Reading Matters

This high-level developmental reader focuses on reading flexibility and how to analyze different genres of writing. Students learn different strategies for approaching textbooks, magazines, newspapers, and other genres. After a basic review of comprehension and critical-reading skills, the text introduces four units of thematically linked readings. Each reading is accompanied by a description of its specific features and some appropriate responses to those features. Readings that center on two or three related issues encourage students to develop informed opinions?allowing them to shape and revise their opinions as they receive, evaluate, and synthesize opposing points of view.

• Consistent vocabulary instruction appears throughout the text.
• Discussion questions and writing assignments have been carefully designed to help students become more aware of issues such as the influence of the media, the consequences of 9/11, the workings of memory, and the limits of civil liberties.