Reading Comprehension Strategy

[Ital91]

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Which strategy do you think works best for reading comprehension?

1) Going straight to the questions and trying to find answers in the passage.
2) Skim the passage then going to the questions.
3) Reading the passage thoroughly and then doing the questions.

 

[topdent1]

well, taking the kaplan practice tests, going write to the questions works best because 70% of the questions are detailed oriented. However, I don't know how this strategy will fare on the real DAT. I have heard there are many "inference and tone" questions.

 

[DMDreaming]

I scored 21 in RC on the real DAT and I can tell you that skipping to the questions doesn't seem like a good option to me. First, I had one passage that was over 15 paragraphs long. Second, I find it easier to seek and find answers if I have noted key words from skimming the passage. Basically, I would read the 1st and last paragraph word for word and skim the rest. While skimming, I would write the paragraph # down with 1 or 2 words that stuck out. Again, I didn't read the middle of the passage word for word but instead skimmed to identify unusual words or words repeated within the paragraph. Then I went to the questions and was quickly able to find which paragraph the answer should be in. BTW, I had more than 10 min left when I had completed all of the passages and was able to go back and double check my answers. Although my score was above average, I was still disappointed.

 

[Shermanmurman]

Which strategy do you think works best for reading comprehension?

1) Going straight to the questions and trying to find answers in the passage.
2) Skim the passage then going to the questions.
3) Reading the passage thoroughly and then doing the questions.

I have not taken the DAT, but when I practice on topscore, I do best when I read the paragraph thoroughly and then answer the questions (I got a 26) but when I tried to skim and go to the questions, my score went down a lot (19). I think everyone is different though, you should get topscore, and try each of those strategies and see which one works the best for you. Good luck

 

[Ital91]

I find when I read the passage well I dont have enough time to answer all the questions. but if I skim the passage I have enough time but have trouble finding some answers and understanding difficult science articles

 

[Jo07]

What about looking at the questions and writing down key words for each question and then going back and reading/skimming?

Did anyone do that?

 

[queenskillers]

did anyone here go straight to the q's on the real DAT recently and then mark and come back to the tone/inference q's later? I have been getting 19-22's on achiever and topscore using this strategy so i am concernced since many of you are saying the real dat rc is harder than achiever/topscore (is the real dat rc that much different?). i feel that when i go to the fact based q's and then come back to answer the inference/tone q's, i end up understanding them since i end up reading everything by the end answering the fact q's. ho

 

[futuredentist07]

i write down keywords from each paragraphs than try to answer the questions. it helps out!

 

[smarterray]

did anyone here go straight to the q's on the real DAT recently and then mark and come back to the tone/inference q's later? I have been getting 19-22's on achiever and topscore using this strategy so i am concernced since many of you are saying the real dat rc is harder than achiever/topscore (is the real dat rc that much different?). i feel that when i go to the fact based q's and then come back to answer the inference/tone q's, i end up understanding them since i end up reading everything by the end answering the fact q's. ho

I used the same exact strategy as you mentioned, and on the real DAT I got a 23.

 

[Chloe29]

for those who have taken the DAT already, was your RC much longer than practice tests? i have heard many people complaining of low RC scores because they had ridiculously long passages. i use the "go straight to the questions" strategy only because time is a big factor for me. i used to try the "keywords" method before but i never had time to finish all the questions.

 

[fireblast713]

I used the same exact strategy as you mentioned, and on the real DAT I got a 23.

Could you post your RC scores for your practices test using this method?

 

[TheWiredNerv]

what works the best for me is reading the entire passage at a faster pace, not quite reading it word for word yet not quite skimming speed. When I come up to a bunch of details (crap) I just down in general what subject those details were about. For example if a paragraph starts firing off a ton of symptoms and complications for a disease I just write an abreviated form of the disease (diabetsis would be "dia") followed by sym + comp. This way you will know the tone of the passage and the purpose of each pararaph because you skip all that detail. When you get to questions that are about information in the paragraph you can refer to your scrap paper or more likely than not you should at least remember the general area of the question. I started out doing a watered down Kaplan method (man kaplan's method is BS) and I have evolved ot this method. Went from scoreing 19s to 20-22s using my method.

However, different people work different ways so as the saying goes, "whatever floats your boat."

 

[TheWiredNerv]

Also, once you feel the overall tone, I think in theory at least, you should be able to answer some of the other conceptual questions dealing with particular paragraph based on the tone. For example if the question asked, "which sentence would the author add to this paragrah?" the answer would most likely reflect the tone of the entire article.