Critical Reading - Chapter 5

Chapter 5 : Locating state main ideas

1. The ability to locate an author’s main idea is a key to understand your reading.

2. The main idea is the more specific controlling idea of a piece of writing.

3. The topic is the most general idea and the details, which are the most specific, support and illustrate the main idea.

4. Questioning yourself, looking in the usual places, noticing clue words, and categorizing an author’s points are four strategies you can use to think systematically about what you read.

5. Some main ideas are stated directly in a reading and are easy to identify. Others are implied, and you must inter their meaning from the reading and then restate them in your own words.