What is the main idea/topic sentence?

Ask: “What point is the author trying to make about school uniforms?”

Summary: Students should wear school uniforms.

Topic sentence: School uniforms should be mandatory.
Main Idea: School uniforms should be mandatory.

Each paragraph offers supporting details to explain the main idea. The details could be facts
or reasons, but they will always answer a question about the main idea. What? Where? Why?
When? How? How much/many? Look at the example paragraph again. You’ll notice that
more than one
sentence answers a question about the main idea. These are the supporting details.

Main Idea: School uniforms should be mandatory.

Ask: Why? Some kids cannot afford to wear clothes they like and could be bullied by the
“better dressed” kids.

Supporting Detail

With attention drawn to clothes and the individual, Students will lose focus on class work and
the reason they are in school.

Supporting Detail

What if the author doesn’t state the main idea in a topic sentence? The passage will have an
implied main idea. It’s not as difficult to find as it might seem. Paragraphs are always
organized around ideas. To find an implied main idea, you need to know the topic and then
find the relationship between the supporting details. Ask yourself, “What is the
point the author is making about the relationship between the details?”

Cocoa is what makes chocolate good for you. Chocolate comes in many varieties. These
delectable flavors include milk chocolate, dark
chocolate, semi-sweet, and white chocolate.

Ask: What is this paragraph about?

Topic: Chocolate
Ask: What? Where? Why? When? How? How much/many?
Supporting details: Chocolate is good for you because it is made of cocoa, Chocolate is
delicious, Chocolate comes in different delicious flavors

Ask: What is the relationship between the details and what is the author’s point?
Main Idea: Chocolate is good because it is healthy and it tastes good.

Testing Tips for Main Idea Questions

1. Skim the questions – not the answer choices – before reading the passage.
2. Questions about main idea might use the words “theme,” “generalization,” or
“purpose.”
3. Save questions about the main idea for last. On standardized tests like the SAT, the
answers to the rest of the questions can be found in order in the passage.
3. Underline topic sentences in the passage. Most tests allow you to write in your testing
booklet.
4. Answer the question in your own words before looking at the answer choices. Then
match your answer with an answer choice.
5. Cross out incorrect answer choices immediately to prevent confusion.
6. If two of the answer choices mean the same thing but use different words, they are
BOTH incorrect.
7. If a question asks about the whole passage, cross out the answer choices that apply to
only part of it.
8. If only part of the information is correct, that answer choice is incorrect.
9. An answer choice that is too broad is incorrect. All information needs to be backed up
by the passage.
10. Answer choices with extreme wording are usually incorrect.

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Making Inferences and Drawing Conclusions

Drawing inferences and making conclusions happens all the time.

In fact, you probably do it every time you read—sometimes without even realizing it! For
example, remember the first time that you saw the movie “The Lion King.” When you meet
Scar for the first time, he is trapping a helpless mouse with his sharp claws preparing to eat it.
When you see this
action you guess that Scar is going to be a bad character in the movie.

Nothing appeared to tell you this. No caption came across the bottom of the screen that said
“Bad Guy.” No red arrow pointed to Scar and said “Evil Lion.” No, you made an inference
about his character based on the context clue you were given. You do the same thing when
you read!

When you draw an inference or make a conclusion you are doing the same thing, you are
making an educated guess based on the hints the author gives you. We call these hints
“context clues.” Scar trapping the innocent mouse is the context clue about Scar’s character.
Usually you are making inferences and drawing conclusions the entire time that you are
reading.

Whether you realize it or not, you are constantly making educated guesses based on context
clues. Think about a time you were reading a book and something happened that you were
expecting to happen. You’re not psychic! Actually, you were picking up on the context clues
and making inferences about what was going to happen next!

Let’s try an easy example. Read the following sentences and answer the questions at the end
of the passage.
Shelly really likes to help people. She loves her job because she gets to help people every
single day. However, Shelly has to work long hours and she can get called in the middle of
the night for emergencies. She wears a white lab coat at work and usually she carries a
stethoscope.

What is most likely Shelly’s job?

a. Musician
b. Lawyer
c. Doctor
d. Teacher

This probably seemed easy. Drawing inferences isn’t always this simple, but it is the same
basic principle. How did you know Shelly was a doctor? She helps people, she works long
hours, she wears a white lab coat, and she gets called in for emergencies at night. Context
Clues! Nowhere in the
paragraph did it say Shelly was a doctor, but you were able to draw that conclusion based on
the information provided in the paragraph. This is how it’s done!

There is a catch, though. Remember that when you draw inferences based on reading, you
should only use the information given to you by the author. Sometimes it is easy for us to
make conclusions based on knowledge that is already in our mind—but that can lead you to
drawing an incorrect inference.

For example, let’s pretend there is a bully at your school named Brent. Now let’s say you
read a story and the main character’s name is Brent. You could NOT infer that the character
in the story is a bully just because his name is Brent. You should only use the information
given to you by the author to avoid drawing the wrong conclusion.

Let’s try another example. Read the passage below, and answer the question.

Social media is an extremely popular new form of connecting and communicating over the
internet. Since Facebook’s original launch in 2004, millions of people have joined in the
social media craze. In fact, it is estimated that almost 75% of all internet users aged 18 and
older use some form of social media. Facebook started at Harvard University as a way to get
students connected. However, it quickly grew into a worldwide phenomenon and today, the
founder of Facebook, Mark Zuckerberg has an estimated net worth of 28.5 billion dollars.

Facebook is not the only social media platform, though. Other sites such as Twitter,
Instagram, and Snapchat have since been invented and are quickly becoming just as popular!
Many social media users actually use more than one type of social media. Furthermore, most
social media sites
have created mobile apps that allow people to connect via social media virtually anywhere in
the world!

What is the most likely reason that other social media sites like Twitter and Instagram
were created?
a. Professors at Harvard University made it a class project.
b. Facebook was extremely popular and other people thought they could also be successful by
designing social media sites.
c. Facebook was not connecting enough people.
d. Mark Zuckerberg paid people to invent new social media sites because he wanted lots of
competition.

Here, the correct answer is B. Facebook was extremely popular and other people thought they
could also be successful by designing social media sites. How do we know this? What are the
context clues? Take a look at the first paragraph. What do we know based on this paragraph?
Well, one sentence refers to Facebook’s original launch. This suggests that Facebook was one
of the first social media sites. In addition, we know that the founder of Facebook has been
extremely successful and is worth billions of dollars.

From this we can infer that other people wanted to imitate Facebook’s idea and become just
as successful as Mark Zuckerberg.

Let’s go through the other answers. If you chose A, it might be because Facebook started at
Harvard University, so you drew the conclusion that all other social media sites were also
started at Harvard University. However, there is no mention of class projects, professors, or
students designing social media. So there doesn’t seem to be enough support for choice A. If
you chose C, you might have been drawing your own conclusions based on outside
information. Maybe none of your friends are on Facebook, so you made an inference that
Facebook didn’t connect enough people, so more sites were invented. Or maybe you think the
people who connect on Facebook are too old, so you don’t think Facebook connects enough
people your age. This might be true, but remember inferences should be drawn from the
information the author gives you! If you chose D, you might be using the information
that Mark Zuckerberg is worth over 28 billion dollars. It would be easy for him to pay others
to design new sites, but remember,
you need to use context clues! He is very wealthy, but that statement was giving you
information about how successful Facebook was—not suggesting that he paid others to
design more sites!

So remember, drawing inferences and conclusions is simply about using the information you
are given to make an educated guess. You do this every single day so don’t let this concept
scare you. Look for the context clues, make sure they support your claim, and you’ll be able
to make accurate inferences and conclusions!

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Meaning from Context

Infer the Definition

Often in reading comprehension questions, you are asked for the definition of a word, which
you have to infer from the surrounding text, called “meaning in context.” Here are a few
examples with step-by-step solutions, and a few tips and tricks to answering meaning from
context questions.
There are literally thousands and thousands of words in the English language. It is impossible
for us to know what every single one of them means, but we also don’t have time to Google a
definition every time we read a word we don’t understand! Even the smartest person in the
world comes across words they don’t know, but luckily we can use context
clues to help us determine what things actually mean.

Context clues are really just little hints that can help us determine the meaning of words or
phrases and honestly, the easiest way to learn how to use context clues is to practice!

Let’s start with a few basic examples.

In some countries many people are not given access to schools, teachers, or books. In these
countries, people might be illiterate.

You might not know what the word illiterate means, but let’s use the clues in the sentence to
help us. If people are not given access to schools, teachers, or books, what might happen?
They probably don’t learn what we learned in school so they might not know some of the
things that we learned from our teachers! Illiterate actually means “unable to read
or write.” This makes sense based on the context clues!

Let’s work through another example.

We have so much technology today! So much technology that many people have started
using tablets and computers to read ebooks instead of paper
books! In fact, some of these people actually think that reading paper books is archaic!

Let’s look for the context clues. Well, what do we know from this paragraph? We have a lot
of technology and sometimes people read ebooks instead of paper books. From this we can
draw the conclusion that ebooks are beginning to replace paper books because ebooks are
newer and better.
So if ebooks are newer and better, it must mean that paper books are older. Archaic actually
means “very old or old fashioned,” which again we determined from the context clues.

Let’s see if you can try a few on your own now.

Cody noticed the strawberries in his refrigerator were old and moldy, so he abstained and
threw them away.

What does abstained most likely mean?

a. chose not to consume
b. washed
c. shared
d. cut into pieces

The correct answer here is A. The context clues told you the strawberries were old and moldy
and told you that Cody did something and then threw them away. If the strawberries were
moldy, and Cody abstained, it makes sense that he didn’t eat them—which is choice A. You
may have chosen answer B. If the strawberries were old and moldy, Cody could have washed
them. But use ALL of the context clues. After he abstained, he threw them away. Why would
Cody wash them and then throw them away?
That doesn’t make sense! In addition, why would he share them if they were old and moldy?
Finally, I suppose Cody could have cut them into pieces, but why would he need to do that
before throwing them away? It doesn’t make as much sense, so choice A is the correct
answer!

Let’s do one more.

Scott had a disdain for Lily ever since she lied to their boss and got him fired.
a. Compassion
b. Hate
c. Remorse
d. Money

The correct answer is B. Scott was fired because Lily lied. Can you imagine if this happened
to you? I think you would have some pretty strong feelings just like Scott! It’s simple! By
understanding the context, you can determine the meaning of even the hardest of words!