3.2. Scanning: Find the Line
Find the one sentence a question depends on, in seconds rather than minutes.
The short version
Scanning means hunting the text for one thing.
The best anchors are names, numbers, dates and capital letters.
When you find it, read the whole sentence around it.
Your skim map tells you where to start looking.
An anchor is something you can see
Some words are easy to spot without reading. Those are anchors: a number, a date, a name, a capital letter, a symbol such as £ or %. Pick one out of the question, then run your eye down the text looking only for it.
Step by step
- 1Find the anchor in the question
Choose the part that is easiest to spot in the text, not the most important idea.
- 2Run your eye down the text
Look for the shape of that anchor only. You are not reading. You are searching.
- 3Stop and read the sentence
The anchor gets you to the right line. The sentence around it holds the answer.
The same passage as before
This is the text you skimmed in the last lesson, so you already have a map of it. That is the point: this time the work is finding one line inside it.
The swimming pond at Hollin Green opened in July 2016 on the site of a paddling pool that the council had filled in after closing it in 1998. Unlike a lido, it uses no chlorine. A local trust raised £240,000 for the works, most of it from a single grant, and the council agreed to a 25-year lease on condition that the trust pays every running cost. The pond stays clean because its water is pumped through a planted margin. Reeds, rushes and a bed of gravel around the edge take up the nutrients that would otherwise feed algae. Swimmers use a deep central area that is kept free of plants. One pump moves the whole volume of the pond through the margin about once every two days. In a hot week the trust closes the pond for a morning so that the margin can catch up, and a lifeguard tests the water before opening each day. The pond does not suit every swimmer. Because there is no chlorine, visitors must shower before entering, and anyone with an open cut is turned away. Numbers are capped at 120 people in the water at one time, so on a warm weekend a queue forms by 10.00. The trust's manager, Ruth Ashby, says that a second pond would double the maintenance bill without doubling the income, since entry is free for residents. For now the answer to a queue is a wait, not a bigger pond.
Quiz time2 questions
Give yourself twenty seconds for each one.
Scan for the number
NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER. There is no name in the question, but how many tells you to look for digits.
Only people may be in the water at one time.
Write no more than 2 words.
Scan for the name
NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS. A job title is your anchor here, and names carry capital letters.
The trust's manager is called .
Write no more than 2 words.
Tips
- Start where your map says
A question about cost belongs in the paragraph you labelled how it was paid for. Do not start at the top every time.
- Never answer from the anchor alone
Finding the word is half the job. The sentence around it decides the answer.
Recap
Pick the part of the question that is easiest to spot in the text.
Search for that shape only. Do not read on the way.
Then read the whole sentence around it before you answer.
Next: why the question almost never uses the same words as the text.