Reading Comprehension

[Latoof]

Dear everybody,
I would like a/n advice/s to improve my reading skill. I used to read a lot, however, I am still unable to understan the passages I read from the fist time. Sometimes, I spend my time reading a sentence for several time till I get the whole meaning of it. Most of the times I found myself reading the words as separate items and understanding them separately and that gives me a headache. You can imagine to understand each word without getting the whole idea, it is just make me feel stupid.
What can I do? This may sound rideculous to most of you, and may at the same time be a very important issue for some of you. I would like to know the two opinion, please.

[Latoof]

What can I do?

[Tomasz Klimkiewicz]

Hello Latoof,

I would very much like to help you out, but I'm not sure which aspects of the broad term 'reading comprehension' pose special difficulties to you, therefore the advice I'm about to give is based on my personal experience.

Why not take a look at Reading Comprehension tests for one of the Cambridge exams? The exact choice will depend on your level, but I assume CAE would be the way to go for you. There are lots of sample tests available both in CAE coursebooks and as separate publications. As they typically come with the answer key, you'll be able to assess your performance in each case. The tests cover practically all aspects of RC.

I wish you all successes in your studying / testing.

Regards,
TeeKay

[Tdol]

In addition to what Tomasz suggests, try reading in different ways. Take a short text, give yourself one minute to read it as fast as possible, then turn the page over and write down waht you can remember. Try skimming- flicking your eyes over a texta nd getting key points only. Try just to get the gist.

[Latoof]

Ok, what about coming across words I see the first time?

I will work on your suggestions.. thanks..

[Jeremy Taylor]

Graded readers is the answer. Read books that you feel comfortable reading - with just a few new words per page that you can probably guess from context. There are lots of different series, teenreaders, cambridge, Oxford bookworms, even the horrible Penguin readers. Don't worry about individual words, enjoy the stories and read, read read! The more you read, the higher level of reader you can cope with before you move on to 'real' books.
Jeremy

[utsav]

hello latoof

in comprehensions,the 1st reading should always be for the global understanding of the passage so you get an idea of what its all about.then attack those unfamiliar words.look into the words preceeding & succeeding your word,then read the whole sentence again.you'll have a fairly good idea of its meaning. finally ofcourse,refer a dictionary as soon as u get your hands on 1.
hope it helps u.
regards
utsav