I used to read a lot of books when younger. At a certain point I got frustrated with the whole routine because it was hard to remember and use lessons from a book I head read earlier when I moved on to a new book. Now that I have started reading again I have been learning a few strategies to remember what I read.
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Practice what you read – The most obvious of all yet the hardest. It is most effective for books which you can tie to direct action (leadership books, technology books, self improvement books). It does mean you either need to practice a multitude of skills if you read fast or you need to slow down you reading to a rate at which you can practice.
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Change how you read – Reading the classic ‘How to read a book’ by Mortimer J Adler was eye opening. It revealed certain aspects of reading that I hadn’t considered before. My typical reading was starting from the beginning and reading to the end. For harder areas I marked sections I didn’t understand to come back later. However, Adler’s book introduced me the following steps
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Skim through the table of contents to understand structure. Look carefully at sections (groups of chapters) to understand the goal of the book
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Read or skim the first and last page in each chapter to get a deeper understanding of the structure. Dig a bit deeper into chapters that interest you
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Read the book end to end really fast
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Read the book again, critically thinking and asking questions
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The above exercise forces me to think about the structure and also think about reframing the books contents into my knowledge or worldview by first trying to understand what the author is thinking.
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Recollect – Summarizing key points of what you have learnt after a short delay is effective in actually helping you absorb the material read. Incorporating this into your process of learning is another way to help remember things you learn. For example, after you read a book, recall important points from memory and take notes. After a lesson, take 5 minutes to note most important learnings. (A 2011 study indicated that students learnt better by trying to recall something they learnt from memory than by rereading the material)
Daily Pulses 