Reading Tip: Always set a timer, and read a complete passage in one sitting.

Set a timer.

In this installment of my reading advice for college students, I share two connected strategies to get more out of your reading in less time.

The first tip is to decide how long you want to read, and set a timer. Having a timer running will help you stay on task and avoid distractions such as checking email, social media, or YouTube.

Avoid trying to set Herculean goals that are impractical. If you say you are going to read for 2 hours straight, your brain is going to think that a quick break can’t hurt anything. But you can probably convince yourself to focus for 30 minutes on reading with no distractions, and complete focus.

Always complete a passage in one sitting.

The second tip is to always complete a passage in one sitting. What’s important here is that you get to determine what a “passage” is in this case. Just because your instructor assigns 40 pages doesn’t mean you have to read them all in one sitting. Instead you can break them up into shorter passages that can be completed in the span of the time you have set for yourself.

An example.

Let’s take an example. Let’s say that you have to read a 30-page chapter of a scholarly book for your music history class. You look through the book and notice that the chapter is broken up into sub-sections, each with an individual heading.

Now let’s say that you want to break your reading into 30-minute, focused chunks. You take a guess that you can get through about 10 pages in that 30-minute block.

In this scenario, you would break the reading up into three sections, grouping the sub-sections into groups of 10 pages. That means it would take you 1 hour and 30 minutes to read through the whole chapter.

Consider an alternate scenario. What if you have the same 30-minute chapter, but only 30 minutes to read the whole passage? In this case you would still set a timer for 30 minutes, but use the techniques in Reading Tip 1 (Aim for Understanding) to get a sense of the argument throughout the whole chapter. You will just have to skim some sections and be okay with not catching every single detail.

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