Double Your Reading Speed With These Speed Reading Tools

imagine what would happen if you could read twice as many books or absorb twice as much information as you do now since learning is based on reading and absorbing information it means you could basically learn twice as fast as you do now imagine the possibilities you could learn how to grow your own business learn a new language faster or just read more books so whether you want to do more in the same amount of time or you want to do the same amount of work in less time it's beneficial in both cases time is the most valuable currency in the world so we should spend it wisely hi I'm Simon I believe nowadays it's a must to learn and read faster in the era of the internet and information that's why I think it's extreme extremely important to learn to read faster because probably the last time you took a reading class was in primary school when you were a child and you probably wouldn't teach a child the same way you would teach an adult that's why I think everyone needs to give it a shot what speed reading anyway it's a series of methods that have been designed to increase the reading speed without any major comprehension loss speed reading is a skill which means that everybody can learn it there's no entry threshold which means that this course is designed for beginners but even someone experienced can spot something interesting and new throughout this class I will show you a plenty of methods with brief explanations and instructions on how to apply them and a lot of examples to better illustrate the course material I will do my best to keep you engaged from start to finish I also be adding recap slides at the end of most of the section videos so you won't have to worry about taking notes we will cover everything from eliminating distractions and making your environment reading friendly to learning Advanced methods that will help you increase your reading speed this course is designed for anyone who wants to become a better reader and increase the quality of her or his life over time by learning because as Nelson Mandela once said education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world okay whenever you're ready let's Jump Right In thank you for choosing this course before we dive into specific methods that will help you increase your reading speed firstly we need to know where we read how do you know how fast you read and what's fast since we can only manage what we can measure we have to measure your current reading speed or wpm which stands for words per minute so how to calculate this wpm rate pick a book with a fairly standard vocabulary neither too hard like an academic paper nor too easy like a children's book this way this measurement will be most reliable Now set the timer for 1 minute and start reading after that minute count the words you read and that's your words per minute rate for comparison the average is 200 to 250 words per minute the last stop before learning techniques that will help you increase your wpm will be limiting bad habits that decrease your wpm we will start with your environment and the externals first your phone notifications can easily distract your attention when you see or hear a new message and passively you want to grab your phone when it's in your side so turn on an airplane mode or turn it off and put it away from you next noisy environment sit alone in a room close the door close the window if it's noisy outside put ear plugs in your ears or a pair of noise cancelling headphones if you have one try to isolate from the environment as much as you can you can try lowfy or clasical music and maybe it will work for you perfectly but it may not work for everyone though visible distractors I already mentioned your phone now it's time for the rest put away from your side all the things that might visually distract you for example when you're reading a book sitting at a desk and you have a couple of colorful things in front of you a laptop or some food you may get distracted by those things I advise you to clean it up put your laptop away like your phone pH and eat first before you start a reading session by the way be sure not to be extremely hungry and to get a good amount of sleep posture sit in a position that is neither too uncomfy nor too comfortable try to find your sweet spot if it's too uncomfortable you won't be able to focus and if you will feel too comfortable you might even get sleepy my advice is to sit straight cross legged on a couch or an armchair don't lean your head against anything and try to keep your back straight also keep in mind that you might be just too mentally tired to read a challenging book for example after a long day bonus tip keep a notebook and a pen close to you when reading so when you have something on your mind just write it down so you won't forget it and your mind will be able to focus on the book [Music] okay so the next tip is to reduce subvocalization what's subvocalization subvocalization is like an internal voice reading in your head you're pronouncing words in your head and it helps your mind comprehend and remember better but at the same time it decreases your wpm because when you're subvocalizing you cannot read faster than your speech speed which is on average 150 wpm so instead I want you to read visually with your eyes only without pronouncing words in your head there ain't one good technique to reduce subvocalization and one that works for everyone so I will list a few tips here firstly try to do it mindfully I know it sounds ridiculous but you know give it a try if the first tip didn't work on its own try incorporating listening to music in the background and using a pointer about which I will talk about more in the next video last tip try to force yourself to read faster than you normally would I will talk about this one later on in speed adaptation drill video from now on we will be talking about good habits and techniques used to increase your reading speed using a pointer is a great idea here's why when our eyes move they actually don't move smoothly instead they move in what's called sads which are smaller jumps look at my eyes now I'm trying to move them as smoothly as I can but it's actually impossible but there's a way if eyes are tracking something then they can move smoothly so now once again with my finger as a Tracker and so there's a theory that says we waste a lot of time with that jumping style reading and using a pointer on its own should increase your reading speed noticeably also so using a pointer should prevent you from regression which is going back to the words you already read you can use just your finger but from my experience I advise you to use a pen using your finger you have to move the whole hand all the time and using your pen you only have to move your wrist so you essentially have to move less your hand will be a lot less tied you can also use a pointer to force yourself to read faster just by moving it faster grouping words is another step in Reading faster to do that we need to learn about fixations fixation is when you're focusing on one point at a time in this case a word in a book it's possible you're fixating on every word individually when in reality you could easily fixate on two to three words at once so how to do that let's see an example volume two chapter 1 Miss Bing letter arrived and put an end to doubt you can fixate on every word like Miss Bing letter arrived and so on or you can group the words and treat it like this Miss Bing's letter arrived and put an end to doubt try to look at the center of the group of words you want to read at once with this simple grouping technique you can really benefit this will save you a lot of time the next section is related to this topic and will be about peripheral vision hey if you look at my mouth focus on my mouth can you still see what I'm holding in my left hand yes you can it's a banana can you still see what I'm holding in my right hand yes you can it's an orange so that's your peripheral vision despite the fact that you focused your sight in the middle you you could still partially see what's going on on both sides we will use it now in Reading let me show you how normally we read from the furthermost left word to the furthermost right word makes sense but we don't use any peripheral vision on the sides of the page that's why we will move the margins towards the middle draw two lines with your pencil so we can erase them later I suggest moving margins by one word now when you read a new line you start from the second word in this line you fixate on this word and read the furthermost left word with peripheral vision that's how it works as you advance you can move the margins towards the middle but I suggest staying with one word indentation or if you're really Advanced getting to indent maximum this method is about reading slightly faster than your comprehension allows you to let's say 30 to 40% faster for a couple of minutes let's say for five minutes you lose some percentage of your comprehension let's say 10 to 20% but after that you will kind of reset your comfort speed point and what I mean by that is that you probably read now a bit faster let's say 10 to 20% and you do that maintaining full comprehension because you got used to reading faster of course these numbers are indicative to make it more digestible but you get the point you force yourself to read faster for 5 minutes then you go back to your normal comfortable Pace but when you measure your reading speed you notice that you actually read faster than you did before to better comprehend and remember what you read consider learning to visualize visualizing when reading a book is essentially imagining what's going on in the book it's like watching a mental movie I guess it's meant for fiction but who says you can't visualize an economic textbook you can always fictionalize non-fiction to make it more digestible and engaging here your your only limit is your imagination anyway back to the topic to start visualizing you have to intend to do it you have to try to picture the plot in your head the last time somebody told you a story from her or his life I'm sure you've been visualizing what she or he was doing in that story of course it was much easier because it wasn't so abstract as a fiction book or economics but the mechanism is the same this visualization doesn't have to be perfect or extremely detailed there's no standard of how it should look like it should suit you and help you remember the stuff you read in this video I'll will talk about the differences between skimming and scanning they are both reading techniques used to quickly move through the given text they look very similar at first they both look like regular rapid reading but what differentiates them from each other is the purpose it's why you read you skim in order to get a general overview of the text and scanning is used in order to find specific information skimming is a fast reading method whereas scanning is a selective reading method in schimming you focus on a broader picture in scanning you look for something specific scheming can be used for example to take an overview if a book is worth reading scanning on the other hand can be used for example when you're searching for a quote in a book you already read preading is scheming through the book to get a grasp of what's inside you want to decide if it's worth reading you want to get more interested try to spot something that will attract you it's mainly for non-fiction books so how to pread set a timer for 10 minutes so that you won't get bored and firsty grab a book scope out the cover the front and the back smell the book look when it was released originally which Edition this is and who designed the cover so basically look at everything that is in the main text itself secondly read the table of contents thirdly scheme through the whole book but if some of the chapter's titles Drew your attention read them more carefully or even at normal speed if you want I'm show you now more immersed in the book you've chosen good luck and have fun attitudes with a good attitude firstly you'll be much more focused and you'll avoid mind wandering and secondly you'll be far more likely to comprehend and remember remember the text better reading the books you don't like don't read books you don't like quit in the middle if it's bad when you don't like a sitcom or a movie you quit in the middle that's normal seems logical to do the same with the book so try to think of a book as you would think of a sitcom or a film when you're considering quitting even if you paid for it isn't the time you spend reading the book you don't like worth much more than the cost of the book time to read if you can't find time to read in a day firstly incorporated into already existent habits you do every day read when you commute read when you eat you can even try reading in a bathroom also generally try not to waste time for example when you're standing in a long line in a shop instead of grabbing your phone grab your book secondly schedule time to read 30 minutes every day is enough if there is consistency consistency is key also as a general rule when you want to grab your phone grab your book imagine how much more reading time you would get from this one change read two books at a time why because when you get bored of the first book you get to the second one and when you get bored of the second one you get to the first one my advice is to read one fiction and one non-fiction book at once slamp is when you don't want to read anything don't want to start anything I mean am I even a reader to avoid slums try to always start a new book after finishing one the same day and try new genres you wouldn't normally pick up so easily the project for this course will be to apply the methods you just learned about and observe how did they work for you and share your thoughts about it and share the change you made in reading speed down below in the project and resources first measure your current wpm then apply speed reading techniques practice using them actively every day for a couple of days in the beginning practice these methods actively for about 15 minutes so you won't get tired mentally but train yourself your brain is like a muscle it will get used to it and a quick disclaimer here you can still read more and probably you should read more but I'm talking here only about active reading when you're implementing new reading methods after that measure your current wpm shade the change of your wpm and your thoughts about the methods you applied what worked best for you and how do you feel now about reading I'm looking forward to seeing your projects and feedback okay so that's it for today's speed reading course congratulations on make it it through this class I hope you found it valuable if you'd like to leave a rating and a review down below I would be deeply grateful feel free to check out my other courses on my skillshare profile and also I encourage you to check out my YouTube channel which is all about living in the present and appreciating every moment thank you for watching I wish you the best on your reading journey and I will see you next time