In this article we are going to talk about the how to improve reading comprehension skills. Reading is an art, which may or may not come naturally to everyone. It is an interactive process that helps you understand the relationship between different words, phrases, idioms etc and grasp the true meaning of the context that you are reading. It is a skill that needs to be mastered with time and stands to be crucial for school, college or work requirements and even for pleasure as well. Lack of reading skills, which can be due to less exposure or practice or leaning experience can lead to people having low self confidence and frustration in life .
They may not feel themselves to be equally qualified or skilled as this counterparts leading to such thoughts and in worse cases depression. Amongst children it can start from an early age leading to lower grades and response from the child. Even though we might not want it to be yet fluency in reading skills is something people aspire and practice for as it not only establishes your personality but also qualifies as a judging parameters is schools and colleges. But, there’s always hope and room for improvement and that is why here we are going to talk about ten ways to improve our comprehension reading skills.
How to improve reading comprehension skills?
There are a few important points that one must keep in his mind for a fluent reading which are listed as below. So, here we go.
1. Understanding Your Current Status And Then Working On It
Even before we start working on our reading skills it is essential to analyze where do we stand, that is, how good or bad our reading skills is or what rating would we give to our reading skills. Once we realize our problems and limitations only then can we improvise on our skill. Start by reading small paragraphs and build up the stamina to read for long as much as possible. Initially, try to concentrate for whatever time period you are reading and after every long time give yourself a break and then go back with full concentration. If you are not comfortable with sitting and reading for a long hours start with smaller time periods and then with days of practice go on increasing that time, till you find a sufficient amount of time for the practice.
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2. Vocabulary Improvisation
Reading is a combination of understanding the vocabulary and context of the comprehension alike. One of the major reason as to why people are not good at reading is because they fail to understand the meaning of certain words or phrases or idioms which then leads to them losing interest in the whole comprehension. That is why improving your vocabulary quiz is very important. You can use various methods to improve your vocabulary.
Some of the methods are listed like you can make a list of the words you don’t understand or words you find difficult and find the meaning of these words, or you can also make flash heads of the words and meanings and read them often so that you are able to remember.
Another way of understanding vocabulary while reading is to make the use of context clues or in another words you can identify the meaning of a particular word by looking at how it is being used in a sentence.
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3. Developing Interest
In order to learn or master a skill it is very important to have your interest in the subject of matter. It can be achieved by reading books or novels or magazines of personal choice and not only the suggested ones. It’s not necessary to only read the course book and get bored. It is equally important to have fun while dealing with it. This will motivate you to do better and improve your skills naturally. Slowly and gradually this will become a part of your daily life and with practice you will be able to master the skill of reading in no time. The best part of the whole process being that you are enjoying it.
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4. Summarizing The Reading
Most of the time it is a possibility that when you are confused or lose focus in the reading of the comprehension you might not understand the context of it and so it is important to stop when you are confused and summarize whatever you have understood till now. This will not only help you to understand the context better but will also cater to improving your reading skills. When you stop to summarize try to convey the whole context in your own words. The more and more you are able to put the thoughts in your own words the more it shows that you have understood the context and is able to read the comprehension clearly. That’s a major step towards success.
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5. Reading Aloud
One of the easiest and quickest ways to learn and improve your reading skills is to read the text aloud. There may be instances when you’re reading a big paragraph and you might not be able to understand the whole context completely or there might be issues blocking your mind on its way to understanding and hence, it is necessary to read the text aloud so that it clears the blockage caused by any reason. When you hear your own voice out loud you are able to understand what the text is actually saying and the whole process becomes easier.
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6. Re- Reading
Another way into improving your reading skills is by reading and re-reading your comprehension again and again and again till you get the hold of it. When you feel like you’re going off track or you’re mind is wandering you must stop and re-read the previous comprehension texts as it refreshes your mind and you are able to process the reading again. You can even go ahead and read the upcoming texts of the comprehension to have a better idea or you can go through the headings of the comprehension before the actual reading starts. This will help you get an idea of what you’re going to read.
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7. Act It Out
Something that we used to do as a child can also come handy in our goal to achieve later in life like this one being improving our reading skills. Most of the children get dressed like their favorite characters and act out the dialogues or scenes from their favorite cartoons or movies. Similarly, to improve your reading skills you can pretend to be a teacher or a professor or a character of your choice and act as if you are making someone understand what you’ve read. You can imagine situations or use toys as students or friends and teach them like you would do in real. This will not only improve your reading and understanding skills but also boost your self confidence.
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8. Take Help Of A Person
It is frequently advised by the people to take the help of someone skilled in the field or subject when you’re trying to learn or improve your skills. Here also this advice comes handy and can be quite useful because you can ask questions of what you don’t understand in the comprehension or tell your helper the problems you are facing while reading which he/she will be able to help you a lot. This person can be anyone from your parents to teachers to friends. He/she will give you the freedom to ask questions in between and help you improve. You can even take notes with his/her help.
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9. No Distractions
Concentration is essential to learning or improving skills. And so for mastering the skill of reading comprehensions one must be away from all means and mediums of distractions. It requires the person to sit in a quite peaceful place with fresh mind eager to learn. Distractions of any kind, like, television, radio, electronic devices should be muted or put to silent mode while music should be turned off and kept away. This will help you learn better and quicker.
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10. Using Finger Or Ruler To follow Text
You should use your index finger or a ruler to follow the text or line or sentence that you are reading. Even though it may sound like something kids should be doing but it is quite a useful trick for the elder people who are not well thorough with the reading process. It improves concentration of the reader on the comprehension. Also, for people suffering from dyslexia or similar issues or people who have trouble reading a long sentence and get lost, it serves to be quite a benefiting trick. So, don’t forget to try that next time you go reading.
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We have tried listing easy and efficient ways to go about the whole process of improving your reading skills and rest all it takes is time and practice. As we come to the conclusion we hope that the tips and tricks mentioned above will prove to be of significant help in improving your reading skills and in building up your confidence and personality and life at large.
