Practice
Practice and review · Inside the bookMake the method a reflex.
The book takes you from guided walkthroughs to independent passages and timed work. Review connects those sessions, so each one leaves a record you can learn from.
The practice progression
The passage changes.
Your record grows.
One approach across unfamiliar passages.
The teaching, drill, and exam sets change what the work asks of you. Your chart carries the record of your decisions from one passage into the next.
See the full progressionPractice material
MaterialsA worked sample · Chapter X
Chart every miss.
One choice. Its reasoning. A record to return to.
This is one charted miss from the book. It shows how a student’s account of a choice becomes a specific instruction for the next passage.
Why I got it wrong, in order.
The four questions
Worked row from the book
Passage One, question 2 Micro inference
Before the explanation
Record what drew you in and what put you off.
01Why was I attracted to the answer I picked?
Worked-row excerptI picked A because it used the detail about the artist’s own studio applying the varnishes, and quoting the passage back at itself felt like research. I wanted the choice that sounded like my own research.
02What didn’t I like about the correct answer?
Worked-row excerptI didn’t like B because it read like nothing I had highlighted.
After the explanation
Establish what each answer actually claims.
03What was correct about the correct answer?
Worked-row excerptB was right: whatever has happened to an object is the passage’s word reception, put another way.
“whatever has happened to an object”→“reception”04What was wrong with the answer I picked?
Worked-row excerptA had it backwards: the studio detail is the critics’ own evidence, so it supports the critics’ side.
“the studio detail”→“the critics’ own evidence”
The first two questions record the student’s thinking before the explanation. The last two compare the answers after it. Chapter X
The same worked row, continued
This student identifies two patterns. An actual chart may have several labels or none; the record follows what happened in that particular choice.
Read the complete worked row
Why I got it wrong
I had it down to A and B. I picked A because it used the detail about the artist’s own studio applying the varnishes, and quoting the passage back at itself felt like research. I wanted the choice that sounded like my own research. I didn’t like B because it read like nothing I had highlighted. B was right: whatever has happened to an object is the passage’s word reception, put another way. A had it backwards: the studio detail is the critics’ own evidence, so it supports the critics’ side. The passage’s own words, and Eighty percent thinking too. Where: down to two.
Prevention
When two survive and one uses the passage’s own nouns, translate the other back into the passage’s words before deciding. If every word of the plainer one matches something in the passage, select it.
Passage One, q2 · Micro inference
Charting
Free for personal study
Chapter X teaches the complete charting process. The book’s passages give you work to review, with answer explanations to compare against.Inside the book
Question-based chartingThe schedule · Chapter XIII
A plan for the time
you have.
Three preparation windows. One progression from learning the approach to using it independently. Compare the plans included in the book.
The full weekly assignments, pacing guidance, review time, and schedule adjustments are in the book. This is an overview of the three plans.
Keep the procedure.
Let the pace follow.
The book changes the demands gradually.
The teaching passages expose the reasoning. In the drill set, you supply it. The exam set brings that work into timed blocks. The full sequence, explanations, and pacing guidance are in the book.
The teaching, drill, and exam sets