With so much information available to read these days, we all need to be able to increase our reading speed.
But just being able to read faster isn’t enough, as we might miss out on some of the vital information we’re looking for in the first place.
So we need to improve our reading by focusing on various reading skills so that we learn to read faster and better.
To help do this, we need to understand the way it is read in the first place.
1. The Concept of Eye Movement.
Everyone reads, but for most people it’s a messy process. You learned to read in first grade and you read more and more as you get older. But have you ever stopped to think that in all probability nobody taught you to read? I mean no one explained the mechanics or physiology of reading and told you how to make these natural processes work so that you develop speed and faster comprehension.
For example, when you pick up a letter, newspaper, magazine, or book, your eyes appear to move smoothly over the lines of type from left to right. But the truth is that they move in a series of jerks. Your eyes pause—”fix,” experts call it—and register a word or two. They then move to the right and repeat the process until you’ve read the entire line. You only read during stops or fixations.
2. The Concept of the Eye-Mind Relationship.
We read with our eyes, of course. But the eyes are just a camera that photographs images for the mind to translate into ideas. It is the mind that preserves what you read, not the eyes. But since the mind can receive its images only through the eyes, the eyes must be trained to register these verbal images quickly and surely.
3. The Concept of Purpose of Reading.
From now on you will approach everything you read with a purpose. You will undertake many types of reading for many purposes. Both understanding and retention are sharpened when your purpose is set beforehand. You won’t waste time letting your eyes wander vaguely over the page. You will put system and efficiency in your reading.
This kind of selectivity is as much one of the skills of speed reading as it is increasing speed. Remember, you don’t have to read every word on every piece of paper that comes across your desk. The efficient way is to make a quick estimate of its nature and its value to you. Then decide if and how you will read it. This can save many minutes of your workday.
You apply this same assessment to everything you read, whether it’s just for information, for entertainment, or for the sheer pleasure of enriching yourself through a finely written novel or biography. You establish in advance the purpose for which you are reading.
People who have not yet learned the full conception of speed reading often ask two questions: “If I learn to speed read, won’t I miss out on a lot, particularly the beauty of imaginative writing?” And, “Won’t I miss important points if I read the articles so fast?”
Experience shows that the speed reader remembers much more, not less, of what he reads, because he has learned to be an efficient reader. Comprehension increases because he knows why he reads and why he concentrates. As for the missing beauty, Speed Reading requires changes in speed with different types of reading material. The trained reader stops when he wants to savor the beauty of poetry, of drama, of the good passages of a biography or a novel. He adjusts to the rhythm of what he is reading.
So you already have the three basic concepts of Speed Reading:
1. A thorough understanding of the mechanics of eye movement that will govern many of the speed reading techniques.
2. An understanding of the eye-mind relationship that conditions the comprehension and retention of what you read.
3. An awareness of your purpose for reading before you start reading. This causes you to read different types of material at different speeds and reduces the total time you spend reading.
Remember these concepts and you will see how speed reading skills grow from them.
