[annoyedgrunt84]

So I have this personal project of becoming a well read person. Problem is I feel like a slow reader. I had a friend tell me they read three books this weekend, if I read three in a couple weeks I would be shouting from the rooftops So does anyone have any tips to increase reading speed?

Originally Posted by annoyedgrunt84

So I have this personal project of becoming a well read person. Problem is I feel like a slow reader. I had a friend tell me they read three books this weekend, if I read three in a couple weeks I would be shouting from the rooftops So does anyone have any tips to increase reading speed?

same.

i know someone who likes to review books she's read... she gets through 3 or 4 in a week. (impossible!).

i'd love to do that.

trouble is my focus.. it does not really last for a whole chapter

so though i don't have any advice for you, you're certainly not alone. i really want to hear what people have to say about this topic.

Different people read at different speeds, and that's okay so long as the fluency and comprehension are still there. Also, a person's reading speed will change depending on what they are reading. If I am reading a light novel, my speed is rather fast, but hand me a more complex novel, one with a jillion characters with difficult names to keep straight, and my speed will decrease a bit. Hand me a textbook where my need is to retain information, and my speed will decrease a bit more, perhaps significantly more depending on the subject. That is very normal and actually good reading skill.

I wouldn't particularly worry about your reading speed so long as you are enjoying and understanding what you are reading. Try not to get into the comparison game with other people. (I go through this discussion with my students all the time.)

[brainhi]

Books on tape/cds/online
I work with students and some have struggles related to reading and speed. Many times it is "how your eye muscles learned to move"... Check out developmental Optometry/Vision Therapy.. I've seen it work.
Vision Therapy for Adults - College of Optometrists in Vision Development (COVD)

[avlady]

i took a speed reading class in grammer school which helped greatly, but i still have comprehension problems because of my disability

[eeyorestail]

Here's an interesting article I found about speed reading:

The Truth About Speed Reading

I read pretty fast, but the truth is if you read too fast your comprehension will suffer no matter how good you are at speed reading. But there are definitely ways to read faster.

[-jimi-]

When I was younger, I thought you could only read one way, my way of course, LOL. Then I got this friend who claimed I was only "skimming" text. I remember when teachers taught skimming and I never understood what it was. But I certainly knew I read books, no skimming here.

Thing is he could only read as fast as he talked. Actually he silently mouthed the words. It confused me a lot. I didn't understand how you could read like that, how it was technically possible.

The only way I could read was.... I don't know what to call it. Eat text. Sure I look at everything. I don't just look for key parts. I read everything. But I don't read from left to right and only one line at a time. I remember when I was very little and we had to use slips of paper to cover all the lines below, I had no idea what I was reading. If I don't have stuff in advance, I cannot put it together in my head.

Sure words have to be in some kind of order and yes technically I do read from left to right and downwards, but not strictly. The word clusters I eat, the words put themselves in the right order in my head. And will create a flow, like a thought rather than a spoken sentence.

I used to like audio books but they are a TOTALLY different art form for me, a different experience. They are much more close to watching a movie.

So you'd think I am good at reading? Nope. Since I depend on how words look, I depend a lot on font face and line spacing. Modern books have to narrow lines and to big text so I can't do "my thing". Also I barely can read cursive. I cannot read caps only.

And I cannot read out loud. Not even inside my own head. While it is totally natural for me to look ahead when reading to myself, I find it totally impossible for any human being to do that while reading aloud, and it is needed! You know what will come or you cannot say the whole sentence! I cannot read aloud and read ahead at the same time. It is some kind of superpower people have.

I'm not sure it is possible to change the way one reads. If you read letter by letter, word by word you do. If you see the text like an image you do.

Now I should add focusing is another thing altogether. I'm just getting back to reading. I lost my ability to focus on books for a long time. I still don't have it back fully but I can enjoy books again which is super huge for me.

I remember being 15 and for some reason I had nothing to do in class so my teacher gave me Animal Farm to read. Which I finished in 40 minutes. Sure I pushed it to impress him, but I still read it. It's a rather short novel though.

[annoyedgrunt84]

Focus holds me back a lot. I catch myself talking to myself in my head a lot and mumble up the conversation in my head with the text. I have had some success at speeding up by pointing with my finger so I don't lose my place on the line but even when I'm alone I feel self-conscious about doing that. I've tried audiobooks and I did find this really cool thing called libravox that has nearly all the classics available for download for free. I play them at 1.5 speed while I walk or run in the evenings and it has allowed me to make progress on several books at once.

[regulartetragon]

To speed read, it can help to have a pencil moving across the line you're reading. Your brain doesn't need to focus on each word, which is what it's doing. It can understand a few words and put them together.

e.g.

"The horse was brown and lived in the barn"

"Horse brown lived barn"

You can still basically tell the primary message of the sentence (sorry this was a horrible example).

so it can help if you put a pencil down and force yourself to keep up with it. However this may sacrifice some comprehension, so start slow? This may or may not work for you and you should probably stick with comprehending, which is okay.

[brainhi]

I want to make a point..it is that.. reading rate, focus or lack of has NOTHING to do with intelligence. You cannot help how your eyes, eye muscles, brain developed. I hope you find other ways to enjoy the "written word".

[(JD)]

Being "well read" does not necessarily mean being a speed reader. It means you are well informed because of your reading. It may be just one topic, but generally it is considered (or used to be) that you could carry on a conversation in most subjects because of what you had read and remembered.

I think it would be good to figure out if you read better from a computer screen, tablet or a handheld book first. My comprehension rate drops when it's not something on paper.

Make sure you are not reading out loud.
Make sure you are not moving your lips when you read (easy to find out with today's phone cameras).
Begin with something you want to read, and is at your word knowledge level.
Then stop reading one word at a time... force yourself to see two or three words at a time... and work up from there.

Speed readers allow the eye to see and the brain to take in whole paragraphs at a time.

My reading rate is only 650 wpm... I wish it were more but with the head trauma, I'm happy I can read at all!

Stick with it... and yes, reading more does increase your vocabulary and level of reading.

(The person I had been married to was in college with an 8th grade reading level... and he hated to read. So I bought him magazines about the things he was interested in (fishing, flying etc) and by the second year of college he was up to a 10th grade level.)

[-jimi-]

Originally Posted by brainhi

I want to make a point..it is that.. reading rate, focus or lack of has NOTHING to do with intelligence.

But what use is intelligence if everything else is missing? Sigh. Just saying that because I'm seen as intelligent but I act really dumb. Like all the time.

[annoyedgrunt84]

I also realize "being well read" is not really a stationary goal I will ever reach in any meaningful sense. But I feel like it's worth striving for.

[brainhi]

Originally Posted by -jimi-

But what use is intelligence if everything else is missing? Sigh. Just saying that because I'm seen as intelligent but I act really dumb. Like all the time.

You only need to live by your standards... not society's standards. Consider someone who is blind or deaf. I'm not really trying to say it could be worse.. but I'm sure you have traits that you and those important to you value.

[brainhi]

Originally Posted by annoyedgrunt84

I also realize "being well read" is not really a stationary goal I will ever reach in any meaningful sense. But I feel like it's worth striving for.

Sure - but give yourself realistic goals. How many things can you do better than me? I suck at art - I admire others that can do it. I cannot even wrap a present.