Topic: Reading on the Internet

10-second review: Do the strategies of reading print text transfer to reading on the Internet? Do students need to be taught to apply [to the Internet] the same strategies as in print environment? Does the online environment require a set of new strategies for comprehension?

Source: A Kymes. Journal of Adolescent and Adult Literacy (March 2005), 492-500. A publication of the International Reading Association (IRA).

Comment: Interesting question. I find that the Internet requires me to read what is presented to me in order. I can’t easily read the first paragraph, the last paragraph, the first sentences of the middle paragraphs which I like to do with articles. It’s just not as easy as turning pages in a magazine or a book.

Also, the Internet presents headlines that I reject because they do not seem interesting to me, whereas in a book or magazine, I might try reading the first and last paragraphs and might delve more deeply into the article.

And, of course, the Internet does present the opportunity to look up background information while I am reading that would not be as readily available in print in a magazine. RayS.