Reading is an essential skill that everyone needs to have. Being able to communicate with others is critical to your success in the world. From this line of thought, speed reading was developed. If you can gain so much information reading normally, just think what you could accomplish if you could do it twice as fast. This is the basic concept behind speed reading and it has been learned all over the world.
While there is no set speed of reading that people attain, speed reading is able to help you to learn to read much faster than you do at the moment. Chunking and subvocalization are two methods that are used, among others, that enable people to speed read. There are speed readers who are quite capable of reading up to two thousand words per minute and, what is more, they are also able to recall up to half of what they have read. Although this may seem impossible for those of us who have never learned the ability to speed read, for people who use it daily it is merely a way of life and they can do it without even thinking about it.
Speed reading actually came about through a method that is used by psychologists. They would use a machine called a tachistoscope which rapidly flashes images on a screen in front of people. They were astounded by the fact that, although some of the images were only seen for a fraction of a second, their subjects were able to recognize them. This was the basis for the concept of speed reading.
The United States Air Force found out about this ability and they made extensive use of speed reading, even adding their own input to the ability. Harvard then took the process even further and eventually they produced the first film that was made in order to teach the average person the art of speed reading.
Over the years, many people have used speed reading. One of the most famous speed readers was John F. Kennedy. It was said that his reading speed was amazing and he was a big propenent of the skill. One man named Howard Stephen Berg claims that he is the world's fastest reader with the ability to read up to 25,000 words in a minute. He demonstrated his ability across the country on different television programs. For example, he once read an 1100 page book and scored a 100% on a memory recall test afterwards. While not everyone will be able to read that fast, it's generally accepted that you can improve your reading speed.
In order to learn how to speed read there have been a number of programs that have been developed. Some use books that you practice with on a daily basis. You are able to double or even triple you current reading speed by following these exercises. Thanks to technology you are now able to find many software programs that will help you to increase your reading speed.
While there are many different programs out there to help you learn, there are just as many different theories on how to learn. Some methods teach you to view words as whole images instead of sounding them out. Some methods have you stare at the center of the screen while more text becomes visible around it. There are many different theories as to how to learn speed reading. The important thing is that it can be learned. You can better yourself in this area of life.
Speed reading is a very useful tool that can prove very beneficial to you. It will greatly assist you in not only digesting large amounts of information but also in retaining more information in the process.
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Speed Reading Reviews is an independent Internet website with articles, information and advice for anyone seeking to learn more about the fascinating art of speed reading and to learn how to speed read
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