Critical Reading Continued Additional Tools

Determining the Difference Between Fact and Opinion As many of us know, facts are statements that are objectively correct with no room for dispute. Opinions are statements of belief that, although sometimes supported by facts, are not statements of objective fact and can be debated to one degree or another.

Determining the Difference Between Fact and Opinion Read the following statement and explain whether, overall, it is a statement of fact or opinion. “The fact that science is poorly taught in our elementary schools helps explain our nation’s lack of scientific literacy.” The statement is an opinion. Although the writer calls the idea that science is poorly taught in elementary schools a fact, it is actually debatable.

Use Reading Process Critical, active readers don’t just read something once and magically understand everything about the text. These readers use a reading process: First, they pre-read the material. This means that they look at the title and scan the first and last paragraph and sometimes the first sentence of each paragraph and see if they can get a sense of the reading. Next, they read the text carefully, underlining words they don’t understand and making notes as they go. Finally, they re-read and study the text after having looked up unknown words and thought about the notes they made. They also consider the text’s structure and how each part in the text functions.

Annotate the Text Annotating the text means making notes and marking important parts of the text on the actual text itself. This is what Adler is arguing people need to do to “own” a book. Look at the essay “Americanization is tough on Macho” in your textbook. It gives an example of what annotation looks like.

Write a Summary of the Text: This is important because it allows you to better understand the ideas of a text. In order to do this you need two important and related skills: The ability to find or infer the main idea of the text. The ability to find or infer the supporting ideas of the text.

Persuasive vs. Informational Texts: In order to be able to determine the main and supporting points of the text, you also need to be able to tell whether the text is persuasive (trying to convince you of something) or informational (trying simply to inform you of something). The main idea of a persuasive text is what the writer is trying to convince you of. The main idea of an informational text is what the writer is trying to inform you of overall.

Descriptive Outlining: One way to help you discover the main and supporting ideas of a text is to write a descriptive outline of the text: First divide the text up into sections. With shorter texts, each paragraph is often a separate section. For each section write down two sets of notes. First, write down what the section is trying to communicate in your own word. Next, explain in your own words the function of the section or what the section does in the text. When you are done with your descriptive outline, it is often easier to see what parts are support and what the main idea might be.

Practice: Read the annotated essay “Americanization is Tough on Macho” and write a descriptive outline of it. See if you can determine the main point and explain how it’s supported and explain what the supporting points are.

Main and Supporting Point: Although you may have slightly different wording, you should have come up with the following main point: The word “macho” for most Americans has a negative connotation and for many Hispanics, the word has a positive connotation. Supporting points should have included the movie examples mentioned and the descriptions of members of the author’s family. In addition, you should have mentioned the author’s idea that the word probably gained a negative connotation due to feminism.

Using the Main and Supporting Points to Write a Summary Now that you have the main and supporting points, the next step is to put it in proper summary format. Look at the example summary of “Americanization is Tough on Macho” in your text book.

Example Summary: In “Americanization is Tough on ‘Macho,’” Rose Del Castillo Guibault explains that Americans have a negative connotation for the word macho, and this fact bothers Hispanics, who use the word in a positive sense. While Americans use the term to refer to a man who is a “chauvinist, a brute, uncouth, selfish, loud, abrasive, capable of inflicting pain, and sexually promiscuous,” Hispanics use the term respectfully for a male who is “responsible, hard working, a man in charge, a patriarch.” Guibault believes this difference in connotation reflects the fact that in the United States the traits that other cultures prize are not valued by American society. She also believes that during the seventies, the rise of feminism was responsible for macho acquiring negative connotations. More than anything, though, Guibault is concerned because Americans’ sense of macho has become an inaccurate stereotype of the Latin man that contributes to misunderstanding.

Features of a Summary: Note from the example summary that in an academic summary, the main point is stated in the first sentence, which also contains the author name and the title of the text. Each following sentence then is a different supporting point. Note also that signal phrases are used continually throughout the summary to credit the author. In addition, note that the verbs in the signal phrases are in present tense. Another thing to notice is that the summary is shorter than the original and contains no minor details. Finally, note that the writer of the summary does not insert her own personal opinion into the summary.

Practice: Write a practice summary of your own on the article “I am the Enemy” that we used for our diagnostic essay. Turn it in before you leave today.