Speed Reading Helps ADD/ADHD Students Improve Behavior and Overall Performance by Bernie Marasco

Speed reading software helps ADD/ADHD students improve behavior and overall performance by engaging students in interactive exercises and helping them learn to focus on one task at a time.

According to the American Psychiatric Association 5-8% of children and approximately 4% of adults suffer from ADHD. ADD/ADHD is defined as a physiological/behavioral disorder characterized by inattentiveness or short attention spans, hyperactivity, impulsiveness, and disorganization.

How Does ADD/ADHD Affect Reading?

It affects students that have difficulty focusing on study and general reading materials.

How Speed Reading Software can help: Speed reading software helps ADD/ADHD students by engaging them in interactive exercises (i.e. Drills and Games), by focusing on one task at a time, and by allowing the students to view reading material at a faster rate. Because they are engaged, and because they can adjust the text's parameters to meet their needs, they may feel a sense of accomplishment at being able to do the work. Some instructors have found that using a speed reading program for a short period in the morning led to improved behavior and performance overall throughout the school day.

The Educational Research Institute of America (ERIA) reviewed (www.acereader.com/papers/ERIA_Review_of_ACEREADER_Research.pdf) four independent studies of a leading speed reading software program to determine if the results provided valid evidence of its instructional effectiveness. While using different age groups and training levels, each of the studies provided evidence that:
1. The program increased both users' reading rate and their comprehension.
2. The program elicited a positive response in all test groups.
3. The program proved both easy to implement and effective to use among reading instructors.

The studies documented improvements with students at the elementary through the adult levels, as well as at a variety of ability levels. Perhaps most impressive was that the students' scores exceeded expected gains in both the experimental groups and the general school populations.

Students and adults can establish a baseline to measure their improvement by taking a free online reading test at www.freereadingtest.com.



About the Author:
Bernie Marasco is President of Stepware, Inc. developer of the award winning AceReader Speed Reading Software program. Keep up to date with the most recent literacy news by reading his blog at www.speedreadingsoftware.com and measure your reading speed and comprehension at www.freereadingtest.com

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The Natural Perspective of Speed Reading

by Kip Goldhammer

We all know how speed reading can enrich our lives both qualitatively and quantitatively. Qualitatively, because by speed reading we will be able train our mind to process its thoughts faster, and that will make us more intelligent over time. Quantitatively, because speed reading enables us to save time and use it for living our lives to the fullest. When we speed read, we are digesting the thoughts of the writer in a shorter span of time, and that gives us more time to analyze those thoughts and even to start applying them to our lives.



Speed reading courses have mushroomed in recent times like a bacterium undergoing binary fission, but it is necessary to emphasize here that all of them need not be effective at all. Some of them might create temporary boosts of speed reading episodes, but that would be all. Most of these courses do not work in the long run because they skin the human brain superficially. There is no conscious effort at making the person realize that speed reading must come from within, and not from any outside factor.



That is why natural speed reading techniques are much more effective. These do not employ any outer factor for enhancing reading skills; on the contrary, they condition the human senses to begin reading faster. This certainly helps the person to read faster; and not only that, the reader can also assimilate the thoughts into memory for a much longer time. In time, the thoughts become constructive inputs to the mind, and the person's life becomes enriched.



You must certainly have heard that children have much better mental capacities than adults. They are able to remember many more things, and can read at a voracious pace than adults can do. Think about it. When you were a child you learnt your native tongue, your state's language and perhaps some others too. That happened as a natural process, didn't it? Do you remember making any effort to master those languages? But if you were to learn a foreign language today as an adult, you can very well appreciate the difficulties you will have to take.



Why does that happen? That is because, as children, our mind is much closer to the natural way it was made - i.e. devoid of the thoughts that we have pumped into it over the ages. As a result, children can read faster, and that certainly improves their mind. Adults have a mind crammed with worries, which does not allow them to savor reading as they did when children.



The prime intention of natural speed reading is to help the mind understand what is in the written matter. The thing to be remembered is that your knowledge of language is the most important tool in speed reading. In that sense, it is your knowledge that is driving in the other knowledge into your mind. This is the whole premise of natural speed reading techniques. You keep a free mind, and then use your own knowledge to better read what is in front of you.



Natural speed reading works in a much better way than other methods because it allows people to understand their own limitations, and trains them to condition their minds to word faster. This method does not just improve reading capabilities, but it can actually help the person to improve life at large.



Kip D Goldhammer owns and operates http://www.lightningspeedreading.com How To Improve Reading Speed



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