Teaching Resources
Center
Want to learn more or plan a lesson? Check out these links!
- Reading Comprehension Home
- Making Connections
- Fluency
- Determining Importance
- Inferring
- Metacognition
- Questioning
- Synthesizing
- Visualizing and Imagery
- Vocabulary and Word Identification
- Writing Across the Curriculum
Important UNCG Links
Determining Importance
- About Importance
- Professional Books to help you develop lesson plans
- Children’s Books to use in lesson plans
- Some Helpful Web sites
Determining Importance:
Determining importance is learning how to filter the information given in the text to decide what is important to learn and what information can be forgotten. For example, determining importance of the textbook is an important reading comprehension skill for students to utilize when studying for tests. Humans naturally filter information as we read. To teach determining importance, teachers can build upon making connections, inferring and other reading comprehension strategies. Something that is very important for determining importance is background knowledge or experience. Prior knowledge will determine how someone filters through text and decides what is important (Harvey and Goudvis, 2000).
Reference:
Harvey, S. and Goudvis, A., (2000). Strategies That Work. Portland, ME: Stenhouse Publishers
Quotes:
Determining important ideas and information in text is central to making sense of reading and moving toward insight.
1(Harvey, S. & Goudvis, A., 2000, p. 118)
The term main idea refers to “determining what is important.” The “main idea” is often associated with expository text, but it is also important in narrative text, where readers reflect on the theme or moral of a story or poem.
2(Duffy, G. A., 2003, p.117)
2Duffy, G.A. (2003). Explaining Reading: A Resource for teaching concepts, skills, and
strategies. New York: Guilford Press.
1Harvey, S. & Goudvis, A. (2000). Strategies that work: Teaching comprehension to
enhance understanding. Portland, ME: Stenhouse Publishers.