Active Reading: Why Preview?

Essays on Teaching English
Raymond Stopper
Based on His Book, Teaching English, How To….

Active Reading: Why Preview When You Are Studying?

Previewing textbook chapters means reading the first and last paragraphs of the chapter, reading the first sentence of each intermediate paragraph, and raising questions that you will go back to read for the answers.

Previewing novels means reading for ten minutes near the beginning, half way through the novel, three-fourths through the novel and near the end of the novel. After each sampling, you raise questions about what you are reading and after the last sampling, you summarize your questions and begin to read to answer the questions.

By the way, when, as occurs in reading any long book, you begin to slow up and feel as if you want to quit, simply read a paragraph a page until you are again caught up in your reading.

Also, don’t worry that learning the plot will prevent you from having questions. If you don’t have questions, the book is probably not worth reading any further anyway.

Previewing nonfiction or textbooks means reading the foreword or preface for a brief summary of the author’s main ideas, reading the first paragraph and last paragraph of each chapter and, after having read those most important parts of each chapter, begin to read the first sentence of each paragraph throughout each chapter. If you’re “hooked,” keep reading and when you are “unhooked,” go back to the first sentence of each paragraph.

Why preview? Students often respond to my suggestions that they preview before reading by saying that they are wasting time. ”Why not just begin to read starting on page one?” they ask. What follows is my answer to that question:

1. Previewing what you are about to read builds up background information on the topic. The more you know about a topic the better you will comprehend it.

2. Previewing what you are about to read will cause you to see certain unfamiliar vocabulary words that are important to the meaning of the chapter. You can look them up before reading.

3. Previewing what you are about to read raises questions, giving you a purpose for reading—to answer those questions.

4. Previewing what you are about to read tells you how much of it you will have to read. Sometimes only the first and last paragraphs of an article are enough. Sometimes only the first and last paragraphs and the first sentence of intermediate paragraphs are enough. Sometimes, you will need to read the entire article or chapter to answer all your questions. That does not happen often.

5. Previewing leads you to information you can use immediately.

6. Previewing quickly involves you in material that you might not want to read, but have to read. Previewing can motivate you to read.

7. Starting on page one gives you no real clue as to the scope of ideas in the entire article or novel or nonfiction book, leading to your wondering, “Why am I reading this?”