Reading Speed

You've gotta try Zap Reader. This site lets you paste text into its window, and then presents the article you've copied at an adjustable a) number of words per minute b) number of letters at a time c) and probably other cool stuff in settings I haven't checked out yet.

On the surface it's just cool to get a sense of what speed you're comfortable with. Beyond that, I began to wonder how useful it is as a teaching tool to improve reading speed.

Here's what I've found:
After using Zap, when I was reading a slate article I was less enticed to look back at previous words, which I know is a major lag on reading speed. I also found myself focusing on words more closely-- and noticing spelling more-- than what I usually do (generally I glance at word clusters). Now, I'm not certain that's a good thing, because people read by sudden saccades capturing word clusters. One would think the wider the spacing between saccades, the fast you'd read.

Let me pause here and say, I was using Zap on 4 words at a time... various word presentations could have a very different training effect.

So, to sum up, looking back at previous text less is an improvement, and looking more closely at words may be a good thing, but maybe not. The third, and ultimate effect, which is something I've been working on doing but failing-- after using Zap I found myself internally vocalizing the words LESS. Not saying the words as you read is supposed to be the ultimate source of quick comprehension of a passage.

I find all this stuff both very interesting, and also very confusing. That said-- reading is so ubiquitous... for fun, for work, for tests... that it's definitely worth thinking about. Plus I'm always curious about teaching methods, and when I happened upon this site, I was like, Damn-- this could teach kids to read reeeeal goooood. Not sure why my education just dipped there, but it did.

Or just play around with Zap. It's cool (though it's super-version 1.0... I wish google would do this and have it be way less clunky-- like copying slate articles in is a pain in the butt-o cause of all the inserted ads and crap).