Reading skills that work - for tests and in class

"I scream, I..." Hi. James from EngVid. That was for Eddie Murphy, and that line comes

from the movie "Delirious", which is hilarious. In fact, the reason why he used "delirious"

is because if you laugh so much, it's almost like you go crazy. Delirious.

Anyway, so are you ready? I'm going to teach you a lesson today. Actually, it's in response.

"Response" means I'm doing this back to something that was said about reading skills. I did

an earlier video -- go check it. It's on reading comprehension. That video was basically to

help you to understand. It wasn't about doing it for tests or anything special. It was for

you at home, by yourself, trying to understand. And it's valid, which means true, and it's

a good video. This is to help you. It's an -- not excess. It's an addition to, okay?

Which will help you in a different way. So for those of you people who are wondering,

"How can I do this on a test without a dictionary? This is a crazy method." You missed the point.

That was to help you just get better at reading. This one, I'm going to try and help you do

two things. Number one, go faster. Number two, improving your reading skills. And number

three, magically -- because it's magically delicious -- I want to actually have you enjoy

the experience of reading. That's right, boys and girls. I'm going to do what they couldn't

do in school. Yeah, right. Anyway, let's go to the board. First, reading skills that work.

These skills will work. The only thing that -- the only reason they won't work is if you

don't use them. So I'm going to tell you to use them now. Now, part of this is for if

you're in school. If you're at home studying by yourself in our farm country where you

can't get to school, don't worry. You can still apply this. I just used the word "test"

and for "school" for people who are going to be taking IELTS or TOEIC or TOEFL. That

may be you in the future as well. So don't throw out the baby with the bathwater, which

is an English expression for saying, "Don't get rid of everything because you're not happy

about something." Okay? So just keep in mind that if you can't use it now directly, you

will be able to later. Okay?

First, for tests and class, what I want to teach you is active reading skills. I was

actually by the Cornell -- they have a website, and I was checking out how they were teaching

university students, and I found this to be a very effective way, and I believe will work

for you. A lot of times, people take information in passively. That means they sit there, and

they hope that something magic happens. If I keep looking at the page, the page will

start to actually speak, and I'll understand. That's not going to happen. In order for you

to get better at reading, we need to be active or activate our brains and minds.

First thing we're going to do with that is when you start reading something, it doesn't

matter if it's a page or if it's a book, a magazine, comic book, Playboy -- yes, I said

it -- what you want to do is ask questions. Asking questions informs your brain what to

look for, what's important. Right? If the title is on something about history of man,

then it's about history. It also could be about science. It might be about psychology,

but it's probably not about cars. Right? So ask yourself W5 questions, and in this case,

it might be, "Why is this important? How has this affected the world? Why did my teacher

give this to me?" Or, "What do I have to learn from this? What am I expected to learn from

this?" These questions, as I said, will give you the ability to inform your brain. You

must look for this information, and it will actively look for it. Okay? It will also save

you time because it will say, you know, "This information doesn't help me with what I want,

so I can put it away." Or, "I'm not going to read any of this information at all. I'll

get another book."

Next, break down the introduction. The introduction -- I actually have a video on that, so if

you're not too sure, please watch the introduction video. The introduction usually has three

parts to it. It has a topic or subject, what the actual book or essay is about. It has

main ideas, what the author or the writer will actually talk about. And it also usually

has a thesis. I'm going to say this basically. A thesis is an opinion or an action statement

-- what you should do or what the writer thinks is true. You know, what they agree with or

don't disagree with. Okay? So you want to look at this. Break these down and just write

a sentence for each. The subject is this. The main ideas are this, this, and this. And

the author's opinion or action statement is this. Okay? Once again, this helps you skim

what you need, because once you have the topic -- you know, what you're talking about -- you

have the main ideas, and you know their opinion, you don't have to read what we call "fluff"

or "filler". A lot of times, when somebody wants to sell a book -- for instance, The

Eye in the Sky -- God only knows who would read this. Twenty pages are excellent. Then

the author says, "I need to make 252." So they just add pages of nothing. "The moon

was red and glowing in the glorious sky above." It doesn't add to the story, but it does add

to the cost of the book. Okay? So what we want to do is we want to know -- because I

don't have time. I'm doing a test or I'm in a class. I don't have time to read the filler.

I want to get to it. Boom. Okay? So this will help you. Once again, help your brain. This

tells you what to look for by the questions for what I'm supposed to learn, and this tells

me what I can skim. There's a myth in reading that you have to read everything in every

word. You don't. You have to get what's important. Another word is "pertinent". "Pertinent" means

"important". Okay? This will help you with getting what's important and ignoring what's

not important for you.

Next, finally, summarize each chapter in two parts. I'm missing something here because

it's so important. Instead of putting it in a box, I want to actually talk to you, and

I want you to listen, and I want you to get it. This is the pièce de résistance. This

is what makes everything work, the gas in the car, you know, the sing in my voice, and

that sparkle in my eye. When we summarize, it's not enough to write out the words. You've

done that kind of already. I need you to do it in two parts. Have you ever talked to a

girlfriend or boyfriend, and they say certain words, and you realize there's what they're

saying and there's what they mean? When we're writing, there's what it says, and that's

the information you need because you need to give it to someone else. And there's what

it does. What is the function of that chapter? What is the function of that paragraph? Is

it giving you evidence for something, saying this is why it's true, or is it giving you

information? Or is it introducing a new idea? That's one of the parts. What does this paragraph,

what does this chapter do? Is it presenting an idea, or is it giving me evidence? I need

to know that. Okay? So I need to summarize not only what it says, but what it does. That's

so important because when you know what it does, you can know it fits in the whole structure

and know what you need to know faster. Okay?

Now, this is finally summarized. I lied to you. I had to learn this, I studied it, and

now I'm teaching you. I know it's right because in teaching you, in my brain, I'm going, "I

know this, and I don't know that." This is the big key. If you really want to do well

-- now, of course, this isn't for a test because in a test, you can't turn to the person beside

you and say, "Dude, do you know what the teacher's asking? Do you know what this means?" They'll

kick you out. But in the classroom, a good way of testing how much you've learned, engage

someone else, teach. If you're teaching them something, and you're all of a sudden going,

"Oh. Oh, man. It was -- oh." And I don't remember, it's because you have to read it again. Remember

I told you about the other video about comprehension? Check it out, please. Okay? But if you can

explain everything and get the person to understand, it means you've understood what you've read.

This is a great skill to do in a classroom. For a test, all the other ones -- the first

ones I've written on the board -- are extremely important. Okay? So follow them. You'll get

a great benefit from it.

Now, all this is great, you're saying, "But, James, I need to improve. This is cool. I'll

do it on a test, but I need to go fast now. What can I do?" I'm going to tell you right

now. To generally improve your reading, here are the points I'm going to give you. Do these

points every day. 15 minutes is all that is required. You're going to do fantastically.

And then this will be even better. You ready? Let's go.

You almost caught me. Do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do. Mr. E. Okay? Dude loves being in the picture,

and he wants you to improve, so he showed up just for you. Okay, first of all, get a

book that's easy to read. Okay? See what I'm saying? Get this book. Mr. E is not happy

that I'm making fun of this book, but I'm just saying get something easy. Don't get

something complicated or something you don't want to read. You cannot improve by doing

this. Get something you like. Okay?

Next, get a timer. A timer is a clock that will go ding-ding-ding-ding-ding when a certain

amount of time is finished. And specifically, we need one for 15 minutes. An egg timer or

a clock watch -- I don't have mine on -- they usually have timers on them for running, so

you can time it. What I want you to do is then, when you're doing this, read. So when

you're reading, you're going to use what I call the "finger method". You're going to

take your two fingers, put them on the outside of a sentence, like so, and read down. Try

not to go same speeds. Try and see the whole sentence. If that's too difficult, try this

one. It's easy. Just go like this. Get a timer. Follow your finger. Do not follow your eyes.

Follow your finger. Make the finger move and follow it as fast as you can. Okay?

Now, next, close the book. That wasn't so hard, right? 15 minutes, move your finger,

close the book. To really improve, reading fast without understanding is not very smart.

So what I want you to do is I want you to understand -- and here's what we do -- paraphrase.

Paraphrase means to take something and make it simpler. Find another way of saying it

so it's easier to understand. It's similar to when I said to you over here, "Teach someone

else." But you're going to actually teach yourself. What you cannot paraphrase or say

out loud is information you don't have. So what we want to do is make sure we understand

it and I can say it, because if I say it and I go, "Yeah, that's right. I got it right!"

then I understand it. So not only did I read quickly, but I understood the information.

Now, this is sort of like taking a shower or a bath or deodorant. Repeat every day.

This is not something you do once a week. Every day, 15 minutes. You'll start noticing

improvement. Try and go for one-sentence improvement to a paragraph each day. After a while, you'll

find that you're not doing just one page, but two pages. You're doing five. When I said

use the finger method, I forgot to mention count your pages. So when you cut that book

or you finish the book, you've got five pages today, get five pages in one sentence tomorrow.

The most important part is follow these steps and do it every day. Okay?

Now, look. I've got to go. You do this and leave a message in the YouTube. We've got

a YouTube subscription or on Facebook, and sign up for us. Sorry. YouTube, we have Facebook

and engVid. Where's engVid? Oh, got to find some room. We've got www.eng as in English,

vid as in video.com, where we have this lesson and others that will certainly tickle your

tummy, see Mr. E again, and improve your skills like reading. Thank you very much. See you soon.