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From: richl@lumiere.UUCP (Rick Lindsley)
Newsgroups: net.consumers
Subject: Re: Advice on Speed-reading Courses
Message-ID: <1256@lumiere.UUCP>
Date: Tue, 8-Oct-85 22:19:47 EDT
Article-I.D.: lumiere.1256
Posted: Tue Oct  8 22:19:47 1985
Date-Received: Wed, 16-Oct-85 06:00:35 EDT
References: <331@cylixd.UUCP> <151@ur-tut.UUCP> <768@rduxb.UUCP>
Reply-To: richl@lumiere.UUCP (Rick Lindsley)
Organization: Tektronix, Beaverton OR
Lines: 59
Summary: 

I took speed reading in high school .. yes that's HIGH SCHOOL. My
English teacher took the term "college prep course" to heart and gave
us a speed reading course. Boy was I glad! He claimed he got this from
a course he took, and it sure did work.

Consider that when you drive from the middle of town to the outskirts,
moving from 25 mph to 35 mph, the increase doesn't seem that great. But
when you move from 55mph to 35 mph, it seems like quite a decrease. And
25 mph is like crawling. Well, the course we had operated on that
principle.

The first day we spent 10 minutes or so reading a book that had all the
words counted. We were then able to calculate our "before" reading
rate.  Most people came out at about 100-200 words/minute, I think,
with a few like myself nearing 300.

For the first week, we were told to read books as fast as we could. We
were told not to worry about comprehension, just READ. The idea was to
get used to your eyes just passing over the lines. We were told that if
we saw individual words, we were going too slow. We were NOT to back up
for any reason. These books had already had all the words counted
(probably by some poor souls who had earned detention with this
teacher!) Rates soared to 2000 words per minute (but of course nobody
understood any of the stories!). We also went through a book a class
period! It was frustrating not understanding the stories, but the
teacher had explained the theory and it made sense.

For the second week, we were told to read the books a little slower.
Try for a little comprehension, we were told, but you still should not
be looking at individual words. We were told we still should not back
up.  A good yardstick is that you probably could name major characters
and events, but you'd be in no position for a plot analysis or scene
description. Rates dropped to 1250-1500 wpm.

For the third week, we were told to enjoy the stories. Back up if
necessary, but no need to remember every detail, because we weren't
going to have to recite it from memory or anything. Our eyes still
should not be focusing on single words unless they are rather large.
Rates dropped further to 700-1000 wpm.

For the fourth week ... the instructor told us there was no fourth
week. We were at the end of our course. He said that the last week
should indicate to us our pleasure reading speed, and that of course
for study intensive books like textbooks we would obviously get much
lower rates. But there was no reason we couldn't maintain those other
rates for other, lighter reading. And he pointed out that for quickly
skimming articles or magazines, we could use the speed we'd attained in
the 2nd week. If the last week had made us uncomfortable, he pointed
out, even reading half again as quickly, we would drop to 350-500 wpm
-- still quite respectable.

My final rate was about 800 wpm, and although I suspect it is lower now
it was still a boon through college. Even the slowest readers in the
class improved their basic rates to about 150 wpm, mostly through "word
gathering" or seeing several words in a single glance.

Perhaps this technique will be of use to you out there. It's free!

Rick Lindsley