Main Body
The Many Pathways to Knowledge
Learning Goals
In this chapter, you will learn to:
- Use pre-reading strategies
- Use the five W questions to check your understanding while you read
- Build your vocabulary
- Understand the main ideas, details, and sequence of a text
- Spell common homonyms
- Use apostrophes in contractions
- Identify and correct sentence fragments
- Write a how-to paragraph
Get Ready to Read
Think about the questions below or discuss them with a partner.
- Think of a time when you struggled to learn something new. What helped you to cope?
- Are some people born smart or do they become that way through practice?
- What do you already know about learning disabilities?
Reading Strategy
Readers check their understanding of a text while they read. One strategy is to stop a few times in the text to ask yourself: Can I answer any of the five W questions: who, what, where, when, or why? If you are able to answer at least three of these questions, then you are thinking about what you are reading.
Try this strategy as you read The Many Pathways to Knowledge.
Vocabulary
Find these words in the text. Use the context to choose the best meaning.
| decade | factors | affect | learning disability | dread |
| exercise | peer | clumsiness | pace | approach |
1. A condition that makes learning difficult is called a ___________________________.
2. ___________________________ means moving in a way where you might drop or break things.
3. A ___________________________ is one of the things that cause something to happen.
4. ___________________________ refers to activity that is done to be healthier.
5. Another word for 10 years is a ___________________________.
6. ___________________________ is the speed at which something happens.
7. ___________________________ means to act on or cause a change in someone or something.
8. ___________________________ means to fear that something will happen.
9. A person in the same age group or social group can be called a ___________________________.
10. An ___________________________ is a way of dealing with something.
Check your Understanding
1. Read the sentences below. Which group of sentences best describes the main idea of the text?
a. Barbara Arrowsmith-Young taught herself to tell time, do math, understand grammar, and be less clumsy.
b. Geniuses aren’t born being great at something. They become geniuses through practice. People with learning disabilities can also be great at the thing they struggle with. They just learn in a different way and at a different pace.
2. Re-read the second paragraph. What is the main idea?
3. Put these events in the correct sequence.
a. After lots of practice, Barbara was able to do the things her brain was “unable” to do.
b. Barbara’s teachers said she had a learning disability.
c. Barbara made exercises to teach her brain to do the things it couldn’t.
d. Barbara struggled to learn many of the things taught in elementary school.
e. Barbara started a school to help others