Remember Everything You Read: The Evelyn Wood 7-Day Speed Reading \& Learning Program pdfdrive com

particular, be sure that you’re in a comfortable position; that you’re
turning pages efficiently; and that you’re using that underlining hand
motion, with no regression.
Now for the test. Have a pad and a pencil nearby. Look at your watch
with the second hand and note on the pad the exact minute and second.
BEGIN READING NOW. I’ll stop you at some point later in the text so
that you can see how your reading speed has improved.
Those Remarkable Mini-Lessons
Many parents have been deeply impressed by what happens in the
“mini-lessons” at our learning centers, where they observe their children
being introduced to the Evelyn Wood method of study. In the typical
mini-lesson, which involves one forty-five-minute session with an
instructor, the students receive various kinds of reading material and are
asked to read it as fast as they can. Then, they calculate their reading
speed.
Next, the instructor gives several short talks, describing techniques
that will improve the students’ reading speed. These include previewing
the material in advance of regular reading; using special hand motions;
developing the discipline to not read back over material already covered;
and reading the material by looking at groups of words, rather than at
each word individually.
Finally, at the end of the session, the instructor asks the students to
apply what they’ve learned by giving them another test. Consistently,
the students show an average increase in their reading speed of 50

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percent, with improved comprehension.
Even more dramatic from the parents’ vantage point, however, is what
they observe during the final test. As the students apply their techniques
and work at increasing their reading speed, parents notice that the
instructor begins to cavort at the front of the room. He may pick up a
chair and hold it over his head, do pirouettes like some awkward ballet
dancer or otherwise act outrageously within a few feet of the students.
But amazingly, none of the youngsters even notices. They are
concentrating so hard on their reading that they become oblivious of
what’s going on around them.
Most of the parents have never seen their children pay such close
attention to their reading. Usually, after this presentation the adults are
completely sold on the reading and study concepts they’ve seen
demonstrated. They realize that by encouraging these and similar study
techniques at home, it’s possible to transform their children’s study
habits, concentration and academic performances.
I’ve seen much the same thing happen with a group of adults who take
a mini-lesson. In one urban high school, the teachers were periodically
given part of a workday to explore ways to further their own education.
As part of this program, they invited a team from our Evelyn Wood
organization, including the topflight instructor Dan Warner whom I’ve
already mentioned, to show them how speed reading works.
It was fairly obvious that this group, which was noisy and restless, was
going to be difficult to reach. But Dan has encountered plenty of bored
and skeptical audiences before—and he’s also had plenty of experience
cutting through their negativism and getting them interested and
involved.
The first thing he did was initiate a dialogue with them: “Have any of
you ever heard of us?” he asked.
A number indicated they had.
“I understand you work with youngsters and are interested in getting
them to learn more efficiently, with greater levels of concentration—is
that fair?”
“Yes,” the class responded in unison. Almost immediately, he had
them with him, interacting constructively and anticipating with some
interest what he was going to say or do next.
“Mind-wanderers, are you here today? Do any of you ever have

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trouble concentrating on what you’re reading or studying? Do you ever
fall asleep when you read?”
“No!” they all said loudly—with big grins that showed they meant the
opposite.
“Procrastinators, are you here?” Dan continued. “That’s where I came
from. I took this course back in 1967, when I was in grad school. But I
had had plenty of problems before that. At the end of two years of
undergraduate school, I flunked out because I kept putting my work off.
I took notes like a crazy fool in classes, but then, I’d wait until the night
before the test to read and study the material.”
But Dan did manage to finish college; he went on to graduate school;
and he took the Evelyn Wood dynamic reading course. “I proceeded to
nail
the next tests I took in grad school,” he told the class. “In fact, I
became so adept at reading that the Evelyn Wood people asked me to
teach.”
After finishing his preliminary remarks, Dan passed out copies of
Albert Camus’s novel