Top 8 Life-saving Hacks for Speedy Reading
In whatever you are doing your major, you most likely have 50 to 200 pages of reading that you need to get through every single night of the week. The situation gets worse when you have your semester nearing and have heaps of assignments ahead. For those of us who are slow in terms of reading, which can be quite intimidating, especially since there are many other things that must be done.
Do you know that there are actually ways you can improve the speed in which you read and learn, apart from professional writing help from online academic essay services? Read on to learn more about the ingenious ways of speedy reading.
Scan carefully for important keywords:
Search for key words and new vocabulary, which are usually in bold or italic. Then read the sentence before and after. You have a better idea of the overall essence of what is happening and be a step ahead for the quiz.
The mighty rule of 10-seconds:
Browse every page for a maximum of 10 seconds, looking only for the main ideas of the page. When you get an idea that is new or that seems important, stop and spend 10 seconds re reading one article.
The best practice is to summarize:
Take a minute for each page of your book, and write a sentence or two that will help you organize the main ideas of the page. You can even write down the page. This is a great help when trying to find information to study at the end of the semester.
Quickly check the first and last sentences:
One of the great ways to get the gist of a paragraph is fast to focus only on the first and last sentences. That's where you will get 90% meat content. Whatever left afterwards is mainly filler.
Seek out for the visual markers:
Some of the text is more important than others, and it will appear on your test. Any text that is bold, underlined, in a box or a different color is a text that tries to attract your attention. Also look for bullets, numbered lists, or any that simply pops out from the rest of the page.
Numbers and statistics:
Unless you're reading a textbook of mathematics, numbers and statistics are a good thing to stop and look. Not only they are often included in the content, for example, years in your history class, but they will make you look smart in the discussions. It is unusual for many other people to remember the exact percentage of women occupying positions of Congress!
Highlighting color marks:
While the demonstration is not a very effective solution in general, it may be helpful if you use it effectively. Instead of using highlighters, however, invest in a package of mini colorful notes i.e. sticky notes. Then, as you sweep your manual, mark your pages with color matching.
Here is a good method you can follow:
- Green – You’ve understood the ideas on the page.
- Yellow - Some ideas to be considered.
- Red - Come back to this page further.
- Blue - This will be important for the test.
Take a sentence snapshot:
Some of the best research on the reading speed has to do with how you view the page. Instead of being trapped by word-to-word reading from left to right, try to take a mental snapshot of the entire sentence. Although you might not think that you get information, your brain receives and processes even though you were in a new sentence.
If you keep practicing these speed hacks, you'll be able to get through your documents quickly without sacrificing your ability to understand the material. Just keep looking for what's important. Keep your head and lint in the dryer where it belongs.