Speed Reading Successfully: A Starting Point
There are more books and other written works today than there have ever been before. Tomorrow will be a record-setting day, just as will be each day afterward. It’s impossible to read everything ever written, but the number of words we’re expected to take in keep going up just the same. That means that speed reading is a pretty good tool to have in your personal arsenal.
Speed reading isn’t just a matter of cranking up the speed at which your eyes cross a page, though: there are multiple methods for increasing your reading speed. It’s also worth considering that different approaches to reading have both benefits and drawbacks. In general, the methods that allow a person to read faster don’t always provide for the same level of comprehension that slower reading allows.
Barriers to Speed Reading
There are speed reading systems out there that claim they can get you up to reading 20,000 words per minute (about 300 words per minute is typical of a college reader without any speed reading training). At best, that 20,000 words per minute claim allows only for skimming. It’s likely to provide minimal comprehension — rarely useful. More realistic speeds range from 600 to 2,000 words per minute: at those rates a reader can usually comprehend the words on the page.
No matter what approach a particular speed reading system takes, most start with eliminating bad reading practices and then accelerating reading speed through a series of exercises. Bad reading habits can include:
- Sounding out word out loud as one reads — or subvocalizing
- Re-scanning over passages already read
- Moving one’s eyes across the page as one reads
- Using one reading speed for all reading material
Subvocalization is often considered the biggest barrier to speed reading. Because of the way that reading is taught in most schools — students learn to sound out letters rather than recognize whole words — most readers automatically sound out words, especially those that aren’t in their normal reading vocabulary. Subvocalization, no matter its value for initially learning to read, slows down most readers. That’s because saying a word, whether aloud or subvocally, takes more time than recognizing a word.
Learning to Speed Read
There are thousands of speed reading books, systems and software packages. For the most part, those systems are equally effective. It’s also possible to train yourself in speed reading using resources that you can find online. No matter how you approach learning to speed read, you’ll find that you need to complete (and often repeat) a series of exercises. Most systems rely on a simple set of exercises, repeated at increasing speeds to train your eyes and mind to take in and interpret information faster.
A few free speed reading resources include:
- Wikibooks’ Speed reading textbook
- How do you become a better reader? (includes several guides)
- The SQ3R Reading Method
There are also thousands of books available on the topic of speed reading. I wouldn’t necessarily recommend going out and purchasing any speed reading book that’s on the shelf at your local bookstore. Most libraries carry at least one or two different speed reading books, giving you a chance to take a look at individual approaches and try out exercises before committing yourself.
Speed Reading Software
There are numerous commercial speed reading programs that promise to get your abilities up to a faster level. Prices for such software can vary dramatically: You might find a software package that could do the trick for under $20, but there are just as many packages priced over $200.
There are several common approaches used in commercial software packages. The pioneer of speeding reading software, Vortex Speed Reading, placed words in front of a reader one at a time — the method forces readers to focus on just one spot on a page, rather than moving their eyes to read. Some of the speed reading packages currently available follow Vortex’ model.
Others present words in a serial stream. Still other software options guide readers through lines of text at certain speeds, often highlighting certain words in order to train readers to direct their attention to the center of the page.
These software options can provide you a starting point for study, if you’re interested in taking that route:
Speed Reading on the Computer
In many cases, the speed at which you read the page of a book will be identical to that at which you read words on a computer screen. However, some readers report being unable to increase their on-screen reading speed beyond 1,000 words — no matter how fast they read pages. The problem seems to be connected to the refresh rates of CRT screens: as a speed reader progresses through the page, ghost images can appear as a result of screen refreshes. It’s a sort of disconnect between the eye and the brain that causes quickly refreshed images to superimpose ghosts. Readers using LCD screens don’t have the problem.
Some readers also find that larger computer monitors impede their speed reading; most speed reading systems recommend that readers rely on peripheral vision to read, rather than running their eyes across a page. With large computer monitors, taking in text at the edges of the screen can prove difficult. A simple fix is reducing the size of the window in which you are reading.
WRITER'S BIOGRAPHY
Thursday Bram
Thursday Bram blogs about a variety of topics, from personal finance to small business. She is the author of an upcoming book on the tools and tricks you need to build a career you can take with you during long-term travel. More information about Thursday and her book, Working Your Way Around the World, is available on her personal site, ThursdayBram.com.
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Comments
Eyal Sela says on January 30th, 2009 at 10:06 am
ZapReader is a great little tool that helps practice speed reading while you read WebPages. I’ve written a little review about it.
I use it all the time and it is the only tool that has really improved my reading speed.
Eyal Sela says on January 30th, 2009 at 10:08 am
here is the right link!!
http://www.productivewise.com/.....ap-reader/
Tumblemoose says on January 30th, 2009 at 8:18 pm
I’m so glad I subscribe to Lifehack.
This is yet another topic that I’ve been interested in, but forgot I was, if THAT makes any sense.
It will get bookmarked for some delving into this weekend.
Cheers!
George
Rob says on January 30th, 2009 at 9:37 pm
There are people still using CRTs?
Vincent says on January 31st, 2009 at 1:42 am
Hi Bram,
Speed reading is something that can help us to accelerate our learning. It is definitely a great skill to have.
Cheers
Vincent
Personal Development Blogger
Peter Reid says on February 1st, 2009 at 4:52 am
Your write
“There are speed reading systems out there that claim they can get you up to reading 20,000 words per minute”
from memory the average novel is between 60k and 100k words, so at that speed you could read a book in five minutes. I’m not sure you could even turn the pages that quickly. So I think that speed reading at that speed might more accurately be described as flicking through the book, with your face pointing in the general direction.
Personally, I quite like reading slowly and savouring things.
cheers Peter
Yes, But Still... says on February 1st, 2009 at 6:19 pm
Speed reading is an interesting experience, and I would characterize it as a more advanced form of skimming.
I agree with Peter, reading slowly is much more enjoyable.
~~~~~~~~~~~~
Yes But Still
‘adventures in life optimization’
zafran says on February 2nd, 2009 at 7:58 am
reading 20,000 words per minute is possible and it is nothing like skimming.it is a form of subconscious learning . its called photoreading. the conscious mind cannot take in 20,000 words per minute , it goes in directly to the subconscious mind . it is an art to be learned.
ps: fact – the subconscious mind never forgets anything
Boundless says on February 2nd, 2009 at 1:20 pm
Does it actually work? Can anyone actually hold their hand up and say, I studied speed reading and went from 500 wpm to 20,000 wpm with practice and time?
There are no reports from actual people who use them, ie customers.
Ashlee says on February 2nd, 2009 at 6:04 pm
This is a great & FREE website I just found! Simple but awesome!
http://www.mrkent.com/speedread/speedread.asp
Shamroc says on February 2nd, 2009 at 6:21 pm
There is also the little webapp called Spreeder where you can paste test into the parser and control the rate at which the text is displayed.
http://www.spreeder.com
Also reading effectively is a helpful tool to have. Especially for text books. Read the contents, first page and last page of each chapter and skim the index. Lets you build up a quick mental picture of the materiel.
Todd says on February 2nd, 2009 at 6:31 pm
Try Spreeder for online text. http://www.spreeder.com
Also I find rapid overview skimming of text books helpful.
Read the contents, index, first page and summary pages of chapters. Skim quickly through the books. A lot of information in a text book is repeated and summarised. There’s a lot of filler.
Anelly says on February 3rd, 2009 at 3:27 am
Speed reading can help as a lot. But i guess this differs especially when someone have to read something in other language.
Mike King says on February 14th, 2009 at 2:05 pm
The whole notion of speed reading at those huge rates like 10,000+ wpm is very debatable. However, the techniques to reading faster are not and much of what is taught can help anyone improve their reading speed even if you don’t want or plan to read at super speed.
I wrote a guide (click my link if you are interested) about reading faster for those that want to increase your speed without going “that” fast. I improved from 150 to about 600wpm. It’s well worth learning this skill and will also help you learn faster.
Kristjan-Olari Leping says on April 20th, 2009 at 4:12 pm
20000 words per minute is not a realistic reading speed. Of course, you can move your eyes over the text at that fast speed, but you will be not able to read much of it. It will be very superficial skimming. You will miss the majority of the information.
Anne Jones has won the World Speed Reading championship six times. In 2007 she read “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows” at Borders, Charing Cross Road, London in a record breaking 47 minutes and one second – 4251 words per minute.
While the very best speed reader can read at 2000+ words per minute then an average person can double of triple his/her reading speed by learning to speed read. So 600-800 words per minute can be an expected result. If you take it really seriously and practice a lot you may exceed 1000 words per minute.
Actually if you could read at 600 words per minute, it will allow you to save very much time each day. If you are an average office worker, then tripling your reading speed can help you to save about 2 hours in every work day (If you spend about 3 hours out of 8 on reading tasks).
It will take some practice and you will not be able to increase your reading speed to a great extent overnight. You will have to learn special speed reading techniques and get rid of your present bad reading habits such as sub-vocalization, which was mentioned here. You will also have to widen you vision span, learn how to move eyes across the text and so on.
Sara Micheal says on May 17th, 2009 at 4:54 am
Hi,
For speed reading one can find many tools, but, interpreting correctly is another important and debatable issue. You can miss many important points ,or, may be you just couldn’t focus on the essential information that is meant to be delivered. So, here I agree with Peter, one should enjoy reading.
Daniel says on May 17th, 2009 at 10:51 pm
According to the Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subvocalization) subvocalization is a good thing.
Twin XL says on May 22nd, 2009 at 10:43 am
Slow it down… why the rush??
anonymous says on July 24th, 2009 at 2:50 pm
Have you seen the free speed reading test and software at http://www.free-speed-reading.com/ ? I just found this, and I’m thankful I did since some of those software programs and courses are crazy expensive. This site has a test, a 50-some page book, and some basic software for free.