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| Taken during the recognition day of National University of Singapore June, 2006 with my children Jol, Job and Justin(inset 4) with their Lola Trining Luzuriaga(RIP) (inset 3). |
Why do people read at different speeds? How is it that some people are three times more effective than others when it comes to reading?
It certainly doesn't appear to have anything to do with intelligence, or education, or status, or occupation or sex. There are many wives whose jobs requires reading, who infuriate their husbands by being able to read much faster than their husbands, despite less experience and less practice. Similarly, there are many brilliant men and women who are outpaced by their subordinates.
No one seems to know why faster reading comes more easily to some people than others. What we do know is that more effective readers read in a different way from slower readers.
If you feel you do read more slowly than you would like, perhaps it isn't your fault. Certainly, the best of readers can be slowed down by things like:
- the complexity of the material
- the author's style
- a typeface which is hard to read
- monotonous layout and presentation (e.g. solid blocks of print weary eye')
- unfamiliar words and expressions
However, these may be just excuses. It is equally possible that it could be your fault, in the sense that we do know that slow readers tend to have developed some bad habits, whereas effective reading calls for certain techniques. These techniques can be learned and practiced. You could very probably read at least half as fast again as you do now and still understand as well; many people who either attend an effective reading course or are conscientious enough to teach themselves with the aid of the book like Breakthrough Rapid Reading by Jolito Ortizo Padilla are usually able to double their reading or speed without any drop in comprehension. Some people's comprehension level actually increases.
In this book it is not possible to allow enough space to give you a structured training course. What we can do, though, is:
- explain why people read slowly and ineffectively
- find out how you read at present
- suggest some techniques which, if you really want to improve your reading, you can practise perfectly well on your own.
At the moment, it is very likely that that you read practically everything you read in much the same way and at much the same speed. A moment' thought will tell you are spending too much on the easy material, which doesn't leave you enough time to spend on the more difficult stuff. Improving your reading speed is, therefore , mainly intended to increase the range of reading speeds available to you, so that instead of reading everything at the same fairly slow speed, you can be more flexible. With practice you will probably end up reading everything rather than you do now, even the very difficult material.
Reading is rather like driving: when you are learning and rather lacking in confidence, you drive fairly slowly and you don't get much above second gear. When you are more experienced, you can change up and down all the gears at will, almost without thinking about it., in order to suit different road and traffic conditions. So it is with reading. If you can gain confidence by employing advanced techniques, you will be able to adapt your approach to reading to suit the material and your purpose, at any given moment.
There are three basic reasons why we read:
- Pleasure- Many people read for no reason than the sheer pleasure they gain from a good story or the sound of words
- Information- This type of reading is perhaps the most basic reason. Whether we like reading or not, most of us have read in order to get facts -about our job, our interests, our lives in general: it covers everything from recipes to nuclear physics; from instructions on forms, to guidance on operating machines or gadgets.
- Judgement- In this type of reading, you are interested in people's ideas and opinions, in order to come to your own opinions and conclusions; you therefore need to be able to evaluate critically the arguments put forward, and be alert to the presence of prejudice or bias, or use of emotive arguments intended to manipulate you.
Reading faster is not the only problem. Although it is obviously important to eliminate bad habits and increase your reading speed, this is only part of developing a more effective approach to reading.
The other dimension is, of course, concerned with understanding, for it is no good simply increasing the rate at which you read if in doing so you gain less from what you read. In fact, these two aspects of efficient readings are inextricably linked, as we shall see; it is certainly true that many people discover that their comprehension improves as their speed increases.
Many people read inefficiently because of faulty eye movements, of which they are not even aware.
When you read , your eyes do not move smoothly across the page from left to right without stopping. If they did, all you would see was a blur. Try moving your eyes from one side of the room to the other without letting them stop. What did you see? A blur? You can only keep your eyes in focus while they are moving smoothly without stopping if the object you are looking at is also moving. Since the words on the page is stationary, your eyes stop to take in a word or phrase and then move on the next. These stops are called fixations. It is estimated that each fixation that our eyes make lasts approximately- 1/4 or 1/2 second and then the eyes move on. At each fixation, the eyes read or perhaps several words.
The number of words you focus on and take in or recognise at one fixation is called recognition span. Some people appear to be able to read straight down a printed page. In other words, they fixate only once each line and, at each fixations that take up the time. Poor readers tend to make a large numbers of fixations and have a small recognition span, but they also tend to have other habits associated with the eye movements and the brain's activity while reading.
This is the tendency to backtrack while reading. Poor readers, who tend to focus on each word, are actually making life difficult for themselves than they realise, because individual words do not convey very much meaning until they are joined to other words. So, as the slow readers plod steadily from word to word, trying to join idea of one word to the idea of the next, they find it difficult to grasp an overall meaning from the individual words. After three or four words they probably find they have forgotten what the first was and have to go back to the beginning again.
Because this process is slow, much slower than their brain can actually perform, the brain finds something else to do. In other words, they get easily sidetracked or distracted by what we tend to call daydreaming or thinking about something else.
Let's look at an example:
Read the sentence below very slowly word by word, using as finger to cover the word in front each time, but gradually uncovering each word.
Though...there...are...no...doubt...some...people...who...think...words...must...be...read...one...at...a time...they...are...wrong...because...meaning...tends...to...come...from...groups...of...words.
Like this:"Though"...Though there...Though there are... Though there are no...Though there are no doubt...and so on. At each stage the words do not convey very much meaning, do they? Not until we get to "people" does it begin to make sense.
A good reader, then, with a bigger recognition span and fewer fixations, not only reads faster, but also makes the business comprehension easier, and is less likely to be distracted because their brain is being pushed to keep up with the eye movement.
A good reader's reading pattern might look like below. So the good reader tends to select recognition spans on the basis of their meaning. They read thought groups rather than single words.
Though there are, no doubt, some people who thinks words must be read
one at a time they are wrong, because meaning tends to come from group of words
Another habit of a slow readers is the tendency to register the sound of the words as they read, either by physically mouthing them, or internally acknowledging the sound of the words in the head.
This is often a legacy from the days when we learned to read, first aloud and then to ourselves. Small children can certainly be seen mouthing the words as they read and, though this is less common adults, either externally or internally acknowledging the sound will inevitably slow down your reading speed.
Reading aloud, the average reader can only at about 125wpm. Mouthing the words or acknowledging the sounds inside your head would be bound to limit your reading speed to something below 200wpm.
This habit also has consequences for the idea of reading for meaning, which we have just looked at. If you mouth the words or hear them inside your head, you are concentrating on the words themselves, not on the meaning of the ideas you are reading.
Finding out whether you tend to register the words separately by internally acknowledging the sound of each word, is more difficult. There is no real test other than just consciously thinking about the danger, perhaps while you are reading this, and trying to discover whether you tend to do it or not. If you are slow reader, the chances are that you are almost bound to be doing it. If you push up your reading speed you won't be able to mouth the words or visualise them-it will become physically impossible.
Physical discomfort can also affect the ease and fluency with which you read.But too much comfort can reduce your concentration:
- Position- a comfortable chair, which is the right height, at a table, is probably the most suitable position for a serious reading task
- Lighting- good lighting is essential. Although desk lights are commonly accepted as the best form of lighting, a light source falling over your shoulder is best, since it reduces glare.
- Eyesight- have you had your eyes tested recently? Your eyes can deteriorate without your realising it, since the muscles work harder to compensate for any deficiency of vision. Similarly, the lenses in spectacles can become unsuitable . Pride often prevents people going to the optician, but even if you aren't suffering from any physical effects like tired eyes or headaches, your reading could still be suffering.
- Rests- While you should avoid being distracted by noise, other people, hunger or thirst and should give yourself a chance to get stuck into a reading or studying task, you should allow yourself reasonable breaks. Short, frequent breaks are probably more helpful than a longer break caused by exhaustion, after trying to stick at a reading task for hours without a break.
Obviously if you are having to go back to words or ponder over them because your brain can't assimilate them because they are unfamiliar or you do not understand them, your reading speed will inevitably be held back. Although writers to avoid using unnecessarily complicated and unfamiliar words. If your own vocabulary is weak you should work to improve it.
