Too Slow on Reading Comprehension?

Many students think their Reading Comprehension score is lagging because they read too slowly.

Usually, the opposite is true.

Students struggle with Reading Comprehension because they don’t fully understand what they read. When your understanding is shaky, every question becomes a debate. You reread lines, bounce between answer choices, and spend precious time trying to convince yourself that an answer might be correct.

Better comprehension helps eliminate uncertainty. As Nathan points out in the episode, speed is a byproduct of understanding, not a separate skill.

Reading Comprehension Means Genuine Understanding

The name of the section tells you exactly what it’s testing.

Reading Comprehension is not a speed test. It’s not a memory test. It’s not a test of how quickly you can eliminate answer choices.

It is a test of whether you genuinely understood what you read.

If your comprehension is good, the questions become easy because you already know what the passage says. If your comprehension is weak, even straightforward questions can feel difficult.

Predict Before You Peek

One of the most effective ways to improve your accuracy is to pause before reading the answer choices.

Ask yourself what the passage said about whatever the question is asking about.

If the question asks what the author would agree with, think about what the author wrote. If it asks about a specific idea, recall what the passage said about that idea before looking at the answers.

The better your prediction, the less likely you are to get distracted by wrong answers. Nathan and Josh emphasize that students often spend too much time in the answer choices when the answer was available in the passage.

You don’t need to be precise, but you should try to have a general idea of the answer before you actually read the answer choices. 

Stop Litigating Answer Choices

Many students treat Reading Comprehension questions like debates.

They read an answer and think, "Well, maybe the author meant that." Then they move to another answer and do the same thing. That’s the wrong approach.

Most Reading Comprehension questions ask you to identify what is supported by the passage. The correct answer is usually the safest answer. It is the answer that is most directly supported by the passage and the one that requires the fewest assumptions. In that sense, most questions on Reading Comprehension are essentially Must Be True questions. 

Practice Is for Learning

Students often worry when a practice question takes two minutes instead of thirty seconds. That misses the point of practice.

The goal is not to finish quickly. The goal is to understand why the correct answer is correct. If it takes extra time to work through a difficult question, that’s time well spent.

As Josh explains in the episode, athletes don't learn new plays at full speed. They learn the play correctly first. Speed comes later.

The same principle applies to the LSAT.

Speed Follows Understanding

Many students try to force speed before they’ve earned it.

They rush through passages, skim important details, and worry about how many questions they complete. Ironically, that often slows them down because they end up rereading, second-guessing, and spending extra time on answer choices.

Focus instead on understanding the passage in front of you. Read carefully. Make predictions. Review thoroughly. Let accuracy lead the way.

When your comprehension improves, your speed will improve with it.