02.01 Identifying Key Ideas & Details in Reading

And sometimes getting to the main idea of a text might require making inferences or drawing conclusions. Sometimes the conclusion is directly state and very logical, other times you might have to dig deep and pull out implications made by the author of the text.  We do this a lot in our day to day living. For example, if you were presented with this graph you might spend some time analyzing the said graph and draw some conclusions about what it might mean. 

Another example is when we meet others or observe those around us (whether in real life or on social media), we make observations and tend to draw conclusions… like in this image above with a young woman wearing 2 necklaces. When might draw the conclusion that she is a cardiac nurse by analyzing the detailed human heart necklace. We might also conclude she goes to church as it looks like a religious medal. The same critical thinking and skills of inferring must be applied to when we read text. Sometimes it is obvious, other times we might need to order or rely on our experiences and background knowledge.