Six Sigma Blogs

Most people, particularly college students can read about 300 words a minute. Now a speed reader on the other hand, can read 1,000 words a minute or more. This can be a very effective skill to acquire especially for a college student that has a handful of courses they are trying to complete.

The properly trained speed reader can pick up a lengthy document or a thick stack of papers and use their skill to get at the meat of the subject by skimming for the most important details and information. Without developing the ability to speed read, this time-saving technique is merely flipping through pages fast.

Speed reading is linked to increasing the rate at which you understand what you’re reading. The key to successful speed reading is increasing your understanding of the text as you increase the rate at which you read the words.

It takes lots of practice, but don’t be intimidated by the idea of a challenge. Think of it as the next, natural step to your reading development. Once you’ve mastered it, its a skill that will stick with you for the rest of your life.

When you were a child, when you began to learn to read, chances are you began with the alphabet and the specific sounds each letter makes. Then you learned how to combine and blend letter sounds to decipher words. Its called letter-by-letter reading. Then something clicked and you began to recognize words without having to sound out each letter one at a time and you graduated to word-by-word reading.

With lots of practice common words and sentence structure became more familiar and because your brain was tuned and ready, your eye started taking in blocks of words at a time. The difference between average readers and speed readers is in the blocks of words their eyes take in at one time. The larger the blocks, the faster your eye moves through the text.

Speed reading teaches you how to push your reading and your comprehension to the next level. The techniques used in teaching speed reading focus on your individual abilities, namely where you are right now and what might be keeping you from progressing. Say you are a slow reader, factors that hold you back may include, but are not limited to, moving your lips or reading out loud or holding the text too close to your eyes.

If you are one of those people that like to move your lips as you read, then you just slowing down the number of words you are able to read a minute. The brain is much faster than the mouth, and you should be able to take in 3 times more words than you can speak.

Having the skill to speed read can make a significant difference in your life, especially if reading is a strong component of your work. Implementing some simple techniques can get you reading faster and more efficiently in no time at all.