Continuing my interest in all things that increase productivity, and particularly with the concept of speed reading, I have been doing some research around the subject. As you, my loyal reader, already know, I have been learning Photoreading for some time. However I am a great believer in reading around a subject to get balanced knowledge and skillsets from different viewpoints in much the same way as Bruce Lee did for martial arts, but hopefully without the mysterious death and legendary conspiracy theory.
So I also had a look at QSR and a new twist on traditional speed reading, in addition to giving an update on my quest to photoread.
Worth a look is “Quantum Speed Reading” by Yumiko Tobitani. Quantum speed reading (QSR) is a completely new technique for reading books without looking at the pages. It was developed in Japan and has been taught to both children and adults there for the last several years. Astonishing as it may seem to most of us who learned only to read books by reading a page at a time they can in fact be read by simply flipping the pages. Unlike the many well established forms of speed reading that are in existence QSR does not require the book to be opened at all. The book is simply held up in front of the reader’s face and the pages are flipped rapidly using the thumb much like when preparing to shuffle playing cards.
Now the book is a little odd, I wonder whether this is the result of a (presumed) Japanese to English translation, as it reads a little like the dialogue from a dubbed martial arts movie. However, the anecdotes of it working are impressive, and it would appear that the concept is perhaps another step removed from traditional reading than even photoreading. Effectively the readers gain an intuitive understanding of the book that manifests itself using all of the senses - readers may hear noises, experience sensations, tastes or smells.
I did start to lose interest with the book when it began to talk about seeing the future, and a general interconnectedness with the universe. The book is more of a “this is really cool” than a “this is how to do it”, athough clearly it does talk about both the process and exercises to improve your skill. You can find out more at http://www.quantumspeedreading.com .
A more practical or left brain approach, depending on your viewpoint, is a neat software package called “Reader’s Edge”. Produced by The Literacy Company, the program uses Evelyn Wood’s techniques for speed reading, and lets you assess your reading speed and build on it, using interactive exercises that give you a passage to read, time you and then test your comprehension.
This would be a perfect program to help children or people who lack confidence in their reading ability to improve. The site has a small demo of the approach, which is certainly impressive, even if it only goes up to 800wpm, which I laughed at hahaha! I like the idea of the interactivity that such a program offers as it is important that you can benchmark your reading speed so that you can see what you need to do to improve it. The principle here is to eliminate the need to subvocalise text, and to expand your vision to read more than one word at a time. Most people can read three words at a time if they try, however for the average book it is possible to read an entire line at a time and even more, with practice. Sub-vocalising text (reading it out with your “inner voice”) limits your reading speed to around that of your conversation, so this approach trains you to miss out that step in such a way that you don’t lose comprehension.
The package works out at around £50 downloaded from http://www.readfaster.com and might be worth getting if you want to take your reading speed up without having to change your mindset in the way that photoreading or QSR require of you. Even if it ups your reading speed by 100wpm (a fairly modest improvement for most), that translates in to a dozen extra books a year for the average reader, and you know what “they” say - the more you learn the more you earn! The software also comes with a 30day money back guarantee so if you don’t see any progress you can send it back.
Even if you do photoread, a technique that is predomninently productive for non-fiction titles, you might find it useful to increase your speed and comprehension for fiction books, I’m going to give it a go and combine it with photoreading for novels, and see what happens, it might even help me get through a whole Clive Cussler novel without vowing to give up reading altogether. I’m going to search for a demo and give it a go.
So, finally, how is my photoreading going? Ok is the answer. I’ve had a fair amount of success with it, and I am certainly going through a lot more books, but I’m not sure how much i am photoreading versus speedreading, and activation is a rather strange concept that I think I need to learn to trust more. A problem that I have is that I am a very fast reader and processor of information anyway. However my technique, learned through too much study and tendering, is predominently skipping and dipping for keywords, and I wonder whether I am still doing that.
So, i’ve decided to acquire the self-study course, bought for a pittance from ebay, rather than for several hundreds plus shipping and tax from the US, which is far more in-depth and step-by step than the book, so hopefully going back to the beginning and working through the basics at a slower pace will help me improve my results.
What has become very clear to me through my recent investigations, is that the human brain is capable of a hell of a lot more stuff than our conscious mind is capable of understanding. The big step in reading, comprehending, processing and applying information at a better rate, is believing that it is possible. And it is about belief, because in the absence of the ability to comprehend our capabilities, belief is all we have.
Along these lines I’d like to recommend “Genius Mind” by Paul Scheele. An excellent interactive lecture on the capabilities of the human mind, it helps you take a large step towards truly believing that you are capable of more than you know you are.
Paul Scheele devised the photoreading process and much of that is alluded to here, but it is discussed in the context of accelerated learning - how to enable your mind to process information at much higher rates. It also covers the importance of relaxation in the learning process.
