Tuesday, September 23, 2008

Chapter 6 - Reading Strategy: Synthesize

What is Synthesis?
Guided Reading the Four Blocks Way states, “As you read, your brain synthesizes information from the words to comprehend the sentences, information from the sentences to comprehend the paragraphs, information from paragraphs to synthesize sections, and so on, as you move through the text. The text tells you some things, you drew conclusions that pulled together information you had read and what you knew from your own life experiences. As you read, you constantly accumulate information, and you keep this information in mind by subsuming smaller facts into larger generalizations. You summarize, conclude, infer, and generalize, and then you read some more, incorporate the new information, and draw even bigger conclusions” (44-45).

Synthesizing…
· is the most complex of the comprehension strategies.
· lies on a continuum of evolving thinking.
· runs the gamut from taking stock of meaning while reading to achieving new insight.
· is stopping every so often to think about what you have read. Each piece of additional information enhances your understanding and allows you to better construct meaning.
· helps your thinking evolve, perhaps leading to new insight, perhaps not, but enhancing understanding in the process.
· information integrates the words and ideas in the text with the reader’s personal thoughts and questions and gives the reader the best shot at achieving new insight.

Readers who synthesize…
· maintain a cognitive synthesis as they read. They monitor the overall meaning, important concepts, and themes in the text as they read and are aware of ways text elements fit together to create that overall meaning and theme. They use knowledge of these elements to make decisions about the overall meaninAlign Leftg of a passage, chapter, or book.
· retell or summarize what they have read. They attend to the most important information and to the clarity or synthesis itself. Readers synthesize in order to better understand what they have read.
· capitalize on opportunities to share, recommend and criticize books they have read.
· may respond to text in a variety of ways; independently or in groups of other readers. These include written, oral, dramatic, and artistic responses and interpretations of text.
· are likely to extend the literal meaning of a text to the inferential level.
Chapter 6 Assignment
As you finish the book, reflect on the previous chapters and the universal, timeless message this book implies.

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