller, F. L. (2001). Sustained-content language
teaching: An emerging definition. TESOL Journal, 10(2/3),
3-6.
• Shen, M. Y. (2013). Toward an Understanding of Technical
University EFL Learners’ Academic Reading Difficulties,
Strategies, and Needs. Electronic Journal of Foreign Language
Teaching, 10(1), 70-79.