How to Teach Students the Dimensions of Reading Comprehension

Quest Faculty Development Workshop Series, Fall 2011

The Levels of Reading

Syntopical

Analytical

Inspectional

Elementary

The First Level of Reading: Elementary Reading

Readiness

Simplicity

Progress

Refinement and

Enhancement

The Second Level of Reading: Inspectional Reading

I. Systematic Skimming

• Title Page and Preface

• TOC• Index• Publisher’s

Blurb• Pivotal

Chapters• Final Pages

II. Superficial Reading

• Non-stop reading

The Third Level of Reading: Analytical Reading

What is the Book About?

What does the

Book Say?

How do we

criticize a book?

The First Stage: Finding What a Book is About

Classify

Summarize

Enumerate

Define

The Second Stage: Interpreting a Book’s Contents

Come to terms

Grasp

Know

Determine and Decide

The Third Stage: Criticizing a Book

Maxims

Suspend criticism

Disagree appropriately

Differentiate between

knowledge and personal

opinion

Criteria

Uninformed

Misinformed

Illogical

Incomplete