How To

Remember
More of What
You Read
Its probably happened to you. Youre reading a
few pages of text and then you stop to think, I
cant even remember what I just read. You read
the information, but cant remember. Think of all
the novels you read in school. How many can you
remember? Forgetting what you read is a com-
mon problem, but it has a simple solution. In the
pages that follow, youll learn some simple ways
to remember more of what you read. Well also ex-
plore how to read and remember what you read
on the computer screen.
Copyright 2012 The Iris Organization. www.irisreading.com
Decide To Remember
Usually, the time people decide that they really want to re-
member something is when they cant recall it. You want to
start by making a demand of yourself that you WANT and
NEED to remember this information. By doing this you are
mentally preparing yourself for the information that needs to
be retained.
Get Into a State of Mental Focus
You can unlock your brains capacity by learning to focus
while you read. If we dont concentrate while reading, the task
of remembering will be extremely difficult.
The simplest way to improve your focus while reading is
to use your hand or pen as a guide. When you point to some-
thing, its easier for your eyes to focus on it. For example, try
counting all the lines on this page. If youre like most people
youll probably use your hand or finger and go line-by-line to
count, instead of just eye-balling it.
Using your hand as a guide is even more helpful when
you have very long paragraphs. Its very easy to get lost in a
blizzard of words when you are not using your hand. But if
you start making it a habit to read this way, youll find your fo-
cus will easily improve.
Another way to improve your focus while reading is to
simply get rid of distractions. Think about the potential dis-
tractions you may face if you decide to read for an extended
period of time. Your phone may go off. A text message comes
in. An email notification pops up. Your co-worker, friend or
family member disrupts your reading by walking in and ask-
ing you a quick question. The urge to check your email, face-
book or anything else on the internet may arise. You may start
thinking of something else that is on your mind while reading.
Many of these distractions can be eliminated. If you
really need to spend some time on some focused reading, try
turning off your phone. Disconnect from the internet. Ask
your co-workers, friends or family members to make sure they
dont interrupt your reading. Or find a place where you can fo-
cus without distractions. These are simple solutions to remove
distractions that interfere with the reading process.
Select What You Wish To Remember
Are you reading with a clearly stated purpose? Many people
begin reading without clearly defining their goal in reading.
Selecting what you wish to remember will help you remember
it because it will force you to focus on what is most important.
You need to be selective. You cant expect to memorize
an entire book or chapter, but you can select what you seek to
understand and what you need to remember. Even the great-
est memory whizzes in the world have difficulty recalling an
entire book. So dont start with that expectation. Start by se-
lecting exactly what you wish to remember and why you need
to remember it. Otherwise, whats the point in reading this in-
formation?
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Organize Creatively
Taking notes while reading will help you recall the informa-
tion better. But if you organize those notes creatively by using
mind maps, youll find your ability to retain and recall greatly
enhanced. Building a mind map requires that you start with a
central idea and image, representing the subject or main idea.
The picture below is an example of a mind map.
Because our brain is very good at remembering visual in-
formation, try to combine words with images when creating a
mind map. This will help secure the information more
strongly in your brain. The picture above is a basic example of
a mind map that combines words and images.
Using colors, images, multi-dimensional words, and
curved lines will help you create the ideal mind map that will
be source of information you plan to remember.
If youd rather produce your mind map electronically, try
using a web-based mind-mapping tool like MindMeister
(www.mindmeister.com).
Utilize the Multiple Reading Process (MRP)
The Multiple Reading Process is a reading strategy that helps
you read faster with stronger retention. The process involves a
minimum of three steps (for easier material) or a maximum of
five steps (for harder material).
Step #1: Preview
Before even starting this step, its assumed that you have al-
ready established your purpose. In other words, you know
why you are reading this material and exactly what you want
to get out of it.
The preview requires you to figure the main point of the
information. So if you are reading a chapter in a non-fiction
book, you would start by reading the introduction and conclu-
sion. If the introduction and conclusion are not clearly labeled
by headings your chapter, you can simply read the first and
last paragraph. You can do the same thing when reading an ar-
ticle.
By reading the introduction and conclusion of the text,
you now know what to expect and what the main point of the
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information will be. At this point, if your goal is to really re-
member the information well, you should start your mind
map with the central idea in the middle.
Step #2: Overview
The overview requires that you find major concepts and ideas
that are discussed in the article or chapter. If you were read-
ing a textbook, or any other structured piece of material, you
would simply read the following:
Headings
Sub-Headings
Bold-Faced Words
Graphs & Illustrations
Bullet Points & Numbered Lists
If your chapter or article doesnt have headings, sub-headings
and bold-faced words, you would read the first sentence of
every paragraph.
First sentences of paragraphs are usually main ideas. By
reading all the first sentences you can get an idea of all the ma-
jor concepts involved in the text. As you are getting these
ideas, youll want to add them to your mind map to strengthen
your retention of the material. The information that you add
to your mind map should be important concepts and words
that trigger you to remember ideas presented in the text.
Step #3: Read
Before even starting this step, decide whether or not this mate-
rial is worth reading. If the material is not required for school
or work, then you need to be selective about the material you
read fully. Because youve already previewed and overviewed
the material, you now know what its about and can make an
informed decision over whether or not you want to read the
information fully.
After completing two steps in this reading process and
realizing the information you already know about the subject,
you may decide that you dont need to read this information.
Sometimes, youll find that you originally thought the material
would be interesting, but after previewing and overviewing it,
youve found it to be boring. Making an information decision
to not read something fully is a great way to save yourself a
ton of time.
Lets assume you decide the material is worth reading.
Or maybe it is required reading for school or work. Now that
you know what to expect, from the previous two steps, you
can read it with more confidence. Knowing what to expect will
also enable you to read faster.
How does this process help you remember what you
read? We know that repetition is the single most important
reason we remember anything. For example, you dont remem-
ber the lyrics to a song by just hearing it once. Its only after
hearing it multiple times that it gets stuck in your head. Simi-
larly, reading requires repetition. But instead of reading this
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information from beginning to end, repetitively, we are read-
ing it multiple times in different ways.
The preview required you to read the introduction and
conclusion. The overview required you to read the main ideas.
Now you are simply reading to get the detail. And because
youve had multiple exposures to the material, combined with
creative note-taking (mind mapping), youre more likely to re-
member the information better.
To remember more of what you read, try utilizing the
read & recall technique. This requires you to take a quick-
note immediately after reading a paragraph. You can write the
note in your mind map or in the margin if you prefer. The
note that you take should be concise (one to three words at
most). In other words, you are writing down a key word, or
trigger word, for every paragraph.
If you happen to come across any areas of the text that
are very difficult, put a checkmark next to that paragraph and
try to continue reading through the information. You can al-
ways revisit that paragraph later after finishing the chapter.
The read & recall method allows you to immediately,
and quickly, recall what you read after finishing a paragraph.
By rehearsing this information right away, you embed the idea
more firmly into your memory. By doing this, you are also
training yourself to focus more on your reading because you
know that you have to write something down at the end of the
paragraph. Know this makes you pay more attention to the
text. The read & recall method is effective because it em-
ploys repetition. And as we discussed earlier, repetition helps
us remember.
Step #4: Final Review
This is an optional step and should be followed only if you
need to know the information very well. The final review, as
the name implies, is your last chance to review the material be-
fore moving on. There are several ways to do a final review. Af-
ter you finish reading the material fully, you can do any or all
of the following:
Re-read any parts of the text that you think are espe-
cially important. You want to revisit the core concepts.
Re-read any paragraphs where you placed a checkmark
which indicates technical material that needs to be re-
read. Nine times out of ten youll find those paragraphs
to be easier this time around because youve read the en-
tire the material fully and can now connect the informa-
tion to other parts of the text.
Repeat step number two in this process (the overview).
You can re-read the first sentences of paragraphs, or
look at all the headings, sub-headings, bold-faced
words, graphs & illustrations, bullet points and num-
bered lists.
As you are going through the information one last time,
try to relate the information you just read to information you
already know. Association is a memory principle. Anytime you
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can associate new information with something you already
know, it will help the memory last longer.
To make the memory even stronger, try associating the
information dramatically. Any exaggerated visualizations you
can create will help you store the information more strongly
in your brain.
A final review of the information will help you rehearse,
one last time, what the material was about and will provide
the necessary repetition you need to remember the material
better.
Step #5: Recite
This is another optional step in the Multiple Reading Process.
You should do it if the material is especially important to you.
For example, you may need to remember what you read for a
test at school or a presentation at work.
The basic idea here is that you talk about what you just
read. You may want to discuss the material with a co-worker,
classmate, friend or family member. Putting the information
into your own words requires you to activate other parts of
your brain when you explain the information. Talking about
what you just read also strengthens the connections you make
to the information and thus helps you remember it better.
You can also try teaching the material to someone else.
As Stephen Covey, author of Seven Habits of Highly Effective
People, likes to remark, Teach once, learn twice.
Use Spaced Learning to Optimize Your Memory
After finishing the Multiple Reading Process, you can enhance
your memory of the subject matter by utilizing the principles
behind Spaced Learning. This technique requires you to re-
view what you just learned at set intervals to optimize your
memory of the subject.
In 60-90 minutes after you are done reading, try coming
back to your mind map or simply think about what you previ-
ously read. Doing so provides another source of repetition to
help you remember the information better.
In another 12-24 hours, try thinking about what you pre-
viously read again. Or re-draw your mind map from scratch. If
you mind map previously contained a combination of words
and images, youll find it surprisingly easy to recall what you
previously read.
When Reading on the Computer Screen
You can still follow the Multiple Reading Process if you are
reading on the computer screen. However, using your hand to
guide your eyes can be problematic on a computer screen. You
could use an external mouse to guide your eyes line-by-line as
you read, but this again is a problem for those reading on lap-
tops.
We recommend that you use a free speed-reading tool
like AccelaReader (www.AccelaReader.com). AccelaReader is
an application that blinks words on the screen at a speed that
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you set. To use the application, you simply highlight what you
want to read and then copy & paste it into the application.
Then you set how many words you want blinked at a time (for
beginners we recommend starting with 2 or 3 words), and
how fast you would like to read. After clicking the read but-
ton, the application will blink the words at the speed that you
set.
Keep in mind that you should still preview and overview
the material before you set the AccelaReader to blink the
words. Doing the first two steps of the Multiple Reading Proc-
ess will help you retain the information better at a faster
speed.
Dont Read to Remember - Read to Understand
It is important that you read to understand instead of trying
to read to remember. Never, never read in order to remember!
If you do the latter, a strange thing happens - you wont re-
member as much as you will if you read to understand.
Reading to remember is like gathering apples. When you
gather a few and then reach for more, some fall out, and so on.
But when you read to understand, you find the structure of
the material and see how everything relates. When this hap-
pens you learn, and consequently are able to remember a
great deal more.
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