I do it a bit differently:

Read 0 is basically just thumbing through the book and absorbing its "natural structure"

Read 1 is a regular cover to cover but oftentimes I only pick specific chapters that looked interesting from R0. Important: With pencil and marker in hand to highlight interesting stuff. I selectively pick examples and exercises and work through them. At the same time I start building a mindmap on the topic (I use FreeMind). If the language has a REPL I usually play around a bit and copy/paste interesting building blocks into the map.

"Read" 2 is working through a bigish project I made up+additional internet research. Always growing that mindmap.