OT: Speed-reading

I was talking to Claudia tonight about speed-reading (I gave her a few 
basic tips and said if she did some daily practice and didn't see an 
improvement in her reading speed I'd buy her a drink at the next meeting).

I thought others might like to know that the book I used to learn how to 
speed-read is "Breakthrough Rapid Reading" by Peter Kump (see 
http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/100800.Breakthrough_Rapid_Reading for 
reviews - probably over 1000 of them!).

If I want to speed read fiction (normally I don't) I can do so at 1000 
words per minute (approx. 3-4 pages per minute) without trouble, up from 
my normal reading rate of 300-350wpm (approx. 1 page per minute). My 
all-time high score is 3000wpm for the first Harry Potter book that I'd 
previously read and had also seen the movie the previous day.

My results vary wildly with non-fiction and for academic stuff I 
normally understand it slower than my normal reading speed anyway but in 
something I'm familiar with or just want to get the basic idea, 500wpm 
is about average.

Claudia, I have a digital copy of the book I can email to you if you 
want it but I've lost your email address so you'll need to reply :-)

(The major disadvantage from my point of view is that its all about 
running your finger along the page and having your eye follow which 
doesn't work so well with computer screens and is basically impossible 
with touch-enabled ebook readers. My physical set of books is getting 
close to being only 10% of the books I have with most being digital so 
this is a bit of an issue).

-- 
"Believing men would act in their own interest was not cynicism, it turned out, but sheerest optimism; in reality men do not meet so high a standard."
-- Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality (Chapter 84)
http://hpmor.com/

Reece Arnott
Dunedin
New Zealand


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