Reading materials

Academic materials

Reading and note-taking Study Guide from Reading University
Using English for Academic Purposes: a guide for students in higher education, by Andy Gillett This site has some excellent practice activities.
Gresham College has an online library of lectures on many topics. You can read the transcript for each lecture. Click the link, choose a lecture, then click Transcript.
Who on Earth Are We is a series of 12 online lectures about intercultural issues. You can use the transcripts for reading practice.
Academic Listening is a similar series. Again, instead of listening, you can download the transcripts for reading practice.
IELTS books and websites also have some useful material. If you find that you are working hard but not getting better, make an appointment at languagesupport@yorksj.ac.uk to see Charlie Martineau.

Newsademic This is an online newspaper service for school students and English language learners. They take articles from real newspapers and simplify them for learners. Click here for a free copy to find out if you like this paper.
Links to hundreds of websites with reading materials you can use free
Free reading lessons from an American website
There are some programmes you can download free to help you practise reading skills at this page.
Onestopenglish.com is a website for English teachers - but you can register and use it free of charge. There are lots of reading lessons available.
News about Britain is a collection of short articles which you can use for reading practice. Again, you can download the script and the article for reading practice. If the link does not work, go to this page and click ""News about Britain".
Graded readers We have a good library of these at the Language Support Centre (Holgate 137 - check opening times). Talk to us for advice if you want to buy some graded readers. Also, Oxford has some graded readers available as apps.

The BBC website This is a huge site with thousands of pages of multimedia material. Topics include History, Business, Religion & Ethics, Arts, Culture and many others.
CNN Student News This is a daily news programme designed principally for native speakers - but it has a script for each programme.
The Guardian Weekly An excellent international weekly newspaper. If the link does not work, go to the Guardian's homepage and search for "Guardian Weekly".
The Economist Another excellent weekly which you can buy in magazine format in newspaper shops, but also of course constantly updated online.
The New Scientist A superb weekly science magazine which can be understood by non-mathematicians!
CRAYON is a website which allows you, quickly and easily, to create your own newspaper. Articles on topics that you choose, from newspapers you choose, are sent to you.
Links to hundreds of news services around the world are available from this page.

Introductions to specific subjects (Palgrave Macmillan)
Library Guide for my subject Go to this page from the YSJ website. Click your subject. You can then see a lot of useful information - including the name and contact details of the librarian who looks after your subject. She (or he) can show you a good basic book or articles about your subject. You can select a lot of useful basic vocabulary from that book or article by:
Reading the back cover
Reading the chapter titles on the contents page
Reading the summary page at the beginning or end of each chapter
Looking at the index
Looking at the bibliography - read the titles of the books and articles