
Speed Reading is Bullshit - ghosh
https://medium.com/the-mission/speed-reading-is-bullshit-f5acbee7f59e#.xj3w9ny4s
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blueflame_99
I used to be a deep reader when I was younger. Then I discovered some really
bad advice on how to read faster via the internet. At the end of a period of
experimenting with speed reading, I started being able to read very quickly,
grabbing the essence of a page without reading all the words. But I found that
my retention of that material was no longer as clear or as detailed as it used
to be. This continued until I eventually could no longer read slowly at all,
at least not without great effort.

Tl;dr: speed reading creates terrible habits, don't do it.

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andyy
\- Take a pen with black finish and run it under the letters, you’ll read at
1,5 speed (and it’s not a trick, it’s something children dp with their finger
when they learn to read so it's quite natural).

\- Stop saying words aloud in your mind when you’re reading.

\- Try to catch two or three words instead of one.

Now, none of this is bullshit or skimming, I'm doing it and have same
retention as I'd be 'spelling' in my mind word by word, I believe human brain
is smart enough to process more than one word or you think it's a crazy idea?
hehehe if so then good luck ;)

It's not about skimming or reading whole page in a matter of a couple of
seconds (I don't think you can have great retention with that unless you have
really great/photographic memory), but about basic skill which you can improve
(just like riding bicycle or doing tricks on skateboard). There are some 'bad
habits' of reading and eliminating this would improve your reading speed.

btw. I also know couple of mnemonic techniques that lets me remember things
permanently and very quickly - again, no bullshit, just a technique as old as
ancient Greece.

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DanBC
That's not speed reading, that's reading.

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wjnc
If there are techniques available, generally not thaught in school, that speed
up reading quite easily. Why not call that speed reading? Perhaps x10 is not
attainable to most (if any), but +50% is a massive time saver for anyone.

Same goes for mnemonics. The easy tricks are pretty easy to learn and worked
for me as well (remembering lists by visualizing a house with rooms). Might
have been natural to you, but a learning moment for me.

Obviously don't tunnel your life's savings into any scheme. But in the basics
learning more of the skills you use most.. is pretty efficient. (Ever seen
your accountant, or doctor type for that matter? Most nurses I saw recently
single finger type..)

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andyy
I agree, if you speed up by 50% I guess that's an speed improvement... as for
mnemonic techniques I've learned them from books, didn't cost me more than £50
and three months of 2 hours practice per week.

Roman Room (remembering lists by visualizing a house with rooms) is one of
more popular ones. The other popular one is 'chain' method where you remember
just one element connecting to another and this leads you to whole list.

There are mode advance ones like 'mnemonic tables', the idea is simple - you
remember 100 elements perfectly with their number in the table (they're just
images/slides whatever coded to numbers in your head), once you know them
perfectly you add adjectives to extend the table to 1000 elements so... number
one would be a pioneer, 101 would be wooden (or whatever) pioneer, number 1101
would be let's say wooden pioneer riding on a tiger (riding on a tiger is for
1k).

That's how you can use it to remember for example dates - at point of most
practice I was able to remember around 40 historic within two-three minutes
(permanently).

Why it works for everything else than dates? because memorizing things is a
process of creating and connecting new neural paths and as we repeat this
paths becomes stronger and that's one of the things that leads information
from our short term to long term memory.

Mnemonic tables are great because you already got something in your brain you
know perfectly on/to which you 'hang'/'connect' the new information so half of
the job is done - just as Roman room, a bit more advanced, but I guess you
could make a hybrid technique where house rooms have numbers ;) The key is to
make these images in your head as funny, vivid or emotional (can be scary or
any other strong emotion) as possible. That will make sure your brain will
have better chance of making strong neural paths.

Sorry, wrote to much stuff off-top, but maybe will be useful for someone.

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ldonley
Do you have any book recommendations for these techniques? I tried the "memory
palace" or the method of loci and had a small degree of success, but never
found it practical. I'd love to give it another go though.

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andyy
Check out books of Tony Buzan, use your head etc. as well look for some books
on mind mapping. As for that mnemonic system I cannot find it :/ but similar
thing is GMS from 'Phenomenal memory', look it up on google & you shall find
it... :)

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ldonley
I'll check them out, thanks!

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mvindahl
I quickly skimmed the blog post. Seems to be about reading.

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Shorel
Try to read a Lee Child book skipping sentences.

You will be lost in no time.

It is amazing how much information he can put in a paragraph.

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andyy
I don't think you should read any story books this way or for example poetry -
that would be just a nonsense!

Personally I like to imagine what Im reading so it kind of sucks if you read
too fast - skipping or 'scanning' sentences is where you need to 'weed out'
stuff, not really for books that are suppose to work on your imagination... I
think in here you dont want to skip nothing :D

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wodenokoto
Speed reading is a skimming technique.

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d4nc00per
Oh and....?

