Information collection & exchange

telegrams informing them of their awards
prior
Now ask yourself: 
1. What are the key words in the topic sentence? (Is there anything in the topic sentence whic
2. Can you find any enumerative listing signals?
3. Have any enumerators been used (i.e., words like "steps" or "stages")? 
4. Between the first step (soliciting requests for recommendations) and the last step (informing the 
new laureates), how many steps can you find? 
by permission of Prentice-Hall, Inc., Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey.] 
Calling your students' attention to such features of language is doubly beneficial. Not only does it contribute 
to better reading comprehension, but it also adds to the resources which students can use in their own 
writing. 
P
derstand which word, phrase, or clause the substitute word replaces. The 
eral types which may be used to give learners practice in inter
scious of the ways in which substitute words tie sentences togeth
Why is it that American working women complain about job discrimination? Statistics 
the Women's Bureau of the U.S. Department of Labor, nearly 40 percent of all women of 
working age are in the labor force. Although the median education of all women is higher 
than that of their male counterparts, women are highly concentrated in underpaid and 
menial jobs: 75 percent of all clerical workers are women; 55 percent of all service workers 
are women; 27 percent of all factory workers are women. 
10 
Of the women with college degrees, 70 percent are working. Of this number, only 2 percent 
are executives, while 40 percent are employed in clerical, sales, or factory positions. Their 
median income is only 51 percent of that of men. 

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15 
Only twenty-five states have laws requiring equal pay for equal work, and these laws are 
often circumvented by giving a woman a lesser title. In contrast, forty-three states have 
laws which limit the number of hours a woman can work (usually eight) and thereby prevent 
women from earning overtime pay and promotions. 
20 
Finally, while the percentage of women in the labor force increases, the income gap 
between male and female workers has been widening at the rate of one-half percent per 
year for the past twenty years. 
n of Prentice-Hall, Inc., Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey.] 
abo
the following questions: 
th
le counterparts (line 6) What does 'that" refer to? 
2. of this number (line 11) Of what number? 
cumvented (line 16) Which laws? 
avy cognitive demands of exercises which require students to gather 
firs
[Text adapted from Martin L. Arnaudet and Mary Ellen Barrett. Paragraph Development. Prentice-Hall, 
Inc., 1981. Reprinted by permissio
Refer to the 
ve text to answer
1. higher than
at of their ma
3. only 51 percent of that of men (line 14) Only 51 percent of what? 
4. these laws are often cir
5. thereby prevent women from earning (line 18) How do laws prevent women from earning overtime pay 
and promotions? 
As we have said earlier, when people read for academic or professional purposes they usually read to 
gather information. The ability to extract information from written texts depends on several of the microskills 
we have already discussed: identifying the author's purpose; picking out the main ideas and understanding 
the logical relations among them; making inferences and seeing implications; and evaluating a text for 
ccuracy, completeness, bias, and other qualities. Moreover, the information which has been gathered is 
a
often put to use in a writing task of some kind: research reports, summaries or critical reviews of written 
sources, study notes for examinations, and so on. 
 
 
Sample Lesson in Reading an Academic Text 
ou should be aware of the he
Y
information and then process it in some way in order to produce their own discourse. Students have to be 
brought along gradually in a series of steps leading to the culminating activity or task. Here is how the author 
of one widely used reading textbook (Skillful Reading by Amy L. Sonka) lays out such a sequence. Sonka's 
careful development can serve as a model for reading lessons treating academic essays. 
1. The centerpiece of the lesson is a thousand-word reading about experiments in which the nature of 
short-term memory is studied. 
2. The pre-reading activities alert students to the fact that experiments are processes. Processes consist 
of steps which are carried out in chronological order. Descriptions of processes usually contain signal 
ords such as: 
w
t
after that
finally 
to begin
afterwards
in conclusion 
at that time 
later 
next 
second, third, etc. 
subsequently 
then 
3. As the students begin the reading selection itself, they see these ''reading hints": 

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An experiment is a process. 
As you read the first two experiments ask yourself these questions:
What do I do first?
Thus the students are prepared to pick out the organization of the text, to find the main ideas and 
When you take notes on an experiment, your notes should include the objective of the study, the 
Directions: Take notes on the three experiments described in "Short-Term Memory." 
Procedure: 
ts: 
irections for a Short-Term Memory Experiment
5. Students do further post-reading exercises emphasizing the signal words which are used in 
g oral descriptions of the three experiments discussed in the reading 
notes they made in Step 4. 
rcise the students practice asking and answering questions about the steps in 
their notes as they devise and answer the questions. 
8. Finally, in a writing task the students answer sample examination questions: 
What was the experimenter studying? 
What did he do first? 
Then what did he do? 
What was his conclusion? 
In the final section, ask yourself the following questions:
What am I studying?
Then what do I do?
Finally what do I do? 
understand the logical connection among them. 
4. One of the follow-up activities to the reading is an exercise in taking notes. The author carefully leads 
the students through this activity. 
procedure, and the results. 
The procedure of an experiment is a process. Your notes should reflect the order of the process. When 
you look at your notes, it should be clear what happens first, second, third, and so on. 
Animal Experiment of Short-Term Memory
Objective:
Resul
Human Experiment of Short-Term Memory
Objective:
Procedure: 
Results: 
D
Objective:
Procedure: 
Results: 
descriptions of process. 
6. The students work in pairs givin
selection. While doing these descriptions, they refer only to the
7. In another pair-work exe
the experiments. Again they refer only to
Explain one way researchers study short-term memory of animals. 

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Explain how human short-term memory can be studied. 
, Inc., 1981. Reprinted by permission of Prentice-Hall, Inc., 
ding, speaking, and writing 
ctivities are used to reinforce each other.