Improving Reading Speed


When we read in foreign language, very often, we don’t have enough confidence in our text comprehension，therefore we have to slow down and tend to read the same line over and over again. However，low reading speed is an obstacle to us in efficiency and having general grasp of the materials. Thus for us college students and people preparing tests, it is very urgent to accelerate reading speed. Following are some advices from my experience:


Firstly, for we discuss the methods on improving reading speed, we should know how fast or slow we read. It is important to measure our reading speed before and after our practice in fast reading so that we can know how much improvement we have achieved.


Secondly, identify the purpose of our reading and try to achieve that purpose. Improving reading speed is a gradual process and we had better choose a short-term goal that can give us an impetus more easily.


Thirdly, experiment before starting practice of accelerating reading speed, and identify certain methods which are really suitable. Here are some suggestions:

1. Try to get main ideas from one text. When we read only for main point, we will pick up our reading speed naturally.

2. Don’t read every word. Focus our attention only on nouns and verbs and some functional conjunctions such as but, however, in particular, in contrast, otherwise, in fact, until, etc., which can help us get main ideas, and ignore the words or parts that we do not understand.

3. Never use a pen or a finger to point at the words while reading, but move our eyes to help reading faster, and try to broaden our eye span.

4. Don’t let eyes stay in the same line for more than 5 seconds.


Practice these tips and practice as often as possible, and don’t forget to measure reading speed at the end to see how fast we can read. It may be not very rewarding at the beginning, but with patience and time, we shall find that we are making progress.

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