Reading Comprehension

i received a private message regarding this thread.

most of my thoughts on reading comprehension are given in the two RC study halls at this link:
https://www.manhattangmat.com/thursdays-with-ron.cfm
the dates of the study halls are august 19, 2010, and september 9, 2010.

i won't attempt to lay down an entire strategy for RC in one post -- i don't think that can really be done responsibly, and, in any case, i would largely wind up repeating most of the main ideas that are in the study halls above -- but, in response to the original post, a few thoughts:

winner's attitude wrote:Whatever little I have understood by learning from the posts of gmatgurus and high scorers is that

1) A robust strategy is required for nailing the RC - For Accuracy
2) Master the strategy so much that for any given passage the question can be answered within the time limits - For time saving.

these statements are of course true, but they're so general that they aren't actionable in any meaningful way.
i.e., for every single part of this test it's clear that both (a) accuracy and (b) time management are important -- this is not just something that is true for RC.

on the other hand, this sort of explicit insight could be valuable for a student who doesn't consistently realize the importance of both. for instance, if someone consistently practices problems untimed, then a reminder of the importance of time management is a good thing.

Strategy can only be mastered when it is practiced so many times that it just becomes routine and in this process I MUST stuck to the strategy formed , so here the strategy is very important because it cant be changed every day else the results are nil.

this may or may not be true, depending on how broad your definition of "strategy" is.

if you mean that you have to get a sufficient amount of practice so that the general constraints and guidelines of each problem type become routine, then i would agree.
for instance, when you see "which one of the following can be properly inferred", you should know the general template: i.e., you're looking for a statement that MUST be true based on the information in the passage (and NOT looking for a guess/hunch based on that information).

on the other hand, if you think that you can memorize a strategy that is so specific that you can just run through RC problems as if they were an algebra assignment in high school, then that will never happen.

I know its very subjective for every person to read , comprehend , answer etc. but I have tried to devise one strategy for RC , which I wanna master with practice with a standard deviation of 10% only, and I need help of masters to correct me if I am wrong because I don't want to waste time on devising wrong strategy first then realizing mistaken and then again revising a new strategy ( which again may or may not be true )

what do you mean by "a standard deviation of 10%"?

Long RC passage

Main point questions -
a)Active reading for first paragraph.
b)Active reading for the first line of each para.
c)Predicting the answer for main point, structure , tone question and answer them before seeing AC.

this seems decent, although you should probably do this "active reading" BEFORE you actually see any problems -- i.e., you should do this sort of reading up front. that way you'll have at least some sense of where the information is located in the passage, so that you don't have to waste a bunch of time finding things from scratch every time you see a new problem.

also, *sometimes* important points are given at the end of body paragraphs, too.

in particular, though, it's good that you've gotten into the habit of predicting the answer to main-idea questions.

Other Detail Questions :
a)Taking notes from each para ( max one sentence ) and jotting down the key words
(Dates , Names etc )
b)Referring back to the part of the para , structure the answer and then choose the
Answer.

i wouldn't worry about writing down "names and dates", EVER, unless there is some important point or role played by those names/dates.
writing down names and dates (and/or anything else that is just factual) by themselves is an absolutely worthless waste of time -- those things are in the passage, and will still be there when you get questions.
in general, try not to write down anything that's already written in the passage!
instead, when you take notes, try to write down the things that are not explicitly stated already, such as points, purposes, etc.

for instance, if the passage starts off with
"until 1995, scientists thought that disease X was caused by gene YGF-1, but then a groundbreaking new discovery led them to believe that it is actually caused by gene YHH-3"
... then you absolutely don't want to write down any of these actual, specific details. instead, you would want to write down something like "new explanation for disease, making old explanation obsolete"... because that's THE POINT, and because it's not explicitly written there already.

note also that almost every instinct you'll have from school, in this case, is going to be very maladaptive.
in school, in general, you aren't allowed to see reading passages while you answer questions about them -- hence the possible importance of writing down things like names, dates, and facts.
here, though, you can go back and read the passage if necessary -- so writing down facts and names is a waste of your time, since that basically just gives you a second copy of a passage that you will still have.

Pls give me suggestions to improve the strategy....... Because once I am thru with strategy I will focus only on this strategy, what I have done wrong in last month since I started my prep is trying different strategies and then reaching nowhere because everytime I am confused with new strategy ( some say skip to succeed , some say don't

one thing you may want to do is isolate certain problem types -- i.e., just practice one problem type at a time. for instance, if the focus of your study is main-idea questions, you would go through OG, read the passages, and then answer only main-idea questions.
this is a bit of a drastic measure -- after all, you're going to commit yourself to reading entire passages for the sake of answering only a question or two -- but, if there are particular problem types on which you are having a great deal of trouble, it may be worthwhile.

Target2009 wrote:Hi Ron,
I just went thru video at following link.

https://www.manhattangmat.com/thursdays-with-ron.cfm

The way you suggested to approach an RC passage seems to be quite different from what is mentioned in the MGMAT RC book.
MGMAT RC book suggests to prepare Skeletal Sketch, which consist abbv. of passage details whereas in video you suggested to paraphrase each paragraph in our own words. Both this approach seems quite different & have different Pros & cons for me and Now I am confused which one I should follow.

Other possibility is, I am missing the similarity / correlation between these two approaches. Please help me.

Regards
Abhishek

the two approaches should be fairly similar, actually -- both of them focus on exactly the same parts of the passage, and both of them are pretty explicit in their favoring of main points over details.
in fact, the strategy guide says (direct quote):
the limbs of your skeletal sketch are short headlines or one-sentence summaries of each of the remaining paragraphs.
that's almost exactly the same thing i said in the study hall, just in different words.

the only difference is that i tried to make the study hall a little bit more actionable. in other words, i tried to give people very specific places to look and very specific things to do (like the orange highlighted boxes in the passages on the study hall).

Target2009 wrote:Hi Ron,

Thanks for quick response. :) But I still have doubt :( . I will take a para from MGMAT RC passage to explain it.

Polygamy in africa has been a popular topic for social research over the past four decades; it has been analyzed by many distinguished mind and in various well-pulicized works. In 1961, when Remi clignet published his book "Many Wives, Many Powers," he was not alone in sharing the view that in Africa co-wives may be perceived as direct and indirect sources of increased incom and prestige.

Skeletal Sketch :
Past 4 decs: Polygamy in Afr = pop topic soc rsch
-'61 Clig:co-wives=income,prestige

yeah, i don't really like this sketch. WAY too much detail -- this sort of sketch is guilty of reproducing a lot of information that is already on the page, with little or no tangible benefit to the reader.

in fact, i really like your sketch below; it definitely gets to the point of the paragraph.

"Author presented a popular research area ( polygamy) which was lot discussed before Remi ( a researcher) published his book to share same view."

I am not sure if I am in right direction. :( Please help.

one comment:
if a fact is centrally important, you may be well justified in writing down that fact.
what i mean here is that you definitely shouldn't get into the habit of writing down tons of facts, but, if a particular fact is crucial to the thesis or purpose of a passage, then you may want to go ahead and write it down.
here's how this applies here:
"polygamy is a popular topic in social science research" is not really an important fact: the passage is clearly not going to be a general discussion of the popularity of polygamy among social scientists. therefore, there's no reason to write this down.
on the other hand, if they are mentioning Clig's theory in the opening passage, then it's a pretty safe bet that the whole passage is going to deal, directly or indirectly, with that theory. therefore, you may want to write a BRIEF note reminding yourself exactly what that theory is, in different words from what is originally written in the passage.
so, here, you could write something like "theory says co-wives = power & money".

--

also, what gets lost in this discussion, in many cases, is that the right way to take notes is not the same from person to person.
in particular, there is a spectrum along which people's learning processes tend to fall, from "concrete thinker" on one side to "abstract thinker" on the other side; most people are primarily one or the other of these.

people who are primarily concrete thinkers are very good at absorbing and remembering details, but tend to struggle with abstracting things like main ideas, points, and purposes.
people who are primarily abstract thinkers are very good at grasping intentions, purposes, and general mood/tone, but are much worse at remembering specific details.

the idea is that you should take notes that support the one of these two learning modalities at which you are WORSE.
if you are normally a very abstract, big-picture type of thinker, then you may do well by taking notes that do somewhat emphasize details. on the other hand, if you are normally a very concrete type of thinker, then you MUST drive yourself away from excessively concrete and detail-oriented thinking.
(also note that the normal way in which people think in classrooms tends to be excessively detail-oriented, and tends not to involve common sense or critical evaluation at all -- so, for students who are already slanted toward that kind of thinking, it's even more important to strive for abstraction.)

so, part of the purpose of this advice is to react to our client base: the vest-vast majority of our clients tend to come from educational cultures and professional backgrounds that encourage very concrete, detail-oriented thinking (e.g. engineering). as a result, it's more important to emphasize a notetaking strategy that will help the student move from concrete to abstract thinking.