CHAPTER 4 / CRITICAL READING SKILLS 183
Lesson 4:Simplifying the Passage
Simplifyby Paraphrasing
When you read, your brain is not a CD burner: It
doesn’t just record all the information for perfect
recall. You need to train your brain to process the
information into simpler forms. This is called para-
phrasing, summarizing paragraphs and passages in a
few tidy words.
Good readers constantly paraphrase paragraphs
as they read. Don’t worry—it doesn’t waste time. With
practice, paraphrasing will actually saveyou time on
the reading section. Having the key ideas fresh in
your mind helps you to zero in on the right answers.
As you read SAT passages, practice paraphras-
ing each paragraph. You may want to write
each summary in the margin. Be as concise as
possible, but capture the key idea. For in-
stance, “This paragraph is about dolphins and
their intelligence” is a poor summary because
it doesn’t capture the key idea, just the topic. A
better summary is “Dolphins have communi-
cation skills that other mammals lack.” If it’s
relevant, make a quick note of how the para-
graph relates to the previous paragraph. Does
it provide an example of a concept described
previously? Does it describe a situation that
contrasts with the previous one?Simplify, but Don’t Oversimplify
Avoid test-taking tricks that oversimplifySAT CR ques-
tions.Two of the most popular tricks in SAT courses
and books are the “chuck the extremes” trick and the
“don’t dis the minorities” trick. As with many simplistic
shortcuts, they don’t work so well. They assume that the
right answers to SAT questions are never “extreme,”
particularly if they pertain to reading passages about
minorities or women. So, they say, just eliminate any
choices that take an extremely positive or negative tone,
and eliminate all answers with a negativetone if the pas-
sage pertains to a minority or minority group “because
the SAT will never disparage minorities.”
The problem is that the SAT always knows how to
thwart these shortcuts, to force students to readto get
the right answer, rather than just apply a test-taking
trick. For instance, the “minority” passage on the May
2006 SAT was a story about two Asian-American
poets. Here are two of the questions:
The tone of the characterizations quoted in lines
11–12 is best described as
(A) morose
(B) curious
(C) sardonic
(D) threatening
(E) incredulous
The tone of the statement in line 20 is best
described as
(A) impatient
(B) apologetic
(C) reflective
(D) anxious
(E) unconvinced
Nationwide, thousands of students who had taken
SAT courses were confident that they could “crack” these
questions. Because the passage concerns American mi-
norities, the tone of the correct answers must be positive,
right? In question 12, the only choice with a positive tone
is (B), and in question 13, the only one is (C). Easy!
But wrong. Even a cursory reading would reveal
the correct answers to be (C) sardonicand (E) uncon-
vinced, respectively. Pretty negative, huh? Of course,
SAT passages are notdisparaging of minority groups,
but this fact is not so easy to translate into a quick-and-
easy test-taking trick as some would like you to believe.Simplifyby Visualizing
Visualization increases your brain’s ability to absorb
information. After all, “a picture is worth a thousand
words,” right? Visualizing as you read increases your
interest as well as your retention. Visualizing a narra-
tive is relatively simple because narratives contain
characters and action. But how do you visualize an
analysis or argument?- When reading an analysis, visualize the sub-
ject matter as best you can. For instance, if
it’s about life in 15th–century Italy, picture
a map of Italy, and visualize the people in
dress of the times. If it’s about the discovery
of a quasar, visualize the pulsing star and
the astronomers gazing at it through tele-
scopes, and perhaps visualize a timeline of
the discoveries. - When you read an argument, visualize a battle
with the author’s thesis on one side battling
the opposing thesis. It’s very important to “see”
the two sides. The explanations and examples
are like “weapons” against the enemy.