Pre-reading Strategies
Before beginning your summer reading, take a look at these tips and the rationale behind using each.
Pre-reading is an important step in the reading process, especially when you're being asked to read something challenging or when the topic of the text is something you don't find inherently interesting. Using a few of the pre-reading strategies below can very likely help you to understand the text better when you do read, and it can also increase your interest in the topic and increase your motivation to read something that's required.
Below are 5 strategies you should try BEFORE reading a book:
1. Build Background Knowledge and/or Activate Background Knowledge
2. Skim and Survey
3. Question the Text
4. Make Predictions
5. Make Connections
1. Build Background Knowledge and/or Activate Background Knowledge
Activating background knowledge or Building Background Knowledge prior to reading can help you to be better able to visualize, connect to, and generally comprehend what you're reading. Activating background knowledge basically primes our brains to retain incoming information, because the part of our memory that stores similar information will already be alert and ready to receive more. Clearly there's a better scientific explanation, but I like to think of our brains as velcro and the new information contained in a text as a tennis ball. If the velcro's "sticky" side is facing out because it's been activated, the tennis ball is more likely to stick. If the velcro's sticky side is not facing out because there is not any background information or it hasn't been activated, the tennis ball will likely just bounce off and not stick.
Building background information can be done in any number of ways: watching a movie on the topic that is discussed in the book, or that is set during the same time period as a story; visiting museum exhibits, monuments, or locations discussed in a book; looking up pictures or videos online that relate to the story or topic; or, simply having a conversation with someone who is knowledgeable about the topic or the plot of the book. Having some background information prior to reading can help you to become more interested in what you're reading too, can help you to better visualize what's happening, and it can also help you with coming up with questions, making predictions, and making connections (which will all be discussed below).
2. Skim and Survey
Skimming and surveying a book only takes a few minutes at most. Basically, you'll want to look at and read the front and back covers or inside of any book jackets, then flip through the book to notice text features like the chapter titles or subheadings, and pictures or graphics. It's also helpful to note the length of individual chapters, the font size, and how many pages the book is overall, for planning and time management purposes. Skimming and surveying a book can help in that it can prompt you to activate background knowledge, and also because it will help you to come up with questions about the text, make predictions, and make connections.
3. Question the Text
Don't expect the text to answer you back out loud, but you'll certainly find many answers to your own thoughtful questions once you start to read. While skimming or surveying the book, come up with some questions you'd like to find the answers to while reading. You can turn chapter titles into questions. For example, if a chapter was titled "The Wicked Witch of the West," I might ask myself, Why is she wicked? What does she do that's wicked? What's her name? Is she from the west coast of the United States, or the western part of some other region?
Also, for example, if you skim Seedfolks, you will see a number of pictures and chapter titles that are names of people. So, you might ask a question like, Is the title of the chapter the person's name whose picture is also on the page? Or, Why does this chapter have a picture of a packet of seeds, while that other page has a picture of a shovel? Or, Is there only one narrator for the whole story, or does it switch each chapter?
Questions can also be general, like the following:
General or specific, asking questions is an important pre-reading strategy because it gives you a focus and purpose for reading- you're reading in order to answer those questions. It can also help you to enjoy the book more, and keep you reading, because you'll want to find out the answers to your questions. Not all of your questions will be answered, and you'll likely change some of your questions and come up with new ones while reading.
4. Make Predictions
2. Skim and Survey
3. Question the Text
4. Make Predictions
5. Make Connections
1. Build Background Knowledge and/or Activate Background Knowledge
Activating background knowledge or Building Background Knowledge prior to reading can help you to be better able to visualize, connect to, and generally comprehend what you're reading. Activating background knowledge basically primes our brains to retain incoming information, because the part of our memory that stores similar information will already be alert and ready to receive more. Clearly there's a better scientific explanation, but I like to think of our brains as velcro and the new information contained in a text as a tennis ball. If the velcro's "sticky" side is facing out because it's been activated, the tennis ball is more likely to stick. If the velcro's sticky side is not facing out because there is not any background information or it hasn't been activated, the tennis ball will likely just bounce off and not stick.
Building background information can be done in any number of ways: watching a movie on the topic that is discussed in the book, or that is set during the same time period as a story; visiting museum exhibits, monuments, or locations discussed in a book; looking up pictures or videos online that relate to the story or topic; or, simply having a conversation with someone who is knowledgeable about the topic or the plot of the book. Having some background information prior to reading can help you to become more interested in what you're reading too, can help you to better visualize what's happening, and it can also help you with coming up with questions, making predictions, and making connections (which will all be discussed below).
2. Skim and Survey
Skimming and surveying a book only takes a few minutes at most. Basically, you'll want to look at and read the front and back covers or inside of any book jackets, then flip through the book to notice text features like the chapter titles or subheadings, and pictures or graphics. It's also helpful to note the length of individual chapters, the font size, and how many pages the book is overall, for planning and time management purposes. Skimming and surveying a book can help in that it can prompt you to activate background knowledge, and also because it will help you to come up with questions about the text, make predictions, and make connections.
3. Question the Text
Don't expect the text to answer you back out loud, but you'll certainly find many answers to your own thoughtful questions once you start to read. While skimming or surveying the book, come up with some questions you'd like to find the answers to while reading. You can turn chapter titles into questions. For example, if a chapter was titled "The Wicked Witch of the West," I might ask myself, Why is she wicked? What does she do that's wicked? What's her name? Is she from the west coast of the United States, or the western part of some other region?
Also, for example, if you skim Seedfolks, you will see a number of pictures and chapter titles that are names of people. So, you might ask a question like, Is the title of the chapter the person's name whose picture is also on the page? Or, Why does this chapter have a picture of a packet of seeds, while that other page has a picture of a shovel? Or, Is there only one narrator for the whole story, or does it switch each chapter?
Questions can also be general, like the following:
- How does the picture on the cover relate to the story?
- When and where is this book set?
- Who is the protagonist, and what is his or her problem?
- What is the main character going to learn over the course of the story?
- Why does the font change at different points of the book?
General or specific, asking questions is an important pre-reading strategy because it gives you a focus and purpose for reading- you're reading in order to answer those questions. It can also help you to enjoy the book more, and keep you reading, because you'll want to find out the answers to your questions. Not all of your questions will be answered, and you'll likely change some of your questions and come up with new ones while reading.
4. Make Predictions
Making predictions can get and keep you interested in the book you're reading. Make predictions about what sort of problem a main character may have, why the title of the book is what it is, and how the setting of the book might influence the action. It helps to have some background knowledge, and to have skimmed the book, before making predictions. Making predictions, like questioning the text, is another During-Reading strategy you should use.
5. Make Connections
Activating background knowledge is a form of making connections between what you already know, and what you anticipate reading. Many of the connections you can make to a book before you even read it, will fall into one of three categories:
- connections to our own life or experiences
- connections to other texts we've read
- connections to what we know about the world around us
Making connections to the book based on its topic, title, pictures, chapter titles, or other features we see by skimming the book, can help us to be engaged in what we're reading, because we can relate to the story or topic in some way. It can also help is to better remember what we're reading, because the new information gets linked to what we already know (whether it's a fact or a personal memory).
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