5 Finding and Using Information
Learn to locate information, identify central ideas, connect evidence across text and features, make supported inferences, and write accurate summaries.
Locate information
Readers use passages to locate facts, understand how ideas connect, and answer questions with . Information can appear in the main text, headings, captions, diagrams, charts, or different sections of a longer passage. Check all relevant parts rather than relying on memory or guessing.
Find the and
The is the most important point a passage or section makes about its topic. explain, prove, or illustrate that point. They may be facts, examples, reasons, or descriptions; an interesting detail is not necessarily essential if it does not support the .
To identify the and its , ask what the section is mostly about, what the author wants readers to understand, and which details explain or support that idea. Headings can preview a section’s topic, but read the section itself to determine its .
Informational passages may use sequence, cause and effect, comparison, or problem and solution. Recognizing a passage’s structure can help you follow the relationships among its details.
Use
help readers locate, clarify, or compare information. Check each feature and its labels carefully, then connect it to the passage.
Title and headings: Preview the topic and divide a passage into sections.
Table of contents or index: Locate a chapter or specific topic.
Glossary: Check the meaning of an important word.
Caption or labeled diagram: Identify or explain what an image shows.
Chart, graph, or map: Find and compare data or locations.
Sidebar: Read extra information connected to the main text.
A feature may add information, repeat an idea in another form, or give a specific example. Before using a picture or chart to support a claim, read its title, labels, units, and caption. Graphics and text can complement one another, so use both when a question calls for them.
Connect information across sections
A topic may be explained in several places or in more than one format. To combine information, first identify the question’s key words and locate the relevant heading, paragraph, or feature. Read nearby sentences rather than only the sentence containing a matching word, then look for related information elsewhere in the passage. Explain how the details connect and point to for each part of your answer.
For example, one section might describe how a garden is planted, while a later section explains what students learn from it. An answer about both the process and its purpose needs information from both sections.
Make inferences from
An is a reasonable conclusion about something the passage does not state directly. Build it from clues in the text or its features and, when appropriate, relevant background knowledge. An is not simply a guess: the should make the conclusion reasonable.
A useful frame is: “The passage says ____. This suggests ____ because ____.” If another detail does not fit your , reconsider it. Revise an when you encounter new .
Summarize information
A gives the central idea and the most important supporting points in a concise, neutral way. Leave out minor examples, repeated information, and personal opinions. A should reflect what the author says, not add unsupported conclusions.
For a longer passage, briefly summarize each section, then combine those section summaries to capture the whole passage.
Read, connect, and answer
The school garden gives students a place to study living things. In spring, teams plant seeds and measure how tall the seedlings grow each week. Students also record which insects visit the flowers. By comparing their observations, they learn how plants change and how insects interact with them.
The chart gives seedling heights of 2 cm in week 1, 5 cm in week 2, and 8 cm in week 3. Together, the passage and chart support these readings:
: The garden helps students study living things.
Supporting detail: Students measure seedlings and record visiting insects.
Chart information: Seedlings grew from 2 cm in week 1 to 8 cm in week 3.
: The seedlings grew taller each week shown because the chart records an increase from 2 cm to 5 cm to 8 cm. This describes only the three weeks shown; it does not prove what happened outside that period.
: Students use the school garden to observe plants and insects, measure changes, and learn how living things interact.