Types of Reading Reading
skimming the reader does not pay attention to details and can skip new words providing the text can still be understood.
If the reader’s task, however, is to quickly look for facts or key words and phrases, scanning should be applied. During scanning, the reader runs his eyes
down the page in search for particular information. If unfamiliar words are encountered, the reader should look them up in a dictionary, as they can be key
words in the text. Scanning is also very helpful if the reader needs to search out statements, definitions etc. To sum up, the use of both skimming and scanning
improves retention of important details contained in a reading passage, as well as the speed of completing a reading task.
2 Speed reading
The aim of speed-reading is to improve the speed at which a text is read and understood. The second aim is also to improve text comprehension itself.
Owing to speed reading more information can be acquired in a shorter period. To enhance the pace at which the reader reads and comprehends the text, one should
take such steps as reducing skip-back, reducing fixation time, and expanding the complex zone.
During reading, the reader does not process a text letter-by-letter, or word by word, but rather blocks of words by blocks of words. To read blocks of words
effectively, the reader’s eyes should be fixed on blocks as long as possible. Therefore, the larger the fixation zone, the more effective speed-reading will be.
The fixation time during which the eye is focused at a given complex zone, is also
very important, as the shorter complex time, the more reading speed will improve. Since the reader processes the text in blocks of words by blocks of words manner,
it may happen that at some point he will fail to understand a block of words, thus, he wi
ll have to move back to it. Such „returns’ are called „skip-backs’. The aim of speed-reading then is to reduce skip-backs to a minimum, as they slow down the
process of reading.
As it emerges, the reading process can be affected by many factors. All of those factors, however, are reader-dependent. What
important is the reader’s proficiency, and what results from it, his knowledge of vocabulary. As vocabulary
is kept in the learner’s memory, also memory plays a very substantial role in the whole process. Its supplementary task is to activate cognitive schemata.
Appropriate reading strategies, however, are of crucial significance, as they make the success in the overall comprehension.