Subject: English for Academic and Professional Purposes

Authors: Ms. Laila E. Mendoza, Ms. Cristina Cruz and Ms. Sharmaine Myhre
Editors: Mrs. Crista E. Macale and Mr. Jaycie B. Robles
Reviewers: Mr. Elmar A. Cundangan and Mr. Victor T. Reyes

LESSON 5: CRITICAL READING

Description of the lesson

In our previous lesson, you have learned what a paragraph is. You were also able to
acquire the knowledge on how to scrutinize the structures of paragraph. But this
week is all about reading. You will learn how to become a critical reader that you
could use in your future academic endeavors. Are you ready?

Objectives (What I need to know)

At the end of the lesson, you are expected to:
1. Identify critical reading and different strategies of critical reading
2. read critically through various types of activities presented in the learning guide
3. Annotate, analyze, contextualize, and summarize a reading material
Day 1
Pre-assessment (What I know)
Before we proceed to our new lesson, let us first have some brain teasers by answering the following
riddles.

1. ____________________________ 2. ______________________________

3. _____________________ 4. _______________________ 5. _______________________

Amazing! How many correct answers did you get? Be ready to deepen your
understanding about reading. You are encouraged to take down some notes
while studying.
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Lesson content (What’s New?)
Direction: Read the discussion of the lesson below. For deeper understanding of the lesson you are also
encourage to take down notes and/or highlight the important information from the texts.
WHAT IS READING?
According to study.com, reading is a cognitive process that involves decoding symbols to arrive at a
meaning. It is also a process of constructing meaning of words actively. This means that if you see a letter
or a number being put together, and you understand the meaning, that is reading. You, studying this
learning guide is an example of reading.
Now that we define what is reading, let us discuss critical reading.
WHAT IS CRITICAL READING?
It is way deeper than reading. Critical reading is being involve in what you are reading. It is understanding
what message the author is trying to get across. Also, it is being crucial of the materials being read and
not just accepting them easily and being satisfied with everything that is presented by the author. You,
as a reader should evaluate carefully the information presented by the author.
In critical reading, you evaluate claims, seek definitions, judge information, demand proof and
questions assumptions. The reading experience goes beyond just understanding the text. You become
your own judge whether the data presented is true or not.
Take a look at this example:
Before he goes to bed, Paul read an
article which states that working
out at night burns more calories
than working out in the morning.
Immediately after reading that, he
worked out and went to sleep.

Photo Source: Google Images

VS.

Simon wants to lose weight and he stumbled

upon an article that states that working out at
night burns more calories than working out in
the morning. So, he researched about the pros
and cons of working out at night. And when he
found out that it does not really matter what
time you work out, he planned his day and
decided to exercise in the morning instead

Photo Source: Google Images

If you look closely, the following statements are different. The first one just accepted the information
without being critical of the claims and the data presented in the article. While the second one, he
researched about it and at the end, he was the one who decides whether he would follow through with
what the article is saying. Which one do you think is the example of critical reader? Paul or Simon? The
correct answer is Simon.
In critical reading, we have 4 strategies that you could use to become a critical reader

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4 Critical Reading Strategies
1. Annotating – it is a process of note taking where you underline, encircle, and sometimes use
highlighters to highlight the important ideas, topic, supporting, details, thesis statement and other
information. It is similar into having a conversation with the author. Because when you annotate, you
could write questions, comments that pops up in your mind while reading.
Annotation is usually done best after you read it more than once to ensure that you understand it properly.
Here is an example of annotation.

You could see here that the

reader is trying to analyze a
poem. And as the reader
analyzes, he/she writes on a
paper and process the reading
material.

Photo Source: Pinterest

You could practice annotating as you study your learning guide. Let us move on to the next strategy.
2. Analyzing – it is looking deeper into the meaning of the text. It is also looking at separate detailed parts
of the text to understand the entire piece.
For example, you can try to understand each argument given by an author and see if they add up to the
same conclusion the author is trying to give. Analyzing in this case involves assessing the value,
truthfulness and appropriacy of each argument to see if they add up to the author’s main idea. In your
childhood, you may have broken up a toy to see the parts inside and how they work together. This is very
similar to analyzing a text. You take apart the ideas and see how they connect with each other to support
the main idea of the text.
Another example:
research paper
about effects of
bullying in the
mental health of a
student
you choose parts of the
related literature that you look for a
is connected and could related literature
back up your research that will support
paper
your study

you study the

related literature

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Sometimes when you analyze, you ask yourself different questions like: “how is this related?” “what is
the main idea?” and etc.
You could also apply analyzing when reading a news article that you see online so that you can avoid
spreading fake news or be deceived by fake news.
3. Contextualizing – it is knowing the background or the history of the author for the better
interpretation of the text. And as a reader, you place a text in its historical, biographical, and cultural
context. Contextualizing also includes the reader studying about the author, when it was published and
the time it was written. Through this strategy, the reader will be able to get some clues that will help the
reader in interpreting the context if the text. The reader will also understand the how sans the whys that
made the author write the text.

The best example of contextualization is

these works of Jose Rizal. Since we
know that he lived during the Spanish
occupation. We are all familiar with
Rizal’s background so we were able to
understand what these novels are all
about. And the reason why we still study
them to this day.

Photo Source: Google Images

4. Summarizing – this is the last strategy that we are going to discuss. In summarizing, you need to get
the gist of the text. Meaning, you only need the essence or the most important part of the text. In
summarizing, it consists of getting the main points of the essay and important supporting details. It
is also the process writing a material in the reader’s own words. Summary is shorter than the original
text while it contains the most important details or information that a reader needs to know so that he/she
can understand and analyze the reading material.
Here is an example of a summary.

Original passage:
Students frequently overuse direct quotation in taking notes, and as a result they overuse
quotations in the final research paper. Probably only about 10% of your final manuscript
should appear as directly quoted matter. Therefore, you should strive to limit the amount
of exact transcribing og source materials while taking notes. (Lester, James D. Writing
Research Papers. 2nd ed. (1976); 46-47)

The summary
Students should take just a few notes in direct quotation from sources to minimize the
amount of quoted material in a research paper. (Lester, 1976)

If you would observe, the author wrote a shortened version of the passage and only focused on the most
important part of the text. The author was also straightforward with his/her point. You must remember
that when making a summary.

Yehey! We are now through with the discussion! I hope you learned a lot today. Feel free to ask
questions and clarifications when confusion arise.

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Day 2
Review

Yesterday, you learned about critical reading and 4 different strategies of critical reading. Before
you start answering the activity for today, you may go back and reread the lesson and the annotated
notes you made from yesterday to recall your learnings. Are you ready to apply what you learned
from yesterday?

Practice (What Is It)

Direction: Identify what is being described in the following situations. Encircle the correct answer.
1. Mary is writing an argumentative essay where she has to oppose the idea of Academic Freeze. She read
a lot of articles about the topic and she examine the ideas and studied how it will support her argument.
What strategy did she use?
a. critical reading b. annotating c. analyzing d. contextualizing e. summarizing
2. While reading the articles, Mary highlighted the important information and occasionally post a question
on the article. What strategy did she use?
a. critical reading b. annotating c. analyzing d. contextualizing e. summarizing
3. A friend of Alexa recommended her an anti-acne product. Alexa’s friend swears by it and told her how
effective the product is. But before Alexa purchase the product, she read the ingredients, researched its
effects and even watched tons of YouTube reviews of the product. What strategy did she use?
a. critical reading b. annotating c. analyzing d. contextualizing e. summarizing
4. Peter is having a hard time understanding the story that he is reading. So, he decided to search for the
author’s background and the time it was written. After doing so, he could finally get a grasp of what the
story is all about. What strategy did she use?
a. critical reading b. annotating c. analyzing d. contextualizing e. summarizing
5. Francis was reading a thesis and was tasked to write his own abstract of the thesis. So, he writes down
all of the most important part of the thesis. And then he wrote a shortened version of the thesis. What
strategy did she use?
a. critical reading b. annotating c. analyzing d. contextualizing e. summarizing

Day 3
Valuing/Integration (What’s more?)

Yesterday, we test your understanding of the lesson. Today, we are going to have an
activity where it will showcase your critical reading skills by annotating an essay that I am going
to present to you. Are you ready?

Direction: Read this passage about What a Lack of Sleep Do to Your Body and Mind. Underline, encircle,
highlight or even write down the questions or comments that pop up in your mind when you read these
paragraphs. You must keep in mind that whatever information you gain from this activity could be used
later.

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 As researchers from the University of Bonn and King’s College London
discovered, upon missing a night of sleep, a psychologically-healthy
person may experience symptoms typical for some forms of
schizophrenia. During the course of the experiment, which led the
scientists to such a conclusion, a group of people was offered to
first have a night of normal sleep, and then to stay awake by
conversations, games, and physical activities. After this, test
subjects were to undergo prepulse inhibition measurements.

Prepulse is a psychological mechanism helping the brain to

filter incoming sensory information: with its help, our minds
distinguish between important and unimportant stimuli coming
from the environment. After just one sleepless night, this
function turned out to
be inhibited significantly. Test subjects reported altered
bodily sensations, distorted perception, and weird ideas: for
instance, some of them believed they could read thoughts. They
also became more sensitive to light and loud noises (Universitat
Bonn). After having a good rest, perception returns back to
normal, but it takes time to return all psychological and
physical functions back to its usual state. In the case of
prolonged sleep deprivation, some consequences may be
irreversible.
Do you enjoy feeling depressed? Or do you like mood swings,
when periods of euphoria quickly change to severe blues? If the
answer is yes, then sleep deprivation is for you. Numerous
research studies conducted in different sleep laboratories
showed that people who did not have enough sleep, or have been
deprived of it for certain periods of time, tend to be more
irritable and less able to control their negative emotions.
They are also more likely to react negatively to something they
do not like, even if the trigger is not significant. This is
not to mention the increased likeliness of developing
depression. Besides, the lack of sleep inhibits friendliness
and empathy, and impairs one’s ability to stay in a positive
mood (Psychology Today). In addition, if you have such mental
conditions as obsessive-compulsive disorder or chronic
depression, their symptoms may become more acute as well. In
any case, to avoid prolonged periods of negative mood, you
might want to sleep well regularly.

Day 4
Application (What I Can Do)

Yesterday, you annotated an essay about what a lack of sleep does to body and mind.
Today, you are going to analyze a beautiful poem written by E.E cummings.

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Direction: Read the poem [I Carry Your Heart with Me (I carry it in] by E. E. Cummings carefully and
analyze it through the guide questions written after the poem.

I carry your heart with me (I carry it in

my heart) I am never without it (anywhere
I go you go, my dear; and whatever is done
by only me is your doing, my darling)
I fear no fate (for you are my fate, my sweet) I want
no world (for beautiful you are my world, my true)
and it’s you are whatever a moon has always meant
and whatever a sun will always sing is you

here is the deepest secret nobody knows

(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud
and the sky of the sky of a tree called life; which
grows
higher than soul can hope or mind can hide)
and this is the wonder that’s keeping the stars apart
i carry your heart (i carry it in my heart)

Day 5
Post- Assessment (What I Have Learned)

You made it to the end of the week! With that, I want to congratulate you for making
it this far.

Direction: For today’s activity, what you are going to do is very simple. Do you remember the information
that you annotate and gathered from the activity on day 3? Summarize the paragraph that I tasked you to
annotate. Remember to only include the most important part of the paragraph and not copy everything.
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____________________________________________________________________________________
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Congratulations! You are done with this week’s learning guide about the paragraphs and its structures.
Did you have fun while learning? What is your favorite part of the lesson and/or activity? Tell me more
by filling in the blanks below.
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Reminders:
1. Keep this module together with the written outputs in a portfolio.
a.2. Your opinion matters! Give your feedback or message regarding the lesson to your teacher through
text or messenger. You may also ask for clarification and guidance in order to achieve the lesson’s
goal.
3. Enjoy your weekend!

References
Pena, Anudin (2016), Reading and Writing. BOOKS VIBAL
Antonio, Sarte, et.al (2017) Reading and Writing Skills for Senior High School Students. BOOKS
MUTYA PUBLISHING HOUSE INC
Tiongson, Rodrigues, (2016) Reading and Writing Skills First Edition. BOOKS REX BOOKSTORE

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