Although reading print text is now an important way for the general population to access information, this has not always been the case.

There are several types and methods of reading, with differing rates that can be attained for each, for different kinds of material and purposes. In this article I would like to take a closer look at differencies in reading, advantages vs. drawbacks of reading methods and reading assessment.

When you look at a group of words printed or written on paper or anywhere else, your mind is able to derive some meaning from it. This is a cognitive process and this process is called reading. It is a means of communication, language acquisition and sharing of ideas and information. Effective reading involves use of decoding skills in order to translate the printed text into sounds for the purpose of reading. This process also involves the use of semantics, morpheme, context and syntax cues for the purpose of identifying the meaning of words that are unknown. Effective readers use comprehension, activate prior knowledge and also have fluency while reading.

Reading is not only text based. It may also mean pictograms and music notations. The term reading has an analogy in that it may mean acquiring of data by reading some type of computer storage.

Reading is used for various purposes. One purpose may be to just skim the text (400 – 700 wpm). Other purposes of reading may be to memorize (less than 100 wpm), for comprehension (200 – 400 wpm) or for learning (100 – 200 wpm). The kind of reading that most of us do everyday is for comprehension. When there is a large amount of text to be read, we use another type of reading which is “reading for skimming”.

There are different methods and types of reading. It is categorized based on its rate, purpose and the kind of material.

Following are some types of them:

Speed reading: This is very much similar to speed learning. This method focuses on increasing the speed of reading without reduction in retention or comprehension.

Subvocalized reading: In this type the person uses sight reading accompanied by internal sounding of what is read as if it is spoken. Some people are of the opinion that this type of reading may slow down the speed of reading.

Proofreading: This type is used to detect typographical errors. Professional proofreaders are able to do this kind of reading at very high speeds. Such readers may suspend comprehension during the process of proofreading.

Some methods used to teach effective reading practices are the Survey Question Read Recite Review (SQ3R) method, Structure Proposition Evaluation (SPE) method and methods based on Multiple Intelligences. Some other methods of learning and teaching to read had been developed, but have turned out to be controversial to some extent. These methods are Whole Language methods and Phonics method.

Finally, there are some tests that are used to evaluate how well you can read.

I hope this brief look into the most used method of getting information gave you a basic knowledge of its environment.