How To Read And Analyse Documents

Reading Text

When reading text in order to understand what you are reading, it is often required that you demonstrate understanding and the ability to analyse text by answering questions about the text.

We can use a variety of techniques to read the text in order to become familiarised with the text and the content thereof.

Scanning: Scanning is used to find specific information in a text quickly while ignoring its broader meaning.

Skimming: Skimming is a high-speed reading process and involves visually searching the sentences of a page for clues to meaning. It is conducted at a higher rate than normal reading for comprehension.

Pre-reading: Pre-reading is the initial relatively fast reading of a piece of information to form a general idea or get an overall impression of the content, nature and content covered in the material without identifying or addressing specific aspects of the text for purposes of analysis or the answering of specific questions relating to the content of the text.

Re-reading: Re-reading is the focused reading for purposes of gaining a clear and detailed understanding of the text for purposes of comprehension or analysis.

Sifting: Sifting is used to distinguish between the important and other information contained in the text that may not be completely relevant to the main message of the text.

Summarising Techniques

The following technique is followed to successfully interact with text in order to summarise:

Finding the topic sentence in a paragraph: The text consists of a heading and usually a combination of paragraphs including an opening paragraph or introduction, the main body of the text and a closing paragraph.

The paragraph is the unit of thought in a piece of writing. Each paragraph is separated from the rest of the passage by means of a blank line above and below it. The sentences in a paragraph have one thing in common they are all based on the central idea in that paragraph.

Shorten it: When we write, we usually tend to use too many words rather than too few. Many of the things that we say or write are lengthy and sometimes even repeat themselves.

When you summarize information, you take the unnecessary words away and only write the important information.

Rules for Summarising

The following procedure outlines the steps required for successful summarising of text:

• Scan the text quickly in order to gain an overall impression of its contents.
• Read through the text and underline the important sentences.
• Number the topic sentences in order of their importance to your summary.
• Evaluate the information gathered and ensure that there are no repetitions, unnecessary words, examples or illustrations in any of the topic sentences and keywords.
• The summary should be given a title that captures the essence of the passage.
• The summary must be written in your own words. You can refer back to the original passage, but never copy whole phrases or sentences from it.
• The summary should be written in the past tense even if the original is written in the present tense.
• The summary must contain no repetition and no examples.

Check the Summary

• Make sure that you have not introduced meanings and comments of your own that lie outside of the original text.
• Check that your sentences are short, to the point and written in your own words.
• Ensure that your summary is logical and accurate. Have you succeeded in getting across the essence of the original text?
• Check whether your summary reads easily and flows logically.