Reading Skills

The general concept of literacy is the ability to read and write in the daily life. When a child is born, it is not able to speak, read or write. When it goes to school, it starts learning reading and writing. It learns first the mother tongue or regional language, and later on it may learn national language and international language. Those who are able to read may come across different forms of reading, at different times, for different purposes. For a literate person and an average professional, it is said that they spend about one sixth of their time in reading.

Reading is an ability to successfully generate meaning from text. A reader reads a text to understand its meaning and put that understanding to use.

Reading Comprehension is an active process in construction of meaning and involves vocabulary, thinking and reasoning. It refers to the ability to understand information presented in written form. Effective readers not only make sense of the text, but are also able to use the information it contains. Reading without comprehension is simply word calling. Good Readers are purposeful and active therefore it is rightly said, the more reading a reader does, the more reading comprehension should improve. Readers apply following comprehension techniques to construct the meaning from the text;

Monitoring Comprehension: Readers must learn how to consider the meanings in text, reflect on their understandings and use different strategies to enhance their understanding.

Visualization is the ability to create mental pictures of characters and scenes. Mental images or pictures help readers to understand and remember what they have read.

Prior Knowledge affects effective comprehension. Good readers know how to use their background knowledge and experiences to help them understand what they are reading or listening.

Summarizing or Retelling all or parts of text in readers’ own words clears up language issues. It allows readers to discriminate between main ideas and minor details. Readers identify and collect the most important ideas and restate (Paraphrasing) them in their own words.

Generating Questions: Effective readers are always asking themselves questions. Readers ask questions for clarification, to predict and to integrate information from different sections of the text. 

Skimming demands top most speeds and is a method of quickly gathering information from the printed page.

In Scanning reader runs his eyes down the page with the purpose of finding an answer to a specific question. Skimming is a rapid reading techniques and scanning is a technique to find the facts in a very fast manner. 

Example of Skimming & Scanning; We may well skim through an article first just to know whether it is worth reading and then read it more carefully because we have decided that it is of interest. It is also possible afterwards to scan the same article in order to note down a figure or a name which we particularly want to remember.

Reading Comprehension means retention of the information with proper understanding. Comprehension is first dependent on understanding and understanding depends on interest, concentration and the background.

Extensive Reading is also called superficial or surface reading. Reading for enjoyment with emphasis on general understanding is called extensive reading.

Intensive Reading is also called Narrow Reading. It is very effective reading for complete comprehension and long retention.

Reading Fluency is an essential ability to read at an appropriate rate with adequate comprehension. Fluency is the ability to read text accurately and smoothly.

Saying a written text aloud is called Oral Reading or Reading Aloud. Silent Reading is considered to be a ‘see and comprehend process’. Reader perceives a written text in order to understand its content silently.