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Reading For Main Ideas: Learning Objectives
Reading For Main Ideas: Learning Objectives
LEARNING OBJECTIVES
A number of recent books with titles like Raising Cain, Real Boys, and Lost Boys
all focus on the same issue: Today’s teenaged boys are feeling more anxiety than ever
before about their physical appearance. Bombarded by advertising featuring well-
muscled, semi-clad young men, teenage boys are experiencing what teenage girls have
been coping with for years. They are afraid that they cannot possibly live up to the
media’s idealized image of their gender. Young boys below the average in height, weight,
or both suffer the most. Often, they are brutally teased by their brawnier peers. Some
react to the ridicule by heading for the gym and lifting weights. Yet even those who
successfully “bulk up” don’t like feeling that they are considered worthless if they lose
their hard-won muscle tone. Others, convinced that no amount of body building can help,
often withdraw from social contact with their peers. This is their way of avoiding taunts
about their size or shape. Still, they are understandably angry at being badly treated
because of their body type. Although school psychologists generally recognize that boys
today are having severe body image problems, they are at a loss about what to do to solve
those problems.
Questions:
1. What is the main idea of the above paragraph?
Today’s teenaged boys are feeling more anxiety than ever before about their physical
appearance.
2. Do you have difficulties getting main idea of the above paragraph? Explain!
The main idea of a passage or reading is the central thought or message. In contrast to
the term topic, which refers to the subject under discussion, the term main idea refers to
the point or thought being expressed. The difference between a topic and a main idea
will become clearer to you if you imagine yourself overhearing a conversation in which
your name is repeatedly mentioned. When you ask your friends what they were
discussing, they say they were talking about you. At that point, you have the topic but
not the main idea. Undoubtedly, you would not be satisfied until you learned what your
friends were saying about this particular topic. You would probably pester them until you
knew the main idea, until you knew, that is, exactly what they were saying about your
personality, appearance, or behaviour. The same principle applies to reading. The topic
is seldom enough. You also need to discover the main idea.
A paragraph, an essay or a book consists of sentences. To get the main idea from those
reading material, you must start learning from sentence.
Wiener & Bazerman (1988) stated that although a sentence may give a great deal of
information, it usually offers one key idea. Readers must be able to find key ideas in
order to understand sentence meanings clearly.
(how)
features at no extra charge.
B. In the space provided after each sentence, write the key idea of the sentence.
Example: A recent issue of Time magazine contained an article about attempts by
environmental groups to stop the worldwide slaughter of whales.
Time reported on efforts to save whales
1. Recent high school students have shown improvement in their SAT scores, after
nearly twenty years in which performance on these tests declined.
2. Local teenagers on the north side of the city developed a plan for patrolling the
streets during the day and in the evening so that senior citizens could leave their
homes in safety.
3. Thomas Wolfe’s play Welcome to Our City, written fifty years ago and published
a few years ago for the first time, deals with the modern American South and
some of the strange, passionate, and greedy people who live there.
(Adapted from Wiener & Bazerman, 1988, pp. 82)
main ideas
The main idea of this passage is the view from the bridge was beautiful. All the
sentences in the paragraph illustrate that idea by providing many details.
Main idea in
There are 74.5 million television sets in the United States, at least the middle
one set for 98 percent of all American homes. Forty-eight percent
of all U.S. homes have more than one set, and some families even
have a set for every person in the house. Yet, despite the fact that
the number of sets in the United States has virtually reached a
saturation point, the amount of time spent watching television
has declined steadily since 1976. Explanations vary from the
increasingly poor quality of networks shows to the rising
popularity of home video equipment, but some the fact remains
that are owning more sets but enjoying them less.
The main idea of this paragraph is despite the fact that the number of sets in the United
States has virtually reached a saturation point, the amount of time spent watching
television has declined steadily since 1976.
Main idea at
the end
The main idea of the paragraph is Chicago is a fine, friendly city. All the sentences in
paragraph support that idea with details. By stating the main idea at the end, the author
summarizes the pint of the paragraph.
Financial genius James "Big Jim" Fisk (1834-1872) died of gunshot wound when he was
only thirty-seven years old. During his brief lifetime, Fisk earned and lost huge sums of
money, much of it through bribery and theft. During the Civil War, he smuggled cotton
from the South to the North. He also printed and sold phony bondsto gain control of the
wildly profitable Erie Railroad. Then he bankrupted the railroad while gaining a personal
fortune for himself. In 1869, Fisk’s attempts to take over the gold market led to financial
panic and the collapse of the stock market. Oddly enough, Fisk seemed rather proud of
his wicked ways, saying "Some people are born to be good; other people to be bad. I was
born to be bad." A lover of the ladies, Fisk was killed in a fight with a rival over the
affections of actress Josie Mansfield.
Main Idea:
a. Big Jim Fisk liked pretty women a little too much for his own good.
b. In his pursuit of wealth, James Fisk never let law or morality stand in his
way.
c. James Fisk did not have a long life, but that did not stop him from
making a great deal of money.
1. For the ancient Romans, taking a bath was a very special occasion. Because they
considered bathing a social opportunity, they constructed huge public baths that put our
modern-day indoor pools and spas to shame. Not only were the baths themselves lavishly
decorated, they were also surrounded by shops, libraries, and lounges so that a person
could shop, read or chat after bathing. The famed Baths of Caracalla, for example,
offered Roman citizens massages and saunas in addition to a gymnasium and gardens for
after-bath walks in lovely surroundings. Art lovers that they were, the Romans also
frequently built art galleries into their bathing facilities. There were also kitchens, where
food was prepared to serve hungry bathers. Although initially men and women bathed
separately, mixed baths became the fashion until 500 A.D., when the coming of
Christianity brought the public baths to an end.
Main Idea:
a. The ancient Romans were the first to lead a life of pure luxury.
b. If the Romans had spent more time governing and less time bathing,
the Roman Empire would still exist today.
c. The ancient Romans made luxury and socializing a part of bathing.
Birds have long played a central role in superstitions. However, the role birds have
played varies greatly. While crows were thought to be in league with the devil, blue birds
were usually considered signs of good fortune. Blue jays, in contrast, were seldom
assigned a positive role in superstition and legend. Most of the time, they were
2. considered companions to the devil. According to one ancient superstition, blue jays were
never seen on Fridays. Friday was their day to meet with the devil and pass on any useful
gossip about souls who might be ready to go astray. Owls, in contrast, have played a
number of different roles, some good, some bad. In several superstitions they are
portrayed as wise counselors; in others they are a sign that death is near.
Main Idea:
a. Despite having the same color, blue jays and blue birds have played
very different roles in superstitions.
b. Birds turn up frequently in superstitions as signs of both good and evil.
c. Hardly a superstition exists that doesn’t have a bird in it.
French and American cookbooks obviously share the same subject: They both deal with
the preparation of food. But that’s where the similarity ends. American recipes are very
exact, while French recipes are open to personal variation. In American cookbooks, the
teaspoon of sugar, for instance, is described as rounded or flat. French cookbooks are
3.
inclined to be less precise. The French cookbook writer thinks nothing of listing a
"sprinkling of pepper" or a "pinch of salt." French cookbooks are also likely to tell the
reader to "season according to taste." American cookbooks, in contrast, don’t seem to
have as much faith in their readers’ ability to get the recipe right from taste. They tell
readers exactly how much seasoning to use.
Main Idea:
a. Despite a common topic, French and American cookbooks differ in the
way they give directions.
b. Because they are better cooks, the French write cookbooks that trust
their readers’ judgment.
c. American cookbooks don’t have much faith in the cook’s ability to
determine the right taste.
Not surprisingly, the crime victims are often called upon to identify the person who
robbed or attacked them. For a jury, the victim’s testimony is often proof positive that the
accused is guilty. After all, who can better identify the wrongdoer than the person
harmed. This is just common sense. Yet as is so often the case, common sense can be
4.
misleading. As it turns out, crime victims don’t necessarily make reliable witnesses.
Overcome with fear, they often close their eyes or focus fixedly on the weapon being
used to threaten them. As a result, they don’t get a good look at the thief or attacker.
While it’s not true that crime victim testimony is always inaccurate, it’s also true that one
can’t assume a victim’s identification is automatic proof of guilt.
Main Idea:
a. Crime victims do not always correctly identify those who have harmed
them.
b. Crime victim testimony is almost always inaccurate because during the
crime, the victim was overcome with terror.
c. The testimony of crime victims has put far too many people in jail.
B. Read each passage. Write the main idea in the blank space.
Example : In several states across the nation, there has been successful drive to end “social
promotion.” In other words, children who do not achieve the required score on a
standardized test will no longer be promoted to the next grade. Instead, they will
have to repeat the grade they have finished. Yet despite the calls for ending social
promotion--many of them from politicians looking for a crowd-pleasing issue--
there is little evidence that making children repeat a grade has a positive effect. If
anything, research suggests that forcing children to repeat a grade hurts rather
than helps their academic performance. In 1989, University of Georgia Professor
Thomas Holms surveyed sixty-three studies that compared the performance of
kids who had repeated a grade with those who had received a social promotion.
Holms found that most of the children who had repeated a grade had a poorer
record of academic performance than the children who had been promoted
despite poor test scores. A similar study of New York City children in the 1980s
revealed that the children who repeated a grade were more likely to drop out
upon reaching high school. The call to end social promotion may have a nice ring
to it in political speeches. Yet there is little indication that it does students any
real good.
Main Idea: Across the country, many states have abolished the policy of “social promotion”
Source: http://dhp.com/~laflemm/reso/mainIdea.htm
1. Functional organization is efficient, but there are two standard criticisms. Firstly,
people are usually more concerned with the success of their department than
that of the company, so there are permanent battles between, for example,
finance and marketing, or marketing and production, which have incompatible
goal. Secondly, separating functions is unlikely to encourage innovation.
(Adapted from MacKenzie , 1997, p.18)
2. In discussing people’s relationships with their boss and their colleagues and
friends, Trompenaars distinguishes between universalists and particularists. The
former believe that rules extremely important; the latter believe that personal
relationships and friendships should take precedence. Consequently, each
group thinks that other is corrupt. Universalists say that particularists’ cannot be
trusted because they will always help their friends’, while the second group says
the first ‘you cannot trust them; they would not even help a friend’. According to
Trompenaars'
(Adapted from MacKenzie, 1997, p.31)
4. There is no doubt that the impact of the $819 billion economic stimulus package
advanced by President Obama and approved by the House on Wednesday will
start to be felt within weeks once the final version becomes law. But estimating
how effective the huge program of tax cuts and spending will be in getting
America’s economic engines humming again is a far more complex calculation
requiring almost line-by-line scrutiny of the 647-page bill, lawmakers, economists
and policy analysts say.
(Adapted from Herszenhorn, 2009)
5. Manual and service industry workers are often organized in labour unions, which
attempts to ensure fair wages, reasonable working hours and safe working
conditions for their members. British unions are known as trade unions because,
as in Germany, they are largerly organized according to trade and skill: there is
an engineers’ union, and electrician’s union, a train-drivers’ union, and so on. In
other countries, including France and Italy, unions are largely political: workers in
different industries join unions with a particular political positions.
(Adapted from MacKenzie, 1997, p.39)
In everyday lecturing, you will be assigned to read different kinds of reading material
such a book, essay, journal, articles, thesis etc. In order to know the main idea from
those reading material. The following are tips of getting main idea from reading
materials.
REFERENCES
Herszenhorn, D.M. (2009, January 28). Components of Stimulus Vary in Speed and Efficiency .
The New York Times. Retrieved from
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/29/us/politics/29assess.html?_r=1&scp=5&sq=how%20eff
ective%20the%20huge%20program%20of%20tax%20cuts%20&st=cse
MacKanzie, I. (1997). English for business studies. Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press.
Stolberg, S. G. (2009, January 29). White house unbutton formal dress code. The New
York Times. Retrieved from
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/29/us/politics/29whitehouse.html?hp
Wiener, H. S. & Bazerman, C. (1988). Reading skills handbook. (4th ed.). Boston:
Houghton Mifflin.