Scanning

What is Scanning?
Scanning is a very-high speed reading. When you scan, you have a question in mind.
You do not read every word, only the words that answer your question. Practice in
scanning will help you to skip over unimportant words so that you can read faster.
Scanning is a skill that you often use in daily life. Provide examples….
Scanning text

You can use the scanning technique to look up a phone number, read through the small ads in
a newspaper, or for browsing television schedules, timetables, lists, catalogues or webpages
for information. For these tasks you don’t need to read or understand every word. Scanning is
also useful when you don’t have time to read every word. This could be when you’re studying
or looking for specific information from a book or article and need to find it quickly.

Tips: better scanning

• Don’t try to read every word. Instead let your eyes move quickly across the page until you
find what you’re looking for.

• Use clues on the page, such as headings and titles, to help you.

• In a dictionary or phone book, use the header words to help you scan. You can find these in
bold type at the top of each page.

• If you’re reading for study, start by thinking up or writing down some questions that you
want to answer. Doing this can focus your mind and help you find the facts or information that
you need more easily.

• Many texts list things in alphabetical order from A to Z. These include everyday materials,
such as the phone book or indexes to books and catalogues.

• There are many ways to practise scanning skills. Try looking up a favourite recipe in the index
of a cookbook, search for a plumber in your local Yellow Pages or scan webpages on the
internet to find specific information.

SKIMMING

Skimming text
 Skimming is a reading technique that can help you:
• read more quickly
• decide if the text is interesting and whether you should read it in more detail, you can
use the skimming technique when you want to identify the main ideas in the text. How
is skimming different to scanning? The term skimming is often confused with scanning.
• You skim a text to obtain the gist - the overall sense - of a piece of writing. This can
help you decide whether to read it more slowly and in more detail.
• You scan a text to obtain specific information. For example, to find a particular
number in a telephone directory. Sometimes you can use both reading methods. After
you’ve skimmed a piece of text to decide whether it’s of interest, you might then use
scanning techniques to find specific information. How do you skim read? When you use
the skimming technique you don’t read the whole text word for word. You should use
as many clues as possible to give you some background information. There might be
pictures or images related to the topic, or an eye-catching title. Let your eyes skim over
the surface of the text and look out for key words while thinking about any clues you’ve
found about the subject.
• Read the title, subtitles and subheadings to find out what the text is about.
• Look at the illustrations to give you more information about the topic.
• Read the first and last sentence of each paragraph.
• Don’t read every word or every sentence. Let your eyes skim over the text and look
out for key words.
• Continue to think about the meaning of the text.

Difference between Scanning and Skimming

Skimming Scanning

A fast reading method that gives you an idea of what the text A fast reading method that allows you to find
is about without having to read it in full specific information in a text

Means reading the introduction, the headlines, or the first Means going through an article quickly
phrase of a paragraph looking for a date or a quote

Implies not having read the text before Implies previously knowing the information
you are looking for
Basic differences between Skimming and Scanning

1. Let’s imagine to better understand

Although skimming and scanning are techniques for fast reading that help you read well
in a shorter time, the differences between skimming and scanning may take a couple of
minutes to be explained. However, understanding it is an interesting experience, don’t
be discouraged.

Image by Pexcels via Pixabay

Now let’s try to imagine reading as attending a buffet party. There’re so many dishes
nicely displayed. Skimming is when you take a look around and tell yourself “ok, this
party’s worth my next couple of hours ”. Then, it’s time for you to do the scanning
job, selecting what to put on your dish because of the fact that you can’t have them all.

2. Short definitions for skimming and scanning

Sometimes, of course, giving definitions will truly do us a favor. Take a good look at
two short paragraphs below to better understand skimming and scanning.
Skimming is a process of reading to get an overall view or get an impression of the
content. This is when you pick out the main ideas or messages.

Scanning, on the other hand, requires you to look for a particular word or phrase. You
can totally ignore unnecessary ones. If you’re reading, you must be having or about
to have questions to be answered, just wisely choose what to read and quickly get what
may benefit.

When to use Scanning and when to use Skimming

The differences between skimming and scanning are crystal clear. Skimming helps you
tell what the general information is, while scanning helps you position a particular piece
of information. In fact, you have to understand your purposes of reading in order to
apply a proper technique. You have to be the most flexible reader you can become. The
variability of the situations requires you to be adaptable.

Keep reading if you don’t know when to use these two different techniques.

1. When to use skimming

Skimming has always been one of the most selected ways when it comes to FAST
READING. Before putting any effort into studying a document, practising skimming
can be a good hand in previewing. You can use skimming before entering a new
chapter of your textbook or a long article. To be simply said, most people refer to use
skimming when they need to save time. Time-saving has always been one of the top
priorities of today society. Reading every word can prevent us from increasing our
reading speed. There’re many situations that spending long hours of laborious reading
can’t do anything well.

Suppose you have to read an academic text and write an essay about its topic, skimming
can’t do all the job as there is too much information. This skill would help when you’re
trying to find out if something is a waste of time or similar to something else you’ve
already known. Using skimming is an ideal strategy when there are only a few days left
and you’re about to take an examination. In short, you save your time by skimming.

2. When to use scanning

As convenient as it seems, skimming can’t guarantee you all the important points.
Usually, you need scanning when you find a friend’s phone number in a telephone book
or last night football’s scores in the newspaper. Or when you’re in a new restaurant
knowing they have your favourite dish but not sure the price is reasonable, you also
need to scan along the menu to see it with the price. Scanning significantly proves its
value when researching and studying. These two kinds of activity can’t be successful
if they depend on only your general knowledge.

You may also need scanning to locate the correct answer for given questions. You
are likely to scan when you have no intention of getting a general idea. Obviously, if
you have no doubt of your purposes for reading and other unrelated information is far
from support, now take scanning into your consideration. Scanning is perfect when it
comes to looking for something more particular rather than an overview idea in your
mind.

3. Skimming and Scanning are close friends

Despite all the differences between skimming and scanning, those two friends seem to
be best together. They have been taught in almost every class of reading methods. This
is because of the fact that practising either of them can show great results.

However, the combination of skimming and scanning is even much greater. It’s like an
insurance for your fast reading: you read quicker but you don’t miss out anything
important. Why and how can these techniques do such an amazing job? Skimming
takes a role of covering the whole reading material to assure you get what’s beneficial
and leave out the useless ones. Scanning plays a part in taking out the most precious
facts you need. It’s a responsible way of fast reading that no one could deny.
How to use both skills in your reading

1. Effective reading with skimming

When learning to skim, get yourself ready to move your eyes quickly through the pages.
Skimming is not about placing your eyes wherever your attention is drawn to. Effective
work of skimming does not require you to do that.

You know that you don’t read every word but carefully pay attention to what forms the
structure of that reading material. So what exactly are we talking about? Headings,
bulleted lists, numbered lists, bold text, italic text… These are just some of them,
though. Now here are some steps you should take if you do skimming:

 Look at the table of contents if there is. It’s a fast way to figure out what’s
going on.

Image by Pexcels via Pixabay

 The main headings are of the most essential, so don’t forget to read them.
Remember that tables and charts have headings, too (e.g., U.S population
 by age and gender, Healthcare cost from 2010 to 2017 and Risks of
environmental impacts). Some may miss the headings of tables and charts as
a habit, so keep in mind they are there for some good reasons.
 After reading the first sentences, scroll your eyes down to the last ones of
each paragraph. These sentences can be the topic sentences which hold the
main idea. This should not take you too much time as there’re only a few
important words to follow. However, don’t hesitate to stop if you think
something needs to be read entirely. Make sure you leave the paragraph and
move to the next after carefully skimming.
 Attentively read the keywords. They can be nouns, dates, events, names,
numbers,… These very single words or phrases that give details are worth
considering. Questions about these kinds of information usually show up in
the IELTS test.
 Along with your skimming process, underline or highlight
important words and phrases. It’s good to use a marker or pencil (if you
think you might want to erase the lines after that). This is also a preparation
for scanning.

Image by PDPics via Pixabay

 Remember it’s you who decide what rate of speed you want to skim. Of
course, it’s not necessarily equal in every part. The situations may vary, it
 could be a slow-down when you skim through an unfamiliar word, for
example. Sometimes, there are sentences that need more than one glance.

As far as what we have agreed in the previous section, you only scan when you know
what to scan. There are some facts you want to find out. So what are the facts that you
need? If you have questions and are looking for the specific answer, there are probably
some keywords in the question.

2. Effective reading with scanning

You can now leave out all the rest of the text as you’re in search of some specific
question-related information. In case there’re not any given keywords, establish them.
Choose a few words or phrases to search. It’s your choice to look for one or more
keywords at a time. Let’s see if you can practice these suggestions below:

 Use a finger of your hand to scan, which is a helpful way to stay focused. A
calmness of mind together with the strong physical image of your finger
pointing along the lines will provide you with confidence. You’re also sure
of what you’ve scanned and what’s left to be scanned.

Image by Free-Photos via Pixabay

 Repeat silently in your mind the keywords while scanning. You may think
you’re sure of what you need, but keeping on telling yourself the wanted
word or phrase can never be anything of disadvantages. Whether it’s a phone
number, a person’s name, a location, a country… keep saying quietly that’s
the destination.
 When you come across a keyword while scanning, stop and carefully read
the surrounding text. If there’s anything serving your purposes, note them
down to review later and see if this information needs noticing. The chances
we find needed sentences and then lose them can happen without a warning.
If we do not prepare for surprises, we’ll be surprisingly slower than planning.