How to increase reading spead

II. Increasing reading speed

You can improve your learning power very much by speeding up your reading. It is equally important that you are able to comprehend the meaning of what you are reading. You can lose speed in your reading in three ways:
. By reading one word at a time – You should read in groups of words.
. By going back over what you have read – Your eyes should move steadily forward.
. By moving your lips or tongue while you are reading – Keep your lips closed and your tongue and head still.

Task 1: The following passage has 106 words in it; read it in
one minute making sure you are not just automatically
reading the words. Make sure you understand what you
are reading.

Shelly Mann loved to swim; it came naturally to her. But breaking an Olympic Record was a distant dream, afflicted as she was with severe polio at age 6. But then Shelly was mentally strong.She took up swimming when she was 10 and by the time she was 12 she began competitive training in Washington, DC.

In the early 1950s she won the US National Championship.And by sheer hard work and grit Shelly moved mountains, not just muscle! She set a 1 minute 11 seconds Olympic record in the 100- metres butterfly in the 1956 Olympic Games in Melbourne at the age of 17.

Now answer these questions without looking at the passage:

1. What came naturally to Shelly Mann?
………………………
2. What was a distant dream for her?
………………………
3. What was she afflicted with?
………………………
4. And at what age?
………………………
5. Where did she take up competitive training?
………………………
6. What record did Shelly set at the age of 17?
………………………

Task 2:


1. Write the most important sentence in the passage.



2. Write the least important sentence in the passage.

Task 3: Take a passage of about 250 words and read it rapidly
within 2 minutes. You could do the same with passages
of varying length and time your reading.


Task 4: (Note to the teacher: Find an interesting text, which you think may appeal to most of your students such as a joke from a magazine, a brochure about Disneyland, or anything that is colourful and fun. Then, type that passage on a page using large margins so that the text itself is not spread from one end to the other but rather it is squeezed up into a thin column. Make enough copies to go around and then grab a pair of scissors as you go to class. Cut along a line so that the last one or two words at the end of each line are cut off. Hand out the papers and ask the students to read the text and try to find the missing word(s) for about five minutes. You can tell them to work in pairs or groups and discuss it. They will engage in a true communicative negotiation while they are attempting to prove to the others that what they have come up with as the answer is correct. After you let them work for a while, you will hear the words they have found. You will be amazed to find out how creative they may become when they shout out words that are not the originals but are quite correct as
alternatives.)