Tag: Daren Mansfield

 

 

We often get asked about the modern day paradox of being able to retrieve thousands of articles from the fabulous Library website, but not having the time to read more than a handful. Are there any tips we would recommend to, erm, speed up the process…Happily, Sutz & Weverka (2009, 10) have produced their ‘Speed reading for dummies‘ book (also available an ebook), which contains some valuable information such as noting what ‘eye fixations’ are (‘when your eyes stop moving at different points in a sentence as you read it’). Invaluably, the important points to know about speed reading are:

✓ You read several words in a single glance. Unless you’re encountering words you don’t know or haven’t read before, you don’t read words one at a time.

✓ You expand your vision so that you can read and understand many words in a single glance. A very good speed reader can read, see, and process 10 to 14 words in a single eye fixation.

✓ You expand your vision to read vertically as well as horizon- tally on the page. As well as taking in more than one word on a line of text, speed readers can also, in a single glance, read and understand words on two or three different lines. Check out Chapter 6 for more on expanding your reading vision, and head to Chapter 15 for some exercises that help you do just that.

(Sutz & Weverka: 2009, 10)

Speed reading is about expanding your vocabulary, which makes comprehension easier, being familiar with the subject matter, focused concentration and making those strategic selections in choosing the text you want to digest. Sitting position is also important. Because it’s an emphatically practical book, there are helpful exercises at the end of each chapter.

The print book is available in the library at 428.432 sut on the 1st floor.