Speed Reading Class 3

      Friday May 18^th was my last lesson with Mr. Ulsenheimer. We started again with the eye focus chart exercise to warm up our eyes to maintain only three focuses on each line. We then quickly read through “Choosing a Career” at about 750 words per minute. This was an exercise to get comfortable with 750 wpm. Mr. Ulsenheimer was timing us as we read and would tell us to move to the next column if we fell behind the 750 wpm. There was no quiz for this exercise so we moved on to the next article, "Why Learn to Speed Read?" This article was 1734 words and I finished in 2:20 so my wpm was 743. Then, we followed with a quiz and I got a 10/10. My speed was more than twice as fast as the first day and I was able to answer four more questions than the first day. 

     Next, we went to another single column reading. These were tough when first started them the previous class so I tried to work on them between classes. I finished this one with 600 wpm and got 7/10 questions correct. It was much better than I expected and I got both of the fill in the blank questions. The next reading was a long scientific article with pictures and graphs. Because there were pictures and graphs we spent a couple minutes to survey and scan the article. During these first few minutes we were supposed to just study the pictures and graphs and any captions that might go with them. Then, after the couple minutes were up, we read through the article with a hi-lighter to make note of anything that stands out or what you might want to come back to if it was too complicated to pick up on. I read through it with 625 wpm and answered 9/10 questions correctly. We read a couple more articles and finally we finished with "Easier Public Speaking," which I read in 3:30 at 660 wpm. I got 8/10 questions correct. So overall, I saw significant improvement from the first class of only 308 wpm and 6/10 questions to easily twice the speed with better comprehension in nearly every case.

     After taking my last class I started reading Thinking, Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman. Mr. Daly let me borrow it Friday and I read almost all of it, but I had to return it this morning. I spent in total about 6 hours reading it, and I got to page 376 of about 420. This book was unique because it included a lot of examples and exercises to try throughout the book so I started off slow, getting comfortable with this writing style. The first half I read between 326 wpm and 501 wpm. I tried reading one chapter at my normal reading speed without using by hand or focusing on just three parts on each line and I only read 239 wpm. The second half I picked up my speed and read between 490 wpm and 860 wpm. There were about 485 words per page so I was reading under a minute per page. As Mr. Ulsenheimer said, the types of books you read have big impacts on your reading speed, and so does the purpose you read each book or article. 

      I find I want to slow down, but when I slow down I get distracted easily and I have to reread to feel I understood the topic. When I speed up I somehow pick up everything better than when I went slower. The practice improves my focus, which improves comprehension, which makes it easier to read faster. Being able to focus is one of the most important aspects of speed reading. Practice also helps get used to using your hand to guide you down each line and it also increases eye movement speed. Hopefully, I will continue improving my speed as my practice increases.