Critical Reading

CRITICAL
READING
Prepared by:
JOEY F. VALDRIZ

OBJECTIVES
A. Explain critical reading as looking
for ways of thinking;
B. Identify claim of fact, policy, and
value explicitly or implicitly made in a
written text.

INTRODUCTORY ACTIVITY
Write five (5) characteristics of a critical
reader.
1. ___________________________
2. ___________________________
3. ___________________________
4. ___________________________
5. ___________________________

CRITICAL READING
When you read something and you
evaluate claims, seek definitions,
judge information, demand proof,
and question assumptions, you are
thinking critically.
Reading critically means you
are thinking critically.

CRITICAL READING
By reading critically, you find out the
author’s views on something, ask
questions, evaluate the strengths and
weaknesses of the author’s argument,
and decide to agree or disagree with it.
To arrive at a sufficient interpretation of a
text, you need to become a critical and
active reader.

Policies and Achievements of the
Government and Regeneration of the Filipino
by President Manuel L. Quezon
[Delivered before the faculties
and student bodies of public and
private schools, colleges, and
universities, at the José Rizal
Memorial Field, August 19, 1938]
Note: An excerpt of it will be used for this lesson.

National strength can only be built on character. A
nation is nothing more nor less than its citizenry. It is
the people that make up the nation and, therefore, it
cannot be stronger than its component parts. Their
weakness is its failings, their strength its power. Show
me a people composed of vigorous, sturdy individuals,
of men and women healthy in mind and body;
courteous, brave, industrious, self-reliant; purposeful
in thought as well as in action; imbued with sound
patriotism and a profound sense of righteousness;
with high social ideals and a strong moral fiber; and I
will show you a great nation, a nation that will not be
submerged, a nation that will emerge victorious from
the trials and bitter strifes of a distracted world, a
nation that will live forever, sharing the common task
of advancing the welfare and promoting the happiness
of mankind.

We are engaged in the epic task of building our
nation, to live and flourish, not for a day but for all
time. We must find the flaws, if there be any, in our
concept of individual and community life, as well
as in our character, and proceed at once to
remedy them.

I have an abiding faith in our people. I know that they have all the
faculties needed to become a powerful and enlightened nation. The
Filipino is not inferior to any man of any race. His physical, intellectual,
and moral qualities are as excellent as those of the proudest stock of
mankind. But some of these qualities, I am constrained to admit, have
become dormant in recent years. If we compare our individual and
civic traits with those that adorned our forefathers, we will find, I fear,
that we, the Filipinos of today, have lost much of the moral strength
and power for growth of our ancestors. They were strong-willed,
earnest, adventurous people. They had traditions potent in influence in
their lives, individually and collectively. They had the courage to be
pioneers, to brave the seas, clear the forest and erect towns and cities
upon the wilderness. They led a life of toil and communal service.
Each one considered himself an active part of the body politic. But
those traditions are either lost or forgotten. They exist only as a hazy-
mist in our distant past. We must revive them, for we need the
anchorage of these traditions to guide and sustain us in the proper
discharge of our political and social obligations.

The Filipino of today is soft, easy-going. His tendency is towards
parasitism. He is uninclined to sustained strenuous effort! He lacks
earnestness. Face-saving is the dominant note in the confused
symphony of his existence. His sense of righteousness is often dulled
by the desire of personal gain. His norm of conduct is generally
prompted by expediency rather than by principle. He shows a failing in
that superb courage which impels action because it is right, even at the
cost of self-sacrifice. His greatest fear is not to do wrong, but of being
caught doing wrong. He is frivolous in his view of life. His conception of
virtue is many times conventional. He takes his religion lightly. He
thinks that lip-service and profession are equivalent to deep and
abiding faith. He is inconstant; he lacks perseverance; the first
obstacles baffle him, and he easily admits defeat. The patriotism of
many Filipinos of today is skin-deep, incapable of inspiring heroic
deeds. There are those who are apt to compromise with ethical
principles and to regard truth as not incompatible with
misrepresentation or self-deceit.

This appraisal of the character of our people today may
sound too severe. You will realize that I would be happier if
I could only shower praise upon my countrymen. But my
responsibility as head of this Nation compels me to face
and state facts, however disagreeable they may be to me
or to our people, for it is only thus that we can remedy
existing evils that threaten to destroy the vitality and vigor
of the race. Because I have not lost faith that there is,
within us, all the spiritual and moral forces needed for the
building of a great nation, I am ruthless in pointing out our
present shortcomings. Our task—it is a heroic task—is to
awaken and apply these faculties so that our people
should become what of right they should be: morally
strong, virile, hard-working, refined, enterprising,
persevering, public-spirited.

I want our people to grow and be like the molave, strong
and resilient, rising on the hillside, unafraid of the raging
flood, the lightning or the storm, confident of sits own
strength. If we have the will to survive and the will to
achieve social efficiency, we can not delay this task of
spiritual regeneration. Let us begin to mold the typical
Filipino.

To insure the accomplishment of this task of national
spiritual reconstruction, we shall formulate and adopt a
social code—a code of ethics and personal conduct—a
written Bushido—that can be explained in the schools,
preached from the pulpits, and taught in the streets and
plazas, and in the remotest corners of our land. We shall
indoctrinate every man, woman, and child in its precepts.
By every means and power at my command, I shall strive
to enforce its principles and to require that they be so
universally and constantly observed, that our children may
breathe it in the air and feel it in their very flesh. Every
Filipino is a part and an objective of this great national
movement, the success of which depends upon his own
success in building up his character and developing his
faculties.

This undertaking—the regeneration of the Filipino—
constitutes the paramount interest of my administration.
My most cherished ambition is to see it realized. It is the
greatest prize that I can crave for my life. I call upon all the
teachers, the ministers of every faith, the political and
social leaders, and particularly upon you the young men
and young women to be at the vanguard of this crusade.

We have attained our freedom, but our spirit is still
bound by the shackles forged from the frailties of
our nature. We owe it to ourselves and our
posterity to strike them down.
Other peoples of the world are straining
themselves to attain higher levels of progress and
national security. We shall not lag behind.
The Filipino people are on the march, towards
their destiny, to conquer their place in the sun!

VOCABULARY CHECK UP
Match the underlined word in the first column with its meaning in
the second column.

TECHNIQUES TO DEVELOP CRITICAL
READING SKILLS
1. Keeping a reading journal
In a reading journal, you are writing your feelings
and ideas in reaction to your reading assignment.
This process allows you to develop your
impressions of the text and connect them to your
personal experiences. This allows you to better
relate to the essay and understand the author’s
ideas.

READING SKILLS
2. Annotating the text
Annotating the text simply means making notes on
your copy of the reading. This includes
highlighting or underlining important passages and
writing notes, comments, questions, and reactions
on the margins. By doing this, you are entering
into a dialogue with the author and not just
passively reading the text

READING SKILLS
3. Outlining the text
By locating the thesis statement, claims, and
evidence, and then plotting these into an outline,
you can see how the writer structures, sequences,
and connects his/her ideas. This way you will be
able to better evaluate the quality of the writing.

READING SKILLS
4. Summarizing the text
A summary consists of getting the main points of
the essay and important supporting details.
Summarizing is a useful skill because you can
better understand the reading if you can recognize
and differentiate major and minor points in the
text.

READING SKILLS
5. Questioning the text
Questioning the text involves asking specific
questions on points that you are skeptical about.
These may be topics that do not meet your
expectations or agree with your personal views.
Alternately, you should also take note of things
that you found impressive.

SKILLS NEEDED IN CRITICAL READING
1. Identifying and Analyzing Claims
a. Determining Explicit and Implicit Information
Critical reading also means that you are able to
distinguish the information that is clearly stated
(explicit) in the text from ideas that are suggested
(implicit)

2. Defining Claims
Whenever you read something, you find yourself
looking for the writer’s point or position regarding
the chosen topic. That point is also known as the
claim, or the central argument or thesis
statement of the text. This claim is what the writer
tries to prove in the text by providing details,
explanations, and other types of evidence.

2. Defining Claims
Characteristics of good claims:
A claim should be argumentative and debatable.
A claim should be specific and focused.
A claim should be interesting and engaging.
A claim should be logical.

3. Distinguishing Between the Types of Claim
Types of claims:
a. Claims of facts state a quantifiable assertion,
or a measurable topic. They assert that something
has existed, exists, or will exist based on data.
They usually answer a “what” question.
 Is this issue related to a possible cause or effect?
 Is this statement true or false? How can its truthfulness be verified?
 Is this claim controversial or debatable?

Types of claims:
b. Claims of value assert something that can be
qualified. They consist of arguments about moral,
philosophical, or aesthetic topics. These types of
topics try to prove that some values are more or
less desirable compared to others. They make
judgments, based on certain standards, on
whether something is right or wrong, good or bad,
or something similar. They attempt to explain how
problems, situations, or issues ought to be valued.
 Which claims endorse what is good or right?
 What qualities should be considered good? Why?
 Which of these qualities are more important and why?

Types of claims:
c. Claims of policy posit that specific actions
should be chosen as solutions to a particular
problem. They begin with “should”, “ought to”, or
“must”. They defend actionable plans, usually
answer “how” questions.
 Does the claim suggest a specific remedy to solve the problem?
 Is the policy clearly defined?
 How does the policy solve the problem?

4. Identifying the Context of Text Development
Being a critical reader involves understanding that
text are always developed with a certain context.
Context is the social, cultural, political, historical, and
other related circumstances that surround the text and
form the terms from which it can be better understood and
evaluated.
In discovering a reading’s context, you may ask the following questions:
 When was the work written?
 What were the circumstances that produced it?
 What issues does it deal with?

4. Identifying the Context of Text Development
Another important technique in analyzing the
context of a text’s development is defining its
intertextual link to another text.
Intertextuality is the modeling of a text’s meaning
by another text. It is defined as the connections
between language, images, characters, themes,
or subjects depending on their similarities in
language, genre, or discourse.

CRITICAL READING AS REASONING
1. Identifying Assertions
Assertions are declarative sentences that claim
something is true about something else. It is a
sentence that is either true or false.
 The sampaguita’s roots are used for medicinal purposes, such as an
anesthetic and a sedative.
 The sampaguita belongs to the genus Jasminum of the family
Oleaceae.
 The popularity of sampaguita flowers is most evident in places of
worship.
 Sampaguitas are the most beautiful and most fragrant of all flowers.

Common Types of Assertions (according to the
degree of certainty):
a. Fact. This is a statement that can be proven
objectively by direct experience, testimonies of
witnesses, verified observations, or the results of
research.
The sampaguita’s roots are used for medicinal purposes,
such as an anesthetic and a sedative.

b. Convention. It is a way in which something is
done, similar to traditions and norms. Conventions
depend on historical precedent, laws, rules,
usage, and customs.
The sampaguita belongs to the genus Jasminum of the
family Oleaceae.

c. Opinion. It is based on facts, but is difficult to
objectively verify because of the uncertainty of
producing satisfactory proofs of soundness.
The popularity of sampaguita flowers is most evident in
places of worship.

d. Preference. It is based on personal choice;
therefore, they are subjective and cannot be
objectively proven or logically attacked.
Sampaguitas are the most beautiful and most fragrant of all
flowers.

2. Formulating Counterclaims
Counterclaims are claims made to rebut a
previous claim. They provide a contrasting
perspective to the main argument.
What are the major points on which you and the author can
disagree?
What is their strongest argument?
What are the merits of their views?
What are the weaknesses of their argument?
Which lines from the text best support the
counterclaim you have formulated?

3. Determining Textual Evidence
Evidence is defined as the details given by the
author to support his/her claim. It can include facts
and statistics, opinions from experts, and personal
anecdotes.
What questions can you ask about the claims?
Which details in the text answer your questions?
What are the most important details in the paragraph?
What are some claims that do not seem to have support?
What are some details that you find questionable?
Are the sources reliable?

3. Determining Textual Evidence
Characteristics of Good Evidence:
unified
relevant to the central point
specific and concrete
accurate
representative or typical

Reading and Writing Skills
Marella Therese A. Tiongson
Maxine Rafaella C. Rodriguez

Critical Reading

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