Stretch, the speed reading software by Field Craft offers 35 included texts for eye warm–up exercises and speed tests. You can adjust the font size and flashing speeds of the exercises and tests. In addition, you can also see a detailed report of your progress.

Before you begin, you can determine the settings on the Configuration page such as the number of words, the type of tests and the flash speed.

The Repetitive setting is useful for eye warm–up exercises; this setting repeatedly flashes a set of words at a certain speed. The flashing speed increases once the user reaches a high percentage of accuracy. However, the same words are used each time and will eventually become useless, since readers will simply memorize the word order.

For Progressive and Random tests, groups of words are flashed, then you are instructed to type in the correct answer or click on the correct multiple–choice option.

After each test, click the Performance tab and a detailed report of your score will display. The report contains the flashed text, the flash speed, your score and accuracy.

You can contact Field Craft by email and although they are based in Australia, they answered our questions within 24 hours. This product is Vista and XP compatible.

The biggest problem we had using Stretch was reading the user guide. The background colors and textures of the pages make it difficult to read. We eventually copied and pasted each page into a Word document to relieve the eyestrain.

Check out the top three rated programs in speed reading software: The Reader's Edge, Ace Reader Pro and RocketReader.