Tugas Softskill Bahas Inggris 2

Skill On TOEFL Reading

Nama
Kelas

: Dhika Primayuda
: 4KB01 / 21112998

Universitas Gunadarma

Skill On TOEFL Reading

a. Improve Your Reading Skills (High)

1. Read as much and as often as possible. Make sure to include
academic texts on a variety of topics written in different genres
as part of your reading.
Read major newspapers, such as The New York Times or
Science Times.
Use the websites of National Public Radio (NPR) or the BBC to
get transcripts of shows and study the content and new
vocabulary you encounter.
2. Continually expand your vocabulary knowledge.
Develop a system for recording unfamiliar words.
o Write each word on a card and mix up the cards each time you
study them. Write the context (the sentence the word was used
in) to help you learn correct word usage.
o Group the words according to topic or meaning and study the
words as a list of related words.
o Review the new words on a regular basis so that you remember
them.
Increase your vocabulary by analyzing word parts. Study roots,
prefixes, and suffixes.
o Study word families (e.g., enjoyment, enjoy; enjoyable,
enjoyably)
Use available vocabulary resources.
o Use a good thesaurus to study various shades of meanings of
words.
o The Longman Language Activator provides "collocations"
(words used together).

o There are online concordancers that search corpora and provide

examples of words in context, such as the British national
corpus.
Practice using context to guess the meaning of unknown words.
Continually practice using new words you encounter in your
speech and writing. This will help you remember both the
meaning and the correct usage of the words.
3. Think carefully about how ideas are connected within a text.
The connections between sentences and the links between
paragraphs are critical to complete comprehension.
To understand the structure of a reading passage, outline the
text.
o Begin by determining the main idea or concept presented in
each paragraph. Remember to distinguish between the main
points and the details that exemplify them.
o Group paragraphs that address the same concept. Think about
how the key idea in one paragraph relates to the main point of
the next paragraph. If there are several paragraphs that focus on
the same idea or concept, synthesize the key points into one
main idea.
o Write one sentence or phrase summarizing the paragraphs that
discuss the same idea.
o Add important details that support each major idea or concept.
Learn to recognize different organizational styles in order to
understand the way an article is structured.
o Look for the common patterns of organization that you find in
articles.
o Pay attention to connecting words in order to understand the
pattern of organization.
Write a summary of a text, making sure that it incorporates the
organizational pattern of the original.

o If the text is a comparison, be sure that your summary reflects

that and uses appropriate transition words and phrases for
comparison.
o If the text argues two points of view, be sure both points of view
are reflected in your summary and that appropriate transitional
words are used.

b. Improve Your Reading Skills (Low)

1. Read as much and as often as possible in English.
a. Read texts on a variety of topics.
i. Read both academic and non-academic materials.
ii. Read about subjects that interest you and that DON'T
interest you.
b. Write basic questions to test your understanding of a text.
i. Write questions and answers about the first paragraph. Then
guess what might be discussed in the next paragraph.
c. Use your knowledge of grammar to understand difficult sections of
a passage.
i. Think carefully about the relationship between independent
and dependent clauses.
ii. Look for words that refer back to some information given
in a previous section of the text.
1. Look at pronouns and find the nouns that they refer
to
2. Look at relative pronouns (who, that, which, whom,
whose) used in adjective clauses (for example, The
student whose classmates are taking the TOEFL
test....) and find the nouns they refer to
d. Work with a reading partner. Read different newspaper or
magazine articles.
i. Write questions about the articles you read.

ii. Exchange articles with your partner and try to answer your
partner's questions.
2. Continually expand your vocabulary knowledge.
e. It is important to increase your vocabulary on many subjects
because you will have to read about various topics at the university.
i. Review lists of terms used in academic textbooks.
f. Make a plan for studying new words.
i. Write a new word on one side of a card and the definition
on the back.
1. Write the sentence you saw the word in to help you
learn correct usage
2. Study the words often and always mix up the cards
ii. Group the words by topic or meaning. Study the words as a
list of related words.
iii. Study vocabulary by making a list of opposites (words with
different meanings) and synonyms (words with similar
meanings)
1. opposites (relevant-irrelevant; abstract-concrete)
2. synonyms (excellent, outstanding, superb)
iv. Review the new words on a regular basis so that you
remember them.
g. Expand your vocabulary by analyzing the parts of a word. This will
help you understand some unknown words that you see.
i. Study roots (a part of a word that other parts are attached
to)
1. -spect- (look at)
2. -dict- (say)
ii. Study prefixes (a part of word attached to the beginning of
a word)
1. in- (into)
2. pre- (before)

iii. Study suffixes (part of a word attached at the end of the

word)
1. -tion (inspection)
2. -able (predictable)
iv. Study word families (the noun, verb, adjective, or adverb
forms of related words)
1. enjoyment (noun)
2. enjoy (verb)
3. enjoyable (adjective)
4. enjoyably (adverb)
h. Use the context to guess the meaning of unknown words.
i. Notice when difficult terms are defined in the text.
ii. Look for examples with an explanation of the meaning of a
word.
iii. Look at the other words and structures around an unknown
word to try to understand it.
i. Use resources to help you study vocabulary.
i. Use an English-English dictionary to learn correct meaning
and word usage.
ii. Get calendars that teach a new word each day or websites
that will send you an e-mail with a new word each day.
iii. Study the vocabulary you find on university websites that
give information about the university and the faculty
teaching at the school.
j. Practice correct usage by making sentences with new words. This
will also help you remember both the meaning and the correct
usage of the words.
i. Have a teacher check your sentences.
ii. Review the new words on a regular basis so that you
remember them.
3. Study the organization of academic texts and overall structure of a
reading passage.

a. Read an entire passage from beginning to end.

i. Look for the main ideas of the article.
ii. Look for the supporting details.
1. Pay attention to the relationship between the details
and main ideas
b. Learn to recognize the different styles of organization that you find
in articles in English in order to understand the way an article is
structured
i. Pay attention to the connecting words/transitionsused for
specific relationships.
1. steps (first, second, next, finally)
2. reasons (because, since)
3. results (as a result, so, therefore)
4. examples (for example, such as)
5. comparisons (in contrast, on the other hand)
6. restatements of information (in other words, that is)
7. conclusions (in conclusion, in summary)
c. Outline a text to test your understanding of the structure of a
reading passage.
i. Begin by grouping paragraphs that address the same
concept.
1. Look for ways that main ideas in one paragraph
relate to the main points of the next paragraph
2. Write one sentence summarizing the paragraphs that
discuss the same idea
ii. Look at connections between sentences.
1. Look at how the end of one sentence relates to the
beginning of the next sentence
2. Think about the connection between the ideas of the
two sentences
3. Combine the sentences using appropriate transitions
words to show the relationship between ideas

d. Write a summary of the entire passage.

Reference :
https://www.ets.org/toefl/
https://www.ets.org/