Extensive vs. Intensive Reading

The two most important of reading styles are known as Intensive Reading and Extensive Reading. If you learn to master the what, how, and why of these two manners of reading, you will have two extremely powerful tools in your language learning arsenal, which will fuel your ability to acquire vocabulary indefinitely.

Reading, despite being one of the four major skills of language learning, is one of the skills that is most often neglected by language learners.

For the language learner who wishes to reach the upper levels of target language capability, this lack of reading poses a serious obstacle to the expansion of one's vocabulary, as a limited vocabulary offers less capacity to understand and, in turn, be understood.

So let me show you how you can change that.

Intensive Reading

To read intensively is to completely deconstruct a text, with the goal of absorbing as much meaning from it as possible. This is done by taking a text, and systematically looking up every word, phrase, or collocation that you do not understand.

This is an activity that requires great mental effort and focus. Because of this, the learner who engages in intensive reading must be careful to follow specific guidelines, or else risk boredom and burnout. Specifically, if you wish to read a text intensively, you must take care to read texts that are interesting and short, to read only for brief periods of time, and to do so when you have the most mental energy.

Extensive Reading

To read extensively is to simply read as much as possible, without concerning oneself with the minutia of meaning and the occasional unknown word. This is done by reading for large swaths of time, and looking up words only when you deem it absolutely necessary to your understanding of the text.

If the text you wish to extensively read is at the appropriate level, you'll find that most unknown words can be deciphered by looking at their surrounding context, making overt use of translations or dictionaries unnecessary.

While intensive reading requires a high level of focus and deliberate effort, extensive reading is meant to be a fun and pleasurable experience, requiring a low expenditure of mental effort. The more extensive reading you do, the more language you are exposed to, allowing you to increase your passive knowledge of vocabulary quite quickly.

Specifically, if you wish to read a text extensively, you must read texts that are interesting, level-appropriate, of moderate length, to read when you can dedicate longer blocks of time, and to do so when you are relaxed.

Extensive vs. Intensive Reading

By now, you understand the how to read, what to read, and why to read of both Intensive and Extensive Reading. Though you may feel more compelled to one style of reading over the other, don't fall into the trap of thinking that one method is intrinsically better.

Instead, it is important to realize that both styles of reading have their uses, and you should use both styles in tandem (across different texts) in order to bolster your vocabulary acquisition quickly and effectively.

Remember that extensive reading and intensive reading are, at their very core, simply tools. Whenever and wherever you read in your target language, if you know which of these tools is the right tool for the job, you'll be able to maximize your learning, and take your language skill to new heights.

Which reading style do you enjoy the most?