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SEPTEMBER 1983 SOFTALK
Articles:
1) Book
of Apple 84
6) Softalk 83
7) Softalk 84
nonjudgmental insistence
that you continue reading. When the computer presents Tom Sawyer with a pacer
to keep you reading, the pacer, a thin horizontal strip of paper drawn vertically
down the page, won't wait for you to catch up. You set your pace and it relentlessly
holds you to it.
The program suggests you warm up each day with five minutes of the computer
text (yes, Tom Sawyer) and the computer pacer or pencil moving you along.
Then it insists that you practice on real books of your choice. You can do
that anywhere, reporting the results to the program, or you can let the computer
time you. The program figures out your speed based on its own timing and your
page reports.
Using the computer as a timer works beautifully. You enter the number of the
page you begin on, set the timer, and read. The program is considerately designed
to give you plenty of flexibility. Do you like to push yourself and get fast
feedback? Set the program to buzz you every five minutes (or every minute)
for input, and try to beat each five-minute time with another five-minute
read. Would you rather read a good hunk in peace and quiet? Set the timer
for an hour or more. You can opt for the metronome to tick as you read you
tell it the pace you expect to read at and it ticks at what should be two-line
intervals. Or you can tell it to get lost.
When time's up, the program asks if you read for the entire time, so that
if you've been interrupted and actually read for only ten of the fifteen minutes
it was set for, you haven't lost the entire session. Then it asks how many
pages and how many lines beyond that you've read. Immediately upon receiving
your answers, it responds with your reading speed in words per minute for
that session.
When you become fast enough and proficient enough, you can go back to the teaching disk to learn even more esoteric means of super speeding. It's possible, they say, to read and comprehend a novel in the time it takes to turn the pages.
Super Speed Reading comes in a high-quality suede like binder, with a manual that appears, from the first few pages, to be excellent. But who wants to read manuals? (Maybe after you finish the course...) Besides, you don't need to. You can boot up this program and delve into your study and practice; the disks are self-prompting and their content is exquisitely clear and logically organized.
For most of us, learning to speed-read is something we'd like to have done but never quite have the time to do. Super Speed Reading brings the professional process home and, because it's so well done, it behaves a lot like a spoonful of sugar. -MCT
Super Speed Reading,
by Art Carpet,
Developed by Magnum (21115 Devonshire Street, Suite 337, Chatsworth, CA 91311; 213-700-0510). $149.
Super Speed Reading incorporates the best of the computer's capabilities to guide you and time you and help you read books fast-and magazines and newspapers and business reports and other paper products.
The program is based on methods developed by J. Carson Kovar during more than twenty-five years of teaching speed reading.
The method centers on using a device to help you move your eyes quickly down each page with as few stops as possible at best none. Super super-speed readers merely flick their index fingers at the top corner of each page. But the first step is to quit reading word for word, to quit saying each word to yourself as you read. So this method first has you train your eye to stop only three times, then only two, per line and get your lips and throat to quit working.
Super Speed Reading takes good advantage of the computer to encourage you. First, the program presents the theories and methodology in an interesting and attractive way, full of interaction. Then it provides you with tools for keeping track of your progress and for timing yourself while you're working.
The best tool, though,
might simply be the computer itself-and its
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