Reading Skills for College Students (5th Edition) - Softcover

Ophelia H. Hancock

9780130222725: Reading Skills for College Students (5th Edition)

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0130222720 ISBN 13: 9780130222725

Publisher: Prentice Hall College Div, 2000

This highly effective book covers all the reading skills required for advanced study and includes a collection of interesting, relevant readings on a wide variety of topics from magazines, textbooks, novels, and newspapers. Complete explanation of skills such as analyzing context clues, structural analysis, dictionary skills and inferences. Also includes readings in content areas of history, biology, literature, computer science, psychology and more, plus opportunities to practice skills. For those interested in strengthening their skills and building background knowledge at the same time.

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From the Publisher:

This highly effective worktext is designed to help students improve their reading skills and to increase their enjoyment of reading. It covers all the reading skills required for college study, gives students hands-on practice using these skills by reading interesting, relevant material, and by providing a varied questioning format to prepare them for content reading, and for taking all the standardized reading, placement, and exit tests prevalent in colleges today.

From the Inside Flap:

PREFACE To the Instructor

The fifth edition of Reading Skills for College Students has the same purpose as the four previous editions—to improve the reading skills of college students and to increase their enjoyment of reading. As technology advances and jobs become more diversified, students need more proficient reading skills in order to be able to select, read, and critically evaluate the abundance of information that is available.

The only changes in the format of the fifth edition is that the graphics, rate, and study skills chapters have changed locations in the book. These skills are now Chapters Ten, Eleven, and Twelve, respectively. The format continues to be flexible so that an instructor can begin on any chapter desired or can omit any chapter or exercise that is not relevant to the needs of individual classes. The exercises in each chapter begin on an easy level and get more difficult as the skill is perfected.

The book is divided into three major parts. Part One, Reading Skills, covers all the basic skills of reading—vocabulary, comprehension, graphics, rate, and study skills—while providing a wealth of interesting, relevant reading material. All paragraphs and passages were selected not only to teach the skill intended but to add to the student's background knowledge as well. Every conceivable kind of questioning is used in the book, from true-false to essay, to prepare students for all the methods of teaching and all types of tests that they will encounter. Each vocabulary and comprehension skill is explained with examples and is then reinforced with exercises using the skill. Chapters One through Nine use words, sentences, paragraphs, and longer passages in appropriate context to teach and strengthen each skill. Chapter Ten, Graphics, covers graphs, charts, tables, and maps. In a reading context, graphics are designed to support information in the text. Therefore, in the exercises in this chapter, the graphics are presented in reading passages rather than in isolation. Chapter Eleven, Rate, stresses phrase reading for ideas, flexibility in rate of reading, and the importance of determining a purpose for reading. The study skills chapter, Chapter Twelve, is an overview of study techniques and test-taking strategies.

Part Two, Reading in the Content Area, contains six chapters: Literature, History, Political Science, Psychology, Biology, and Computer Sciences and Data Processing. Each chapter contains one long passage selected from a college textbook and is followed by a vocabulary and comprehension exercise.

Part Three, Reading Selections, has been changed to include two additional short stories. "A Worn Path" by Eudora Welty has been added and "The Pedestrian" by Ray Bradbury, has returned by popular demand. The selection "One Good Turn," about how machine-made screws brought the world together, has replaced "What's in the Cards?" The short story, "Quality" by John Galsworthy, has been moved to the Inference Tests in the Instructor's Manual. Other tried and true selections in the book were selected from newspapers, magazines, and books to provide a wide variety of reading materials. All of the selections are followed by vocabulary and comprehension exercises and are arranged progressively, regardless of length, from an easy reading level to a more difficult level.

This edition, like the previous editions, provides opportunities throughout the text to practice good writing skills. In addition, the Suggestions for Further Study section at the end of each chapter suggests ways to expand both reading and writing skills.

The Instructor's Manual with Tests, containing teaching suggestions for each chapter, and answers to all the exercises in the book, has been expanded to include seven new tests. It has an easy and a hard test on all the skills except the skills of dictionary use, signal words, rate, and study skills, which have only one test each.

Thank you for choosing this edition of Reading Skills for College Students for your reading classes. I hope that you enjoy using the textbook and that it will help your students become better readers. Acknowledgments I am grateful to Craig Campanella, Maggie Barbieri, Fran Russello, and Joan Polk of Prentice Hall and Bruce Hobart of Pine Tree Composition, Inc., for their patient guidance and expertise in preparing the fifth edition of this textbook. I am indebted to Richard Fuller, Art Institute of Philadelphia; Lois Reeves, University of Great Falls; Jian Zhang, Suffolk Community College; and Della Burt-Bradley, Harold Washington College, all of whom made comments and suggestions that helped shape the content of this edition. A special acknowledgment is due my husband, Jerry Hancock, whose support and help with the manuscript was invaluable. Ophelia H. Hancock

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