WordieWhat Is Extensive Reading?
Extensive Reading: an approach to language learning in which you read large amounts of easy, self-chosen material quickly and for enjoyment, focusing on overall meaning rather than on studying every word.
Also known as: ER, free voluntary reading, pleasure reading
Extensive reading is reading a lot of easy, interesting material for meaning, at a comfortable speed, without stopping to analyze every unknown word. The goal is volume: many pages, many books, many encounters with the same common words and patterns. It contrasts with intensive reading, where you study a short text in detail.
Origins and principles
The distinction between extensive and intensive reading goes back to Harold Palmer, a British language teacher writing in the early twentieth century. The modern approach was defined most influentially by Richard Day and Julian Bamford in Extensive Reading in the Second Language Classroom (1998) and their "top ten principles" paper (2002). Paraphrased, the key principles are:
- The material is easy, with few unknown words.
- A wide range of topics and genres is available.
- Learners choose what they read and can stop reading anything they dislike.
- Learners read as much as possible.
- The purpose is pleasure, information and general understanding.
- Reading is its own reward; there are few or no comprehension exercises.
- Reading speed is usually faster, not slower.
- Reading is individual and silent.
- The teacher guides and is a reading role model.
Extensive vs intensive reading
| Extensive reading | Intensive reading | |
|---|---|---|
| Text length | Long: whole books, many articles | Short: a paragraph or page |
| Difficulty | Easy, about 98% of words known | Challenging, many new items |
| Speed | Fast, fluent | Slow, careful |
| Dictionary use | Rare | Frequent |
| Main benefit | Fluency, consolidation of known words, gradual new words | Precise understanding, explicit grammar and vocabulary |
An example
An English learner at B1 level picks a graded reader of a detective story written for their level. They read 15 pages a day on the bus. When they meet suspect for the third time ("The police questioned the main suspect"), they guess its meaning from the plot and keep going. They do not stop for a word that appears once and does not affect the story. After a month they have read four short books, and words such as suspect, evidence and alibi feel familiar because they kept coming back.
Why extensive reading matters for vocabulary
Most words are learned through repeated exposure, not single encounters. Extensive reading supplies those repetitions on a scale no word list can match. Studies of incidental vocabulary learning show genuine gains from reading, and also show their limits: in Waring and Takaki's (2003) graded reader study, many new words were forgotten within months, and words met more often were much more likely to be retained. Pellicer-Sánchez and Schmitt (2010) likewise found that words encountered more frequently in a novel were learned better.
Extensive reading also deepens knowledge of words you already half-know: their collocations, grammar and typical contexts. That is the part of word knowledge that flashcards teach poorly.
How to start extensive reading
- Find your level. Pick a page and count unknown words. If you meet more than one or two per 100 words, go easier. The lexical coverage calculator can estimate this for a text.
- Choose easy, interesting material. Graded readers are designed for this. Later, move to young-adult fiction, blogs and news on topics you know well.
- Set a volume goal. A daily time (for example 20 minutes) or a page count. The reading time calculator helps plan it.
- Keep reading past unknown words. Look up only words that block the meaning or keep recurring.
- Capture a few words. Save recurring words for light review. With Wordie, a word you save while reading online is highlighted the next time it appears, which turns further reading into review.
Limitations
Extensive reading is slow to show results and needs a large supply of suitable texts. Learners with small vocabularies may not find authentic material easy enough, which is why graded readers exist. It also builds recognition more than active use, so it works best alongside speaking, writing and some deliberate study. See how to learn vocabulary from reading for a full routine.
Sources: Day, R. & Bamford, J. (1998) Extensive Reading in the Second Language Classroom; Day, R. & Bamford, J. (2002) Top ten principles for teaching extensive reading, Reading in a Foreign Language; Waring, R. & Takaki, M. (2003) At what rate do learners learn and retain new vocabulary from reading a graded reader?, Reading in a Foreign Language; Pellicer-Sánchez, A. & Schmitt, N. (2010) Incidental vocabulary acquisition from an authentic novel, Reading in a Foreign Language; Hu, M. & Nation, I.S.P. (2000).
Frequently asked questions
What is the difference between extensive and intensive reading?
Extensive reading means reading a lot of easy text quickly for meaning and enjoyment. Intensive reading means working slowly and carefully through a short, harder text to study its vocabulary and grammar. Most learners benefit from both.
How easy should extensive reading material be?
Easy enough that you rarely need a dictionary. A common guideline is knowing about 98% of the running words, which means roughly one unknown word in every 50.
Does extensive reading improve vocabulary?
Yes, but gradually. Studies show real incidental vocabulary gains, especially for words met many times, though many single encounters are forgotten. Volume and repetition are what make it work.
How much should I read for extensive reading to work?
More is better. Many programs aim for something like one graded reader a week, or a fixed daily habit of 20 to 30 minutes, sustained over months rather than weeks.
Related terms
Intensive Reading
a careful, slow way of reading a short and relatively difficult text in which you study its vocabulary, grammar and meaning in detail, often with a dictionary and a teacher's guidance.
Graded Readers
books written or simplified for language learners using a limited, level-specific vocabulary and grammar, so that learners can read whole stories with few unknown words.
Comprehensible Input
language that a learner can understand, mostly from context and prior knowledge, even though it contains some words or structures they do not yet know.
Incidental Vocabulary Learning
the learning of new words as a by-product of doing something else, such as reading, listening or watching for meaning, without deliberately setting out to memorize them.
Lexical Coverage
The percentage of the running words (tokens) in a text that a particular reader knows. At 98 percent coverage, about one word in fifty is unfamiliar.
Articles about Extensive Reading
Teaching Vocabulary in ESL: A Research-Based Guide for Teachers, With Lesson Ideas
How ESL teachers can teach vocabulary using research: choose words by frequency, recycle them, assign extensive reading, use retrieval practice, and pick tools.
Incidental Vocabulary Learning: How Much Do You Really Pick Up from Reading and Listening?
Incidental vocabulary learning research from Nagy (1985) to Webb: realistic pick-up rates from reading and listening, what boosts them, and the limitations.
Comprehensible Input Explained: Krashen's Theory, Its Critics, and What Actually Helps Learners
Comprehensible input explained: Krashen's input hypothesis, the main criticisms, what research supports, and how to use extensive reading to grow vocabulary.
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