Never read more than a single paragraph without stopping to test your
understanding of what you have read. At the end of each paragraph there
should be a dead line; in fact there is a dead line and he who reads
carelessly and quickly beyond this line need not expect to remember.
Put your finger between the pages, close the book, and review the
thought of the paragraph. Now make a definite effort to visualize the
picture in the author's mind. It is true that some passages make an
easier mind's eye picture than others, but all will make one which can
be used to help in formulating a definite understanding of the author's
thought.
You cannot visualize a thing which you do not understand. The aim
of your study is to comprehend the author. To visualize the thought
of the paragraph will test your understanding. Making of a definite
picture will increase your knowledge of the essentials. Form the habit
of visualizing what you read. Do not be handicapped by doubt. Make an
effort to formulate the main facts of the paragraph into an expression
of your own. If you are by yourself, where you can do so, state your
thought audibly, not in the words of the author, but express the
thought and the facts accurately in your own words.
=No knowledge is yours until you can tell it to some one else.=
Use this test and tell it to some one, or if no one is handy tell it to
yourself, but do it audibly. This forces a definite expression which
can only come from a definite understanding. Parents should question
their children and encourage them in telling what they are reading and
studying about. The audible expression demands definite knowledge.