Speed Reading Tips: Supersonic Readers Take the Advice of the Sages – Why Not You?

Remember when you were young and went to your favorite swimming hole and couldn`t wait to dive into the water and your parents, or other adult would tell you to look before you dive in?

Or, have you ever ventured out on a long road trip; did you first look at a map?

Or, do you remember the Aesop Fable of the Fox and the Goat?

Although these examples may seem to differ they all have a powerful meaning to understanding our 4th Key to Supersonic Reading (the ability to read and comprehend at rates above the 600 wpm threshold of linear sub-vocal reading. Key Concept Four is the easiest of the 4 keys to employ, makes the previous 3 keys easier to apply, but is the most forgotten and overlooked concept that leads to problems in comprehension at high rates when not employed.

The Fourth Key Concept of Supersonic Reading is referred to as using the Gestalt.

Gestalt means: An organized whole that is perceived as more than the sum of its parts.

How this applies to the Dynamic Speed Reading Methodology is that when you have something to read that is more than a paragraph or so, your mind will be better able to respond to the meaning of the text, especially at super fast rates, if you stop to first consider the whole before focusing on the parts. When reading then consider first the organization of the material, before jumping into reading the first words and sentence of the text to be read.

What the three examples listed in the beginning of this post are meant to suggest is that before you read anything that has more than a few paragraphs look before you leap. Know the overall direction and how the various pieces fit into the whole. This requires a little pre-thinking.

And remember, when I mention pre-thinking, we`ll assume that you know that reading comprehension is actually thinking and responding to the meaning of the text.  IT DOESN`T MEAN MERELY MOVING YOUR EYES RAPIDLY!  It`s how fast your mind can respond to the meanings that constitutes reading with comprehension.

Similarly, if you venture on a long road trip, have you looked at the map of the journey first to understand the general direction and the main roads to be taken? If you are approaching a swimming hole do you look first to see if the water is deep enough to dive safely? Remember, the fox humiliated the goat in the Aesop Fable warning him to be sure there is always a way out before venturing into something unknown, to look before he leapt.

When reading applies this centuries old wisdom to your reading and sees how comprehension will become easier for you. I also invite you enroll in The Dynamic Speed Reading Masers Program for a wealth of comprehension strategies and tactics as well as proven developmental exercises to stretch and grow your skills. It will provide you with the keys to reading at the speed of thought.

Is Your Brain Being Re-wired Without Your Approval?

A colleague of mine, Robert Tanner, just published an article that has great relevance for everyone in this Digital Information Age which inevitably creates overload for us.

Go to Conquering the Email Burden 

The Naomi Tran reference is true for highly efficient readers. Unfortunately most people still approach their information without changing the strategy and tactics they learned as grade-schoolers, thus they fall behind!

As Nicholas Carr notes in his latest books and articles, the digital age has caused many to change their behaviors in dealing with information overload. Neuron-scientists are beginning to investigate the emergence of the possibility. But Carr`s writing causes us to take a pause and think about the long term implications.

I think you`re Robert is correct about his conclusion that time is money and then describing the catch-22 that organizations face regarding the re-training of their people. Retraining for mastery of information overload does require hands-on training (or in this case re-training) of the brain. But how do organizations provide for that time away from work?

These challenges go way beyond the email overload. They require us to learn to read, think, and remember in new ways. In order to conquer Information Overload, we need to properly train our brain to meet the challenge.

Speed Reading Tips: Avoid the Trap of Focusing on “Eye-Span”

When learning to speed read, the saying that a little information can be a dangerous thing still applies. Consider the term eye-span. Even though I`ve been teaching people from all walks of life how to speed read for 30 years, I have only recently received many questions about it. For new learners coming into my programs, the question keeps coming up early in training. I don`t even use the term in my training. The new learner has read something about it somewhere. There is too much concern for it though.

Eye-span is referred to the amount of text someone takes in with the eyes for each stopping, or fixation of the eyes. By stating eye-span, someone has already been doing some investigating about speed reading. There is much misinformation about the topic. It is true that part of the goal of speedreading is to allow the eyes to take in more for each stop of the eyes (fixation). A traditional linear reader typically takes in one to three words per fixation. That is inefficient when you consider the total area of clear focus the eyes have at normal reading distance. This normal area of sight measures between one to three inches in diameter. Sight is always dimensional – that means there is both a horizontal and vertical field.

The problem of learning to speed read and eye-span becomes apparent due to marketing and the fact that many programs try to teach you to widen the horizontal span. In fact many programs, especially speed reading software programs, will train your eyes way beyond the natural limitation of the sight experience that is about 3 inches using only the horizontal field. These types of training exercises try to stretch that span to six inches or more telling the learner to go straight down the page with one fixation per line, line by line.

There are 2 problems with this:
1. Natural sight takes in the horizontal field as well as the vertical field. So this is an unnatural muscular change for the eyes, not to mention merely an enlarged linear approach to reading.
2. The new learner`s mind is busy thinking about the mechanics of the eyes, rather than focusing on the meaning of the print.

Remember I pointed out that sight is dimensional? Try this experiment. Take a page of mostly text that the printed area across measures six to eight inches and has big paragraphs. Now, focus your eyes somewhere in the middle of the text. Lock your eyes still. Take a pen or pencil and draw a circle around how much print you can clearly see. Don`t worry about understanding the text, just focus on clarity of the sight experience, or how much you see. Measure the area. It is probably somewhere between one to three inches in diameter. This is your natural cone of sight.

When you speed read, you are trying to move this cone of sight across and down the page. However, you don`t want to be concerned by how many words you are seeing. You want your mind to search out meaning from the text. However, without training the mind to respond and comprehend with these words appearing out of order, it will be quite frustrating because you do not comprehend.

Please know that you can not read if you do not comprehend. Comprehension is the key. Comprehension is getting meaning from the print. Too often I get learners who say they learned to go through material at 1500-2500 words per minute, but they don`t understand. They have gone through the visual training, but not the cognitive training, or comprehension.

With this focus on eye-span the learner gets too concerned over the technical aspects of the eyes, or mechanics, and forgets about the meaning of the text. The mind gets overloaded because there is competition for what the mind is doing. You can`t comprehend if you`re so focused on the technical aspects of what the eyes are doing. So forget about what your eyes are doing. Push for the meaning!

For all our years of teaching speed reading, we teach learners to open that 1-3 inches in diameter in a natural manner and search for idea chunks, or meaningful groups of words. It is not about word groups, word clusters, or the number of words that is important. It is about stopping the eyes on meaning groups. Speed Reading is a process by which the reader is searching for meaning from the print in a more efficient manner. Eye-span only plays a part of the reading process, but gets nearly all the attention in most speed readingtraining.

Why not get the help you deserve and overcome your information overload?

Speed Reading Tips: What Do Hackers and Time Management Have to Do with Speed Reading?

The term "hack" has been used in recent years to refer to a short cut, or more efficient way of doing things. From time to time I will continue to post reading hacks that can help you with both your speed and comprehension, as well as being tactics for more efficient reading. Today's reading hack is going to look at your day and your time management as it relates to reading, whether you read traditionally, or with a "DynamicSpeed Reading" approach.

If you're like most people, one, if not the very first thing you do when you sit at your work station is to open up your email application. Of course you want to do that because you want to: 

·        

• Be responsive to your customers,
• Be responsive to your co-workers,
• "Be respectful" to your friends,

Or, for some other reason that may or may not be as praiseworthy, such as a procrastination technique because your brain hasn't fully awakened Right?

Wrong!!!

Be honest with yourself. What have you noticed about this habit? For most people they realize that a big chunk of their most productive time has vanished leaving them late to get other important tasks and activities accomplished.

Additionally, time challenged people most often find their day being consumed by all kinds of activities that require them to focus outside themselves to the other people in the workplace - phones, email, texts. im's, meetings, drop-ins, etc. Because they want to be perceived as being an "accessible team player," they put off their important work related reading (except for email) for when "things quiet down." Or, they adopt an attitude of, "when I can get around to it."

But here's the problem - "around to it never comes." By the time it does come, you find yourself exhausted from all the other activities of the day. You may try your best to do the reading at these times. But what happens? Do you find yourself falling asleep? Or, do you find your mind drifts off to all sorts of other things rather than the meaning of the material you are supposedly                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                           reading?

Unless you are the exception, this is the norm. Not just for you, but for most people in today's digital world.

So here's your Speed Reading and Time Management Hack 

(there's actually 2 parts to this that will save you enormous amounts of time)

            1. Do not open email first thing in the morning (there are some rare exceptions to this rule). Take care of other important high payoff activities first.

            2. Schedule and block off time slots to do your important readings. If you need to read things that will take more than 2-5 minutes, if it doesn't get scheduled, you will fall into the trap as described above. Why shouldn't it scheduled and blocked off like any other important meeting or activity? Schedule your reading time for when your brain is freshest for the day. During work hours you may have to put up temporary "do not disturb" signs, or go to a quieter place in the office.                                                                        

What do you think?

Speed Reading Tips: Supersonic Readers Use 4 Key Concepts and Skills to Read Super Fast

In the last 4 posts I have described 4 Key Concepts and naturally occurring skills that super fast readers apply in order to read faster than the 600 wpm threshold of traditional linear reading. This post summarizes and illustrates graphically these important keys to help you remember and encourage you to apply to your reading practice. Keep in mind that super fast readers seldom discover this on their own accord. The vast majority have needed to be trained. The good news is that you too can learn how to do this. You have these abilities naturally within you. You just haven’t learned how to apply them to your reading.

These Four Key Concepts are:

• Knowing that the mind can understand meanings even when the words appear out of expected grammatical sequence.
• Knowing and applying the fact that we can understand the text upon seeing them and not needing to say hear them in our mind before we understand the meaning. This is called Visual Reassurance.
• Knowing and using our natural dimensional sight experience of moving the clear area of our visual experience of about one to three inches in diameter as we move down as well as across the page seeing overlapping areas of print as we move in a generally downward direction.
• Knowing and applying the powerful learning concept of Whole-Part-Whole that is using “Gestalt” as an organizing principle that enables the mind to understand and retain facts and details, once the bigger picture is in mind.

These key concepts are not necessarily sequenced. They operate together. If there is one that initiates this new approach to comprehension it is the fourth key – Gestalt. Always cue your mind up around the topic first.

Here is an info graphic to help you “see” it all and help create your memory of these critical elements to read super fast and comprehend.

If you are truly interested in changing your reading skills to a level of mastery to get ahead in school, work, or life, then check out the DynamicSpeed Reading Masters Program that will show you how to apply these 4 concepts and supercharge your reading today.

Feel free to share with your friends and colleagues.

Tap The Potential Your Own Mind with Speed Reading

Today, with the internet revolution, the world is changing faster than before. Students and young professionals find themselves in a fix wondering how to keep up with the changing times. Following the traditional study system, by the time we graduate from school, much of what we learn becomes obsolete. So we need to spend time learning how to learn and unlearn to keep up with the times.

Thankfully we have techniques for accelerated learning that can improve our learning curve and we can learn more in less time. This is the need of the hour since so much information is available to us in such a little time. The person who has the most updated knowledge rises in academics as well as at the workplace. Study skills matter more than ever and it is not just the hard work but also some smart work that is needed. Everyone has the same 24 hours a day but different people utilize them differently to get different results. Study skills apply to working professionals, not just students. To remain current and competitive, we must all learn continuously.

Speed reading is a technique that one can learn to get super fast results. The concept is simple. Our mind does not think or understand in the form of words. Through speed reading training, anyone can learn how to read faster. The results are astounding. It is hard to believe how much time a person can save just by reading faster. You can read and comprehend the same amount of text in half the time simply by applying some speed reading tips.

Accelerated reading techniques are scientifically proven and are based on extensive research done on the functioning of human mind. Speed reading courses are now available to help students and professionals from around the world to save their time and become more efficient. It not only improves the quantity but also the quality of your reading. If you take one of the courses available, you can see the difference for yourself within a few days. This is one of the greatest discoveries of our times and we must make the maximum use of it to get ahead in life.

The treasure house lies within you in the form of your own brain. Human brain has much power but most of it is often underutilized. Learn how to use the most of your brain that you already have. Learn how to comprehend better and read many times faster. All this is possible and help is available to find out how. Mastery learning is a great way to get ahead of your peers and get the jobs and promotions you always wanted.

For getting different extraordinary results, we have to do something that ordinary people would not. This different something could be a good online speed reading course which can change your life forever for the good. Use your own mind to work for you and not against you. Look for some of the finest speed reading courses online and get yourself registered. With an improved memory you can hold the information that you read and this will help you perform better in exams as well as at work.

Mastery learning is adopted by more and more professionals these days and if you don't want to be left behind, you must start tapping the potential of your own mind from today!

Speed Reading Tips: Going Beyond Individual Words to Comprehension

In many studies of the reading process and the nature of linguistics, it has been established that the reader knows well over 90 percent of the words. It is therefore unnecessary to have to pronounce each of the words to oneself as you have already learned them.

Before comprehension can be understood we must understand the relative importance and unimportance of words. Words are signals that call forth a response in the deep-well storage banks of the minds. If the words stand alone, the response may be incomplete or erroneous. Words only stand for things we know. The larger the word meaning group, the more accurate and complete comprehension may become. As it is not possible to see large meaning groups at slow rates, the advantage of faster rates for building comprehension becomes apparent. You never have totally accurate comprehension until you have seen all the words. The idea, or the concept, gives the meaning to each word and delegates the relative significance of each word.

The Master Dynamic Speed Reader must also understand the function of the eye in reading. The eye is an extension of the brain. The delicate tissues of the brain must have some protection. The eye offers that protection. The eye makes it possible for the mind to receive image impressions from external sources. The eyes are to the mind what feelers are to an insect. The eyes are to the brain what antenna is to radar. The mind constantly tells you what is in front of you. Sight, in the sense of understanding, is in the brain. When you have mastered the Dynamic Reading method, your mind moves your eyes down the page searching for meaning.

There can be no comprehension if there is nothing in the mind with which to associate the words viewed. Thus, as we generate our thinking, comprehension begins.

Thousands of words must have been placed in the storehouse of the mind before it can be of much value to you. Meaning is in people, not in words. Reading is seeing it with the eye and knowing it with the brain. Reading is thinking with an aid; the aid is the printed page.

This is a good place to again ask the question, how fast should I read? You should only read as fast as your mind can respond. Pre-Reading is the best way to develop high efficiency.

You should therefore be able to read anything as fast as you can think it!!!

The critical questions for a beginning speed reading student is: How fast can
I think? Also, how do I get my mind to think/respond faster in relationship
to the print?

The answers are in the training you do.