“I’m a slow reader,” say many of my friends that do not like to read, or have trouble reading for school.
My boyfriend’s brother often says this, but my boyfriend suggested this program “spreeder” that trains the brain to read and comprehend faster. It flashes the words in front of you at whatever speed you set it at. It says the average user reads at 300 wpm, but it lets you play with different speeds as well as how many words are on screen at once. It claims that it can train you to go up to 1000 wpm, which I tried and found very challenging. It gave me a bit of a headache.
What I think is even more interesting than the concept of training your brain to read faster, is how the website pitches its product:
Read 3x Faster and be More Productive in Life
I love that they claim that this will make you more “productive” in life. While reading faster may make it easier to get work done faster, it is likely that you may not be able to comprehend as much or at least have as deep of an understanding of a text. Heck, some texts require multiple readings at a slow pace. While I like the idea of reading faster, I am skeptical of the depth of comprehension this brings.
I think I actually have the same read-faster app program that you mentioned. I used it for a week or so and enjoyed it until I was able to get long novels done in mere minutes with next to no comprehension. What’s the point of being to read the words and passages quickly if the ideas in the text itself begin to be blurred and incoherent for the reader?
That is my concern as well. I do like the idea that it can help you read faster, though I don’t think anyone should sacrifice comprehension. My mom is an extremely fast reader, and she reads all the time. I would love to read as fast as her, and I think this program could help with that.