A Brief Analysis of Reading Methods and Skills in College English Extensive Reading

Yang Hui

Abstract：College English extensive reading is an important subject for English majors. It is established to develop students' reading comprehension ability and language ability. This paper analyzes some reading methods and skills in daily extensive reading in order to help students develop good habits and improve their reading skills.

Key words：reading methods； reading skills； college English extensive reading

At present， many high school students can enter the university through the college entrance examination， but their reading ability is awful. In order to solve this problem， extensive reading comes into being. Students are required to read widely and read a lot， thus they could learn a lot of knowledge.

1. The meaning of extensive reading

The College English Extensive Reading is a main subject for English majors. As the literal meaning might imply， extensive reading means reading widely and reading a lot. In the process of extensive reading， students have to deal with many kinds of reading materials including society， science， technology， culture， economy， biography and so on. Also， lots of body materials can be seen such as narration， description， exposition， advertising， brochures and charts. Students are not only required to read fast and read more， but also to understand accurately， so extensive reading is not so easy for them.

2. The significance of developing extensive reading ability

Students could continue extensive reading， which will help them to consolidate what they have learned in intensive reading. Maybe they would regard extensive reading as a difficult course， but it is exactly good experience for them to increase the amount of reading， develop the reading ability and improve the speed of reading in an effective way. Whats more， students can open their eyes， get the knowledge， and enhance the sensitivity to cultural differences. Most of all， extensive reading could help students develop good reading habits and these habits must play an important role in students life.

3. The methods and skills of college English extensive reading

（1） Skimming

Skimming is a special and practical fast reading skill. It requires students to read something quickly to find them in a facts or ideas in it. In order to find out the central ideas and main points of the article as fast as possible， Students only need to find the key statements and the main facts or examples while skimming. The theme of argumentation is often clear， and it is usually highlighted at the beginning of the article. Then the central argument could be found at the beginning or end of every paragraph. In English exams， while there are some questions about the main ideas of the article， students should use skimming. The key idea of the article has a great relationship with its title， and students could roughly guess the content of the article according to the topic. Each paragraph has a topic sentence， so students may infer the key idea by combining the title and topic sentences. Using skimming methods and techniques can not only help students save time in the examination process， but also help them solve the problem in a more accurately way.

（2） Scanning

Scanning requires students to read something quickly in order to find some particular information. It is more targeted than skimming. Students should only look for answers related to specific information， such as time， place， figures and ignore other unrelated materials. There are some differences between skimming and scanning： students have to grasp the overall information in skimming but just a specific fact or specific information in scanning. Scanning requires speed and accuracy of reading， so it is of great practical value to read in students' daily life. For example， when you read a book， you can grab the tip of the article and find the section that contains the information you need， next you can look at the title or chapter title to determine whether the article contains the related materials， then you could directly turn to the part. Scanning not only helps the students solve the problem of reading speed and efficiency， but also plays an important role in testing students' language proficiency and reading comprehension.

（3） Guessing

Vocabulary is the basis of learning English. If the students dont have large vocabulary， they will meet a lot of new words in the reading process， and the new words will get in the way of reading fast and understanding the whole article accurately. Guessing is a solution to the vocabulary problem. In the process of reading， you cannot pause to look up individual words in the dictionary， but you should guess the meaning of words through word formation or the context of article. There are some common clues of guessing， such as definition clues， synonyms and antonyms clues， explanation clues and word - building clues. You can guess the meaning of words easily by having a good knowledge of these clues.

4. Conclusion

Developing reading ability is one of the aims of English teaching， and it is the key to improve the quality of teaching. If students have a good knowledge of methods and skills of skimming， scanning and guessing， they would get better grade in the examination and would be willing to study English harder than before. Extensive reading focuses on improving reading methods and reading skills in order to improve students comprehension ability and reading speed. Thus， after taking extensive reading course for a long time， college students would develop their reading ability and would become better English majors.

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