PART ONE
ISOLATING DETAILS AND RECALLING SPECIFIC FACTS
Preview Quiz 1
As a preview to what will be discussed in Part One, try to answer this question:
The reading skill, "Recalling Facts" requires the reader
Begin reading Part One to discover the correct answer.
The purpose of this booklet is to demonstrate how your memory can be trained to make easier the recall of details and facts which directly affect complete and accurate reading comprehension.
Isolating Details and Recalling Specific Facts are two closely related reading comprehension skills. Both skills require you, the reader, to recall from memory certain details and facts.
The reading comprehension skills Isolating Details and Recalling Specific Facts are defined below. However, it is not necessary that you remember the definitions, nor is it necessary that you remember how the skills differ. It will be useful, however, to read the definitions for reasons of general information.
1. The comprehension skill Isolating Details requires the reader to recall from memory a single detail from among other, closely related details.
2. The comprehension skill Recalling a Specific Fact requires the reader to recall from memory a certain fact which stands alone and is not part of a series of related facts.
It is obvious from these definitions that both skills require the reader to recall details and facts from memory. And, since the words details and facts are very close in meaning, it seems reasonable and practical to combine the two skills under one heading and simply refer to them as Recalling Facts.
Grouping the two skills under this single heading will also help to avoid confusion and to make learning easier.
The skill of recalling facts is not the most critical of the reading skills. Understanding the Main Idea, Making an Inference, and Drawing a Conclusion are obviously more sophisticated skills, but in order to find the main idea, make inferences, and draw conclusions, the reader must first recall the facts upon which these are based.
Recalling Facts, therefore, is an important reading skill which makes use of memory and is necessary for complete and accurate comprehension.
In Part Two of this booklet the expression "Recalling Facts" will be Used to refer to the two skills defined in this section.