Yesterday you learned about logic games. Today we’re going to look at reading comprehension.
[Edit: Since you’re on my website, it’s possible you never signed up for my course at all. Someone might have sent you this link, or you found it on Google. This page is part of my free five day email course for getting a better LSAT score. If you’d like to see the rest, let me know your email here.]
Reading comprehension is the section everyone loves to hate. A common opinion is that there isn’t anything you can do to get better at reading comprehension. From my experience teaching hundreds of students, I know this isn’t true. I’m going to teach you the two ways that will definitely improve your score:1. Reading faster, and better
2. Knowing the structure of the passage
3. Knowing where to find information
4. Rereading/skimming to improve retention (advanced)This email is longer than the others, but it has just about everything I know about LSAT reading comprehension. Stick with it, and enjoy!
You can read faster than you currently do
People treat reading speed as something fixed, that can’t be changed. I hate this. It’s clearly false: reading speeds vary greatly. Most LSAT students read between 240-280 words per minute (WPM). That’s a 20% variation right there. That’s HUGE. If you could read 20% faster, you wouldn’t run out of time on reading comprehension sections.
But speed differences don’t stop there. I see many students who read 200-240 WPM, and also a sizable minority that read between 300-400 words per minute. Some students read twice as fast as other students!
I personally read around 500-600 words per minute. Really – and I’ve met others who read this fast. People often misunderstand this, so I want to be perfectly clear: I am not rushing. My comfortable reading speed is 500-600 WPM.
I’ll say it again: I am not recommending you skim, or rush. Instead, I want to teach you how to comfortably read at a faster pace.
Reading faster on the LSAT by reducing subvocalization
Your ability to understand is not what limits your reading speed. You can understand just fine. Your reading speed is actually limited by something called subvocalization. You know how you pronounce words in your head when you read? Almost everyone does. If you do that for every word, it’s practically impossible to read faster than 300 words per minute.
So the main limit to your reading speed is how quickly you can get words to your brain. The good news is that it’s possible to learn how to read without subvocalizing so much. For example, I still sob-vocalize, but only every few words. The result is that I can read much faster, and I can read three words at a time. You can learn to do the same. I’ve seen students go from 270 WPM to 350 WPM in less than 7 days.
Finding your reading speed
Your first step should be finding out how fast you read. Don’t worry about being slow – this is just a baseline test, so you’ll be able to see how much you improve. I use this reading test with my students. Here are the steps:
1. Go to http://www.readingsoft.com/
2. Press the start button, it will switch to “reading….”
3. Read the text below the start button, at a comfortable pace. Don’t rush – just go at your normal speed.
4. When you finish, press the stop button.
5. Scroll down to find your reading speed, and record it somewhere.
Later, you estimate your reading speed with books. Count the number of words in two lines, and divide by two to get an approximate number of words per line in the book. Then set a timer for a minute, and read until the timer goes off. Multiply the number of lines you read by the average words per line, and you’ll have a good estimate of your actual WPM.
It’s important to keep tracking your WPM in order to know whether you’re making progress. Next, I’ll show you the exercise you can do to reduce subvocalization.
Using Spreeder to reduce subvocalization
Spreeder is a great, free online tool for improving reading. The basic idea of spreeder is to display words faster than you can pronounce them in your head. To keep up, you’ll be forced to read them without subvocalizing. As you get used to doing this, you can increase your reading speed on spreeder. This will translate to better reading speed when you read ordinary texts.
Here’s how you can use Spreeder to improve your reading speed:
1. Go to http://www.spreeder.com/
2. Press the Spreed button
3. Click on the settings arrow (bottom right)
4. Set the reading speed to about 40 WPM faster than your baseline speed. So if you read at 270, set spreeder to 310 WPM
5. Set chunk size to three. This makes spreeder display three words at a time.
6. Press save
7. Press the play button. Read the words, always looking at the middle of the words being displayed.
8. If things seems too fast or too slow, then pause and adjust the speed. Otherwise read through to the end.
Note: I use three words because this lets you teaches you to read three words at a time on a regular page. It’s ultimately much faster.
Afterwards, you can use spreeder each day to train yourself to read faster. You can can paste any text into the text box on the main page. I recommend simple texts. LSAT passages are not a good idea, and neither is the New York Times. Both texts require you to refer backwards to understand what you’re reading, and the software doesn’t let you do that.
With Spreeder, you’re really just training the physical act of reading. Pick something simple like an article from your local newspaper or a blog you read, and use that. There are two mains ways you should use spreeder:
1. Slowly increasing your base rate. If you first read at 330 WPM, try 350 WPM the next time. Keep moving upwards whenever you get semi-comfortable with a given speed. (Note: Choose new articles for this exercise.)
2. Reading a text way too fast, like 1000 WPM. Then read the same text again at a somewhat slower speed, like 900 WPM. Keep dropping speeds until the text makes sense. You’ll find that you’ll eventually be able to read it at a higher speed than you’re used too. (Note: Use the same article for this exercise, until it makes sense. Then choose a new article the next time you do this exercise.)
If Spreeder works for you, the effects should be rapid. Many of my students report increases of 70-80 WPM within a week. Like I said, your capacity to understand is not the limiting factor. Your reading speed is slowed by how fast you can physically intake words, and that can be changed easily.
Note: Spreeder may not work on Microsoft Internet Explorer. I recommend Chrome, Firefox or Safari.
A note for skeptics
A lot of people are skeptics when they hear about this. Maybe you’re resistant to the idea that you can change how you read. That’s fine – you can believe what you want. But I’d ask you not to write me with reasons why this won’t work. I’ve heard lots of protests, but generally they come from people who don’t try it.
This is not a massive job. All I’m asking you to do is to try this for a half hour a day for a week. If it works, you gain about five extra points on the LSAT, and maybe earn a scholarships worth thousands. If it doesn’t work, you lost three hours.
In my experience this works for about 70% of students. It’s certainly worth taking three hours to see if this works for you. So rather than think up reasons why this won’t work, why not just try it? It’s an experiment.
Read LSAT reading comprehension passages for structure
LSAT reading comprehension passages are not like any texts you’ve ever read. They’re not taken from books and pasted into the LSAT. The LSAC writes every single passage themselves. The LSAT is a standardized test, and the reading comprehension passages have a common form.
LSAT paragraphs and passages can be summarized. Each paragraph has a common theme. E.g. “Introduction of a dilemma about shellfish. Research history of this dilemma. New research that may resolve the dilemma. Combination of new research and old research to draw a conclusion.”
You should make sure to be able to summarize each passage you read. This serves two purposes:
1. Summarizing forces you to make sure you actually understand what you’re reading. You can only summarize if you understand.
2. If you summarize a passage, then you know roughly where to find specific facts.
Before you move on to the questions, make sure you’re able to summarize each paragraph. You can do this paragraph-by-paragraph, or at the end, but make sure you’re able to do it.
Don’t start RC questions until you understand the passage
The biggest mistake you can make is moving on to the questions before you understand the passage. I know, I know, it feels like there’s no time. But guess what: if you’re like most students, you consistently overestimate how much time you spend on the passage. I’ve sat down with students, took a stopwatch, and timed them. Usually they took 2-3 minutes to read the passage. Then I would ask if they felt like they understood. If they said no, I told them to reread until they did.
When they finished rereading, I asked them how long they think that took. Usually, they groan and say “ugh, a minute and a half”. The actual time it took: 20 or 30 seconds! And once these students understood the passage, they usually flew through the questions.
An extra 30 seconds spent understanding the passage probably saves you 1-2 minutes on the questions. If you don’t understand the passage, you will waste time choosing between answers. If you do understand the passage, you can easily eliminate wrong answers.
My best tip for now is to slow down and reread the passage if you don’t understand. This takes FAR less time than you realize. It’s staring googly-eyed at questions that takes time.
Most LSAT RC answers can be eliminated with lines from the passage
If you have a look at the reading comprehension sections of my LSAT explanations, you’ll notice that for half the questions, all the right and wrong answers can be proven with specific line references. That’s why you can usually figure out reading comprehension questions when you review them. LSAT reading comprehension is designed so that you can easily prove or disprove any given answer.
Now, you probably feel like you haven’t got time to check the passage under timed conditions. Well, remember how I said students overestimate how much time they spend reading the passage? You also overestimate how much time it takes to find specific lines. If you follow my advice above and know the structure of the passage, you should be able to find a given line reference in 1-3 seconds. I’ve timed students, and this is how fast they go.
Now, do you know how much time you can waste staring at answers choices? 30 seconds or more! The answer choices do not add information. They are intended to trap you and distract you. Only the passage has the answers. Try using specific lines from the passage to disprove or prove answers, and you should go faster.
Rereading, skimming, and memorization
The first thing I do is read the passage at a comfortable pace. If I don’t understand something, I reread it until it makes sense. Then when I reach the end, I usually find I don’t remember what happened at the start of the passage. So I do a quick skim of the whole passage, usually takes me 10-15 seconds. I use the techniques from Spreeder, above, to skim faster.
So by the time I start the questions, I’ve seen everything at least two times, and usually more. This doesn’t take that long, because rereading is about three times as fast as reading the first time. When I skim, I’ve already made sure I understand the structure of the passage. So even if I just see details briefly, I retain them because I’m able to fit them into a structure.
Now, there is a method to my madness. The science of memorization is actually pretty well understood. One element is that of Spaced Reptition. Researchers have found that the more often you see something, the better you remember it, and the longer you remember it. Much longer in fact.
I’ve taken a language course that uses spaced repetition. It’s called Pimsleur, and it’s extraordinarily effective. Within a 90 days I had conversation in Italian. The program reminds you of words at the following intervals: 5 seconds, 25 seconds, 2 minutes, 10 minutes, 1 hour, 5 hours, 1 day, 5 days, 25 days. So the program teaches you a word, then repeats it 5 seconds later, then at 25 seconds, then at 2 minutes, etc.
How does this apply to LSAT reading comprehension? 10 minutes is about as long as you need to remember a fact for a given passage, since you have a bit less than nine minutes on average. So if you reread sections or skim before moving on, you are hitting the 5, 25 or 2 minute intervals, and you’re likely to remember much more of the passage, for much longer.
This lets you easily avoid most trap answers. Typically, incorrect answers try to confuse you by mentioning things out of context, or things that were never in the passage. I find I can easily avoid these answers, because I know what was in the passage, and where it was.
I do not try to memorize random facts – you don’t need to know everything in the passage. But the more you know, the more you can easily dodge trap answers. Rereading some sections of the passage, and skimming before you start, it an excellent way to improve your retention.
Note: Obviously, you are not supposed to only skim the passage. Read it thoroughly at least once first.
Homework – practice LSAT reading comprehension skills
What I’ve written is just an overview of my approach to reading comprehension. I’ve tried to highlight key skills used by high scorers, and how to learn them and apply them. Every skill I mentioned above can be trained. Here’s a checklist of skills that high scorers tend to have:
* Reading Speed: High scorers tend to read faster than average
* Passage Structure: High scorers tend to know what each paragraph is saying
* Retention: High scorers tend to remember what they read
* Locating information: High scorers tend to know where information is, and they can find it quickly
You can practice all of these. Time how fast you read, and use spreeder to improve. Test whether you can actually summarize paragraphs. For retention, read a passage then turn it over and see if you remember what it’s about. For locating information, have a friend ask you to find a given fact, and see how long it takes you.
Good luck! Tomorrow will be the final email from the intro course (though I’ll periodically send further tips), I’ll be covering how to study.
Graeme
Creator of LSAT Hacks
Brandon says
I thought the LSAT RC section takes excerpts from scholarly journals or articles. You say the LSAC writes each passage themselves. You say this in the section, “Read LSAT reading comprehension passages for structure.” Is this true?
FounderGraeme Blake says
The LSAC actually rewrites scholarly material for the LSAT. So they may take a whole book as a source, and then condense it down to four paragraphs written in LSAC house style.
This is different from the SAT, which to my knowledge just lifts articles from other sources. LSAC, by contrast, creates everything themselves.
Ida says
Dear Graeme
I usually do not response to articles and text like this but I had to in this case, I only wish I had found your site earlier in my LSAT training (I am taking the dec lsat) however it’s never too late.
Thank you on the speed reading advice as it has and will come in handy for reading Comp.I found I read at 375wpm and 91% accuracy so the advise of reading a passage twice I am going got adopt as “Eureka” a sceptic is now a believer. I went from 64% accuracy to 91% accuracy at a second read going from 375 to 670wpm the second time who knew? oh well you did!
So thank you.
Cheers
Ida