Comprehending what you read better comes easy one you know the mechanics of how you comprehend. In my post Reading Comprehension Strategies, I cover in detail the mechanics of how reading comprehension works. I highly recommend you check it out fist prior to moving on to this tip.

The Tip: Read the first sentence of every paragraph prior to reading the article in it’s entirety.

As simple as this sounds, this technique is very effective for improving your reading comprehension. The first sentence in every paragraph is called the “topic sentence”. In the formal academic paragraph, it is the most general of all sentences and contains within it, the most relevant information about the paragraph’s contents. By taking the time to read the first sentence of each paragraph prior to reading the entire article, you will learn a great deal about the article’s contents. When you then read the article, you will comprehend it better.

This little tip is a spin on the truth that if you read an article twice, you will comprehend it better. That’s however a very time consuming task and won’t help you in your overall reading speed. If you read the first sentence of very paragraph, you will be able to enjoy the same benefits of reading it twice but in a fraction of the time. Give it a shot and post your feedback, thanks for reading!

Whether you’re the CEO of a multinational, or the department intern, you qualify as a business professional.  Needless to say, that title entails the possession of a broad set of skills that includes leadership, communication, practical knowledge, and yes–reading.  Reading may not seem like a significant part of your day-to-day work.   You may have abandoned the notion of reading with the concluding chapter of your college textbooks.  Quite the contrary, in fact.   If you are a serious player in the competitive job market of today, you already know that simple tasks that may not seem to take up much of your time actually eat up more of it than you’d think.  But you already knew that.  You’re a clever professional.  You know that cutting down on time spent doing menial labor–like reading–means more time doing work that relates directly to your job. (more…)

Although these tips won’t have you reading like Matt Damon in Good Will Hunting, they will help you get an immediate boost in speed. Speed reading does take practice, but these are the simplest things you can do to start. (more…)