Speed Reading

Speed Reading

Speed Reading is an essential skill when you have to master large volumes of information quickly.

By knowing what information you want from a document before you start reading is an important part of the skill. If you only want an outline of the issue that the document discusses, then skim the document quickly extracting only the essential facts. If you need to understand the real detail of the document, then you need to read it slowly enough to fully understand it.

The greatest time savings are gained by learning to skim excessively detailed documents.

Technical Issues

Apart from ignoring irrelevant detail there are other technical improvements you can make to the way you read. This will increase your reading speed.

As you read notice that you are fixing your eyes on one block of words, then moving your eyes to the next block of words, and so on. You  are reading blocks of words at a time, not individual words one-by-one. You will also notice that you do not always go from one block to the next: sometimes you may move back a block if you are unsure about something.

Reading faster involves reading many words in a block and only looking at each block for an instant, then moving on.  This reduces the amount of work your eyes have to do and increases the amount information you can examine in a given amount of time.

Poor readers spend a lot of time on small blocks of words and skip back often. This causes the loss of the flow and structure of the text and limits the overall understanding of the subject. This irregular eye movement makes reading tiring and therefore harder to concentrate and understand the information.

Increasing the number of words read in each block

Skimming is a process of speed reading that involves visually searching the sentences of a page for clues to meaning. Skimming is usually seen more in adults than in children. It is conducted at a higher rate (700 words per minute and above) than normal reading for comprehension (around 200-230 wpm), and therefore results in lower comprehension rates, especially with information-rich reading material.

Another form of skimming involves skipping over text that is less interesting or relevant. This form of reading is not new but is more prevalent due to the ease with which alternative information can be accessed online.

Meta guiding is the visual guiding of the eye using a finger or pointer so the eye to move faster along the length of a passage of text. It can also involve the drawing of invisible shapes on a page of text to broaden the visual span for speed reading. For example, an audience of customers at a speed reading seminar will be instructed to use a finger or pen to make these shapes on a page and told that this will speed up their visual cortex, increase their visual span to take in the whole line. The reduction in subvocalization is supposed to speed up reading. This whole process encourages the eye to skim over the text but reduces comprehension and memory, and leads to missing important details of the text.

Meta Guiding takes a conscious effort. Try to expand the number of words that you read at a time. Practice will help you to read faster. You may find that you can increase the number of words you read by holding the text a little further from your eyes. The more words you read in a block, the faster you can read!

Reduce the length of time spent reading each block.

The minimum amount of time needed to read a block is about 0.25sec. Push yourself to reduce the time you take. You will notice that you get better at picking up information quickly. This is a matter of practice and confidence.

Reduce the number of times you skip back to a previous sentence.
To do this run a pointer along the line as you read. Your finger or a pen will do. Your eyes follow the tip of the pointer making the flow of reading smoother. The speed of this method depends on the speed you move the pointer but just by doing it you can nearly double your reading speed without doing anything else.

Skimming should not be used when complete comprehension of the text is the objective. Skimming is mainly used when researching and getting an overall idea of the text. Where time is limited, skimming or skipping over text can aid comprehension. The main points of a text can be better understood after skimming than after normal reading but there is no difference  in understanding less important information in the text.

Speed reading courses which teach techniques that largely constitute skimming of written text, also result in a lower comprehension rate (below 50% comprehension on standardized comprehension tests).