There are basically four ways to read, based on my understanding of reading as I teach in my own accelerated whole-brain reading programs. When researching new topic areas, I devour about 20-30 books in a week or so using this methodology and spike my expertise in that area. Then there is testing that goes on to see whether the modeling process worked or not!
#1 - Broad reading. This is where you explore the breadth of a topic, going wide first. You'd consider this first because you need to build up topic expertise. Involves opening up a book, looking at the pieces that form the big picture. Consider this the frame of the jigsaw puzzle of knowledge.
#2 - Narrow reading. You look at things you don't understand and start to look into the definitions, glossary, meanings of words. This happens when your mental schema don't match the words that are on the page. This is important - if you never studied electrical engineering, and only have the mental schema of Shakespeare, you'd be slower unless you did #1 first. Often, narrow reading is facilitated with Glossary reading, and some memory skills like mnemonics and visualization.
#3 - Reverse reading. If you wanted you check on comprehension, you have to test yourself. Instead of gettting questions to answer, you'd probably formulate questions along the way. This actually has an effect of getting you to formulate an all encompassing question for the 'answer' you've just read. Let's say para 1 and 2 talk about "the factors that caused the downfall of the Roman Empire". The questions you could forumlate include "What were the factors that caused the downfall of the Roman Empire", "who and what caused it" and "why were they involved" among others.
#4 - Reading To Interpret (if an examinable question). This is my own term for interpreting the requirements of an examination question. For instance, if you interpret a question as asking for facts, that's what you will have to give. If you are asked to compare and contrast, that's a different set of answers to give altogether. Interpreting the nature of the question being asked about the topic is important as a reading skill as well.
There is a constant test-feedback cycle that helps to formulate a better model and understanding of the topic area you wish to gain expertise in.
Not sure if this correlates with Photoreading, but I hope it helps enrich in some way.
cheers. |