Basic Understanding

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Basic Understanding

  1. Reading for Details
    1. Find the part of the story that has the facts you need to answer the question.
    2. Reread the selection.  Check each choice to find the word that fits the facts.
    3. Read all the choices.  Choose the one that is most like what you have read.
  2. Making Inferences and Drawing Conclusions
    1. Remember that the answer will not be written in the story.  Use your head.
    2. Use clues to figure out the best answer.  Think about what you know about the event or topic.
    3. Clues + Background Knowledge will help you figure out the right choice.
  3. Understanding the Difference between Details and Inference
    1. Is the answer stated directly in the selection?
    2. Look for clues to the answer.
    3. Clues + BK = Best Answer.
  4. Using Context Clues to Understand Meaning
    1. Read the sentence with the new word or phrase.
    2. Read the sentence before and after the word or phrase.
    3. Guess what the word means from context.
    4. Look at all the answers.
    5. You can use context clues to understand figurative language.
  5. Finding The Main Idea
    1. Sum up the story in one sentence.
    2. Look for details that support the main idea.
    3. A story theme is something about life that the story teaches.
    4. Don’t pick a theme that sounds good but isn’t in the story.
    5. When you summarize your information, put in only the most important information.
  6. Describing and Analyzing Characters
    1. A character is a person in a story.  Look for details about how the character acts.
    2. What words describe the character?
    3. How are characters in a story alike or different?
    4. How do characters change?
  7. Analyzing Story Plots
    1. Try to find the central problem or conflict in a story.  What event caused the problem?
    2. How does the story end?
    3. What is the setting?
    4. When does the story take place?
    5. Look for key words such as first, last, before and after.
    6. Read the sentence before and after the event described in the question.