A good beginning is half the battle. You may get twice the result with half the effort before you study.
1, before reading, make clear the reading goal. In other words, we should know whether reading this book is to learn specific knowledge points, improve literary literacy, or just for entertainment.
2. Choose the appropriate reading method according to the reading goal. Not all books need intensive reading and notes.
3. Be clear about your initiative in reading. The more active reading, the better the effect. Don't read when your head is sleepy and your eyes are dull.
4. The abilities required for efficient reading include keen observation, sensitive and reliable memory, imagination and well-trained analytical and reflective abilities.
5. Find a suitable reading environment. Whether it's a study, bedroom, coffee shop, library or study room, it's most important that you can really devote yourself to it if you like it.
Before you start reading, you should eliminate the factors that may interfere with reading. If you don't need to look up words and dictionaries, try to put aside electronic devices such as mobile phones, tablets and computers. Completely immersed in reading.
7. Reading doesn't have to take a lot of time. Some fragmented time, such as spare time on transportation, getting up early and going to bed, will be magical to use.
8. If you need to take notes, you need to prepare tools for taking notes.
How to browse a book
Not every book needs intensive reading, however, when it comes to skimming, does it mean that you can flip through it at will? NONONO, skimming also needs methods and strategies
9. Start skimming from the following questions: What book is this? What is the core idea of the whole book? What kind of overall structure does the author use to expand his views or state his understanding of this topic?
10, look at the title page first. If it is in order, you can look at the order first. Pay special attention to the subtitle, or other relevant explanations or purposes, or what special angle the author has in writing this book.
1 1, which defines the classification of books. If it is a non-literary book, is it biased towards theoretical research or practical skills? If it is literature, is it fiction or non-fiction? Only after the classification of books is clear, can we better grasp the key points according to the subject matter when we skim the content in the next step.
12, research directory page. Get a general idea of the basic structure of this book.
13. If there is an index in the book, you need to read it. Most of the works are indexed. By reading the index, you can quickly judge which topics are covered in this book.
14. If it is a new book wrapped in a book coat, you may wish to look at the publicity copy on the package or waist seal. These may be the theme, essence and highlights of this book.
15, by looking at the vague impression formed by the table of contents, pick a few chapters that seem to be related to the theme. If there are summaries at the beginning and end of these chapters, be sure to read them carefully.
16, skim from beginning to end, each chapter seems to be important for one or two paragraphs or consecutive pages, but not too many. Pay attention to the basic pulse of the topic and look for the signal of the main argument at any time.
17, don't miss the last two or three pages. Usually the author will summarize the core ideas and innovations of the book again at the end.
18. When skimming a difficult book, don't stop to ask or think about something that is extremely difficult to understand. Only pay attention to what you can understand, and don't be blocked or discouraged by a chapter, annotation, comment or reference that you can't understand.
19. If you read with Kindle, you can use some auxiliary functions of Kindle to help skim. For example, quick page turning, X-ray (through-the-book function, to help readers sort out the characters and places in the book).
How to read a book intensively
For books that want to read intensively, Xiao K extracts the following points from the reference books, so that you will no longer be afraid of difficulties before difficult writing, learn to deepen your memory and improve reading efficiency.
20. Do your homework about books and authors in advance. Understand the author and his life, the opportunity and background of Ta's writing this book, what position Ta holds among similar authors, what position this book holds among similar works, and so on.
2 1, put aside your distractions, read the preface of the book first, get a general idea, then list some specific questions in your mind or on paper, and go to the next chapter with these specific questions.
22. Intensive reading of a book does not mean careful reading of every word. The smallest language unit can only be divided into phrases or sentences, and you can't stare word for word. There are not many types of phrases and sentences in modern Chinese, but they are very important. Sometimes it is difficult for us to improve our reading efficiency and understand sentences because of the lack of basic knowledge of these languages.
23, re-establish the structure of the book. This is different from understanding the chapter structure of a book through the table of contents mentioned in the previous skimming. In intensive reading, readers should jump out of the original structure of the book, rearrange the key points in the combined book according to their own understanding or needs, establish a new structure and establish their own knowledge system. But remember not to deviate from the theme of the book and the objectivity of the materials in the book.
24. Tell the contents of the book in your own words. Sharing and dissemination are important features of knowledge. Reading a book and gaining knowledge from it often requires us to "speak" to achieve the reading effect.
25. Experience and learn the author's way of thinking. When you encounter an incomprehensible problem, it may be that your thinking angle is different from the author's. You might as well sort out the context of this book in your mind again and think about why the author put forward such views at this time in the order of the author's thinking.
26. Try to read it again and again. "If you read a book a hundred times, you will understand what you mean." That makes sense. Repeated reading is the most common and important way to read a book intensively, but it is not a mechanical rereading of the book from beginning to end, but a focused, orderly and detailed reading.
27. Learn to think critically when reading. The process of intensive reading is more like a deep dialogue with the author. The author does not necessarily accept all the viewpoints stated, but keeps asking and thinking while reading, and goes deep into each chapter with dialectical questions.
28. Sharing and exchange meetings can be organized. Reading the same book, the exchange and sharing of feelings after reading it will help us to understand the book more deeply and comprehensively from different angles.
29. Take reading notes. The specific method of taking notes will be carefully worked out later.
How to improve reading speed?
Whether intensive reading or skimming, it is necessary to improve the reading speed appropriately. But what Xiao K wants to remind everyone here is that the speed of improvement is by no means the same as a cursory glance, not the sooner the better, but the frequency of input absorption, so as to improve reading efficiency as much as possible on the existing basis.
30. Visual reading is silent reading. That is, don't read aloud when reading, but read silently. The average person's speech speed is slower than visual reading, and the sound will interfere with the reader and affect the reading effect.
3 1, use a hand-held pen to guide the line of sight. Similar to the "finger reading method" commonly used in reading when I was a child, on the one hand, the pen tip can make my attention highly focused on what I read, on the other hand, it is also convenient to outline keywords, main arguments and even take notes with my pen at any time.
32. Do eye exercises regularly. Research shows that whether a person's horizons are broad or not directly affects reading speed. Want to broaden your horizons in reading, in fact, is to increase the scope of clear visual area. You can choose to use the "letter tree", focus on the middle number from top to bottom in turn, and then look away to see if you can recall what words are on both sides, so as to broaden your horizons.
33. In addition to visual exercises, we should learn to jump the line of sight and get rid of the disadvantages of word-for-word reading. If you want to speed up reading, you should increase the amount of information you receive every time you concentrate. Don't just read one word at a time, read it according to the phrase structure, short sentences or even whole sentences.
34. Try a few lines. It may be too exaggerated to read ten lines at a glance, but you should learn to look between the lines, take in the focus and the words that can be seen clearly up and down, left and right at a glance, and image them in your mind.
35. Try not to read back. It is normal to encounter something that is difficult to understand at the moment when reading. Repeated reading will disrupt the reading rhythm and reduce the reading efficiency. In fact, if an article or a book wants to be logically self-consistent, there is generally no isolated concept. What you can't understand for a while will be interpreted or compared in detail later.
36. improve your concentration. Going deep into the text, constantly asking questions and thinking, and concentration can greatly improve efficiency.
37. Be alert to the negative emotions of reading. Overcome the fear of difficult books, don't be afraid of books and authors, keep a normal mind when encountering things you don't understand, don't be anxious, and don't give up easily.
38. Quick understanding is also important. Understanding is the speed of processing the text information obtained by the eyes, so speed reading is essentially fast understanding. We need to sort out the context of the article while reading and understand the author's creative thinking.
39. Learn to do mind mapping in your mind.