7 ways to IMPROVE ENGLISH READING skills and comprehension Learning English Technique Lesson
hello everyone and welcome back to
english with lucy so i’ve made a video
about improving your listening and i
made one about writing very recently as
well and i have made one on conversation
but today the time has come to make a
video about improving your reading and
your reading comprehension because
that’s what you guys have been asking
for so this video is going to be
jam-packed ie really really full of tips
that will help you improve so whether
you want to improve because you need to
do a reading exam or if you just want to
read for pleasure and understand more
these tips are going to help you let’s
get started with the video now let’s
start with an easy one and one that you
definitely will have heard before but
it’s so important I feel like I need to
reiterate it and this is read the
question now at school I remember being
bored of my teachers telling me to read
the question always read the question
remember to read the question but having
worked as a teacher and having marked so
many exams oh my god so many points are
lost through people miss reading the
question how many times have you seen a
question that says answer with one
example of bah-bah-bah well if you give
two examples most of the time you will
not get the point because you’ve given
too many examples or if they asked you
to describe something and you provide a
list it’s not a description so you might
lose that point so please just bear it
in mind you need to read the question
that was a pretty easy one let’s get on
to the next one now tip number two is
all about practice but the best way to
practice and this is by reading the news
we’re better to find up-to-the-minute
current vocabulary that you can use in
conversations that you’re going to see
in exams because often exams will
use examples of current events or recent
events so as a teacher I am always on
the lookout for the best news resources
for my students
The Telegraph app have very kindly
sponsored today’s video but it wasn’t a
hard job for me because I already use
the app on a daily basis it is the news
app that I recommend to my students the
reason I recommend this to my students
is because it’s trusted news content you
can use it both online and offline so
when you’re connected to Wi-Fi you can
download all the news stories and then
when you’re out and about you can catch
up on everything it’s excellent because
you can click on the topic that is
relevant and interesting to you because
that’s really important
download it whilst you’re at home or
connected to Wi-Fi and then when you’re
on your commute or you’re out and about
or you’re somewhere where there’s bad
internet or at school for example you
can catch up with all the latest news
stories in the section that interests
you most so that’s one thing that I love
about it the way that you can view
everything offline as well as online
know it’s all very well reading the news
every day but how can you use the news
to get as much vocabulary into your
brain as possible well I would encourage
you to keep a vocab diary my
recommendation is keep it all on your
phone use the Telegraph
app try and read the articles that are
relevant and interesting to you and then
on the note function on your phone keep
a vocab diary so you could date it every
day you can note down the words that you
don’t understand in the app and then
when you get home you can fill in that
diary find out what the words mean and
there you have a list to study from now
you guys have probably heard all the
fake news and the untrustworthy news
articles going around The Telegraph is
completely trusted it’s well written
it’s well researched it’s current it’s
up-to-the-minute and you can view it
both online and offline so it’s
completely accessible I’ve left the link
in the description box for anybody who
wants to download it I really do
encourage you to do that vocab diary
because it has transformed so many of my
students vocabularies right tip number
three relates back a little bit to tip
number two but it’s really important if
you want to achieve the right amount of
because practice does make perfect and
that is scheduled in reading time and
you will be amazed at how much this can
increase the amount you read every
morning on your commute or or during a
break work or school or you could be
reading for pleasure so you could be
setting aside an extra half an hour in
the evening but make sure you make
reading part of your routine because
otherwise other things take priority and
you will miss out because improving your
reading and improving your other
language skills really is like running a
marathon
you can’t cram it you can’t do something
once and then inspect to see a massive
improvement it needs to be little and
often that’s why little tasks like
scheduling in and writing a vocab diary
are so so effective let me know in the
comments below when you most like to
read or if you’re going to schedule in
reading time and when that’s going to be
now another way you could look at
scheduling in reading time is setting
yourself a reading goal so depending on
your level schedule in a certain amount
of articles every single day or however
many chapters or pages of a book every
single day you know I’m not reading to
improve my English I’m reading for
entertainment and to keep up to date
with current affairs I like to set
myself the goal of reading at least 5
articles in the morning whilst I have my
coffee I skim read them and it’s just
the right amount of time for me
obviously if I have more time I’ll read
more I do like to start off the day with
my set amount I can go over but I can’t
go under so look at scheduling in a goal
for each day now the next hip is a
little bit strange and it might not work
for everybody but it really really works
for me it worked for me when I was doing
my exams at university because I found
studying so boring but I needed to
ingest a huge amount of articles essays
textbooks literature in general and
something I found incredibly helpful and
something that made reading much more
pleasurable and much more enjoyable was
reading using the voice of a celebrity
in my head
and my celebrity of choice was always
Stephen Fry who I’ve mentioned in
previous videos
he speaks with received pronunciation
he’s very very intelligent he’s a
comedian he has a lovely voice and I
used to read through all of the essays
literature for my university degree in
in his voice and I just got into a habit
and I found that it made everything less
dreadful and I’ve seen that other people
do it too because I get messages on
Instagram and comments on YouTube saying
whenever I read anything in English I do
it in your voice loosely and at first I
thought how strange and then I thought
oh that’s what I do just even Fri so
yeah pick a voice of somebody that you
really really like and and try using
their voice in your head next time you
read something if you’re reading to
practice your English let me know which
person you choose in the comments
because I think it’ll be quite funny to
see who everyone chooses now the next
tip is for people who just really aren’t
satisfied with their reading
comprehension if you feel like you are
underperforming in exams or you’re not
getting the most out of reading for
pleasure this tips for you I want you to
step back from your reading and evaluate
what’s going wrong why why are you
dissatisfied in order to find a cure you
need to find the problem you need to ask
yourself why are you lacking vocabulary
is it that every other sentence you
can’t understand because you don’t
understand the words are you lacking
technical vocabulary so you’ll fine
reading a general story but if you read
about politics or science you’re
completely stumped stumped means
confused is it that you really struggle
with tenses is it that you can’t work
out which past tense is being used or if
they’re talking about the present or the
future is it rather than the language
used is it that you find reading too
tiring or too boring is it that you run
out of time in an exam you need to think
about what is going wrong and then find
yourself a solution or ask some
I’d help you find a solution I can give
you all the tips to apply to your
reading but if you don’t work out what’s
wrong in the first place you’re going to
have a tough time improving so I invite
you to think about your reading what is
going wrong write it in the comment
section and let’s all help each other to
improve our reading skills I can
identify what’s wrong with my reading
when I read in Spanish for example I get
bored i skim read I miss the point and I
don’t try hard enough to understand the
whole passage what do I need to do I
need to work on summarizing every
paragraph or every page to make sure
that I get a clear grasp of the context
and just what’s going on in the piece so
what’s your problem and if you can what
do you need to do to fight it
comment down below my next tip is going
to sound weird as well but it’s
something that really worked for me and
this is use a pen and this helps you in
a couple of different ways one of the
obvious ones which you will know about
is you can underline words but it is
really really important to underline key
words or even cross out words that you
think are not relevant as well I
wouldn’t completely cross them out but
maybe put a line through if you think no
no this stuff doesn’t matter just the
key words but another use for your
trusty pen is use it to help you speed
read so you use it as a pointer this is
going to really help anybody that
struggles with reading a text in a short
amount of time in a lot of exams you’re
under time pressure so you want to read
as much as possible in the shortest
amount of time so I find that by using a
pen and following under the words like
this I know I look ridiculous right now
but I want you guys to speed read really
helps me read much more quickly you can
try it out see if it works for you take
an article read it first without the pen
read it again with the pen time yourself
see which one is quicker it might take
some getting used to but learning to
speed read and using a pointer it can
transform the way you perform in reading
exams right guys that’s it
with the tips for today I really really
encourage you to click on the link in
the description box and download the
Telegraph app I’ve already said how
great it is it was what I was using
before and it was an absolute pleasure
to be invited to work with them because
I love recommending things I truly
believe in I’m confident that if you set
yourself a goal of reading to 3 or 5
articles a day for example you really
really will improve your reading
comprehension over time don’t forget to
connect with me on all of my social
media I’ve got my facebook I’ve got my
Instagram and I’ve got my Twitter and I
will see you soon for another lesson
yeah
you