I used to have good memory power. I always believed it’s simply an effort to exercise one’s memory power. As long as you try, your memory power will be strong. Of course, repetition in drill and practice may constitute the effort. If you keep reciting the passages or songs, you will remember it. When I started teaching in college, I was able to know all my students by their first names, knowing about their backgrounds and in-class performances. As time goes by, I tried to keep up with this practice. However, I found it much harder to do than I did 20 years ago. My students appreciated my effort and regarded me as sincere because I cared. At this point, I realized that my memory power is weakened by ages. I’ve been checking around studies and anecdotal stories about the use of memory, and I realized that we need more than just an effort to keep our memory power strong. We also need strategies.
I have actually encountered people, both young and old, struggling with memorization tasks. Some of them felt their brains had betrayed them. Others felt frustrated with diminishing memory power. In fact, a little memory challenge or exercise will help our brain stay active and healthy. To avoid the aggravation of the memory struggle, we can take notes whenever we can to avoid the unnecessary memory burden for individuals.
The earliest memory I had in my life was before I was two. The memory was still vivid and fresh in my mind. My family was moving into a new house, where the living room concrete floor was still not dried yet. I stumbled in the room leaving my tiny foot prints all over the place as my elder sister started screaming. I got startled as I realized that I had caused trouble. However, I was laughed at and not punished. That was a unique memory and I enjoyed every bit of it till now. It occurred to me that if we can make an event special or unique, the memory of the event will last for a long, long time.
There are two kinds of memory: short-term memory and long-term memory. To prepare for a quiz or an exam, most people will turn to their short-term memory and try to cram as much as information as possible. After the exam, they would forget the “stuff” completely real soon. In order to put things into the long-term memory, one must internalize (and comprehend) the meaning of an event so that it will be encoded and stored in our brain cells.
There were nine presidents between Lincoln and Teddy Roosevelt: Johnson, Grant, Hayes, Garfield, Arthur, Cleveland, Harrison, Cleveland, and McKinley. How can you memorize these names in order? Try the following sentence: Joe got his gun and chased his crazy mule. If you pair them up and this is a free association to the content. Surely this makes it a lot easier to remember.
Here are also a few other strategies that may be used to memorize things:
- Reorganize the information and make it well-structured information for quick processing.
- Try to understand the things to be memorized and try to teach about the things you want to remember to others.
- Use cloze passages.
- Use mnemonics.
- Use audio-visual aids and media.
- Create unique impression. Add a twist to the information to be processed. Sometimes fun and humorous messages can help remember things better.
- Record one’s own speech on things you want to memorize and recite after it a few times. You’ll be amazed how fast you can memorize things.
- Write down key words and outlines with good structures for hints to help memorize the information.
- Play the concentration games.
Here are a few exercises: Memorizing all the planets around our sun can be done with mnemonics. In order from closest to farthest from the Sun, these are Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune, (and Pluto is out) we can use the sentence: My Very Elegant Mother Just Served Us Nine Pizzas. How can you remember the five great lakes? Use the acronym HOMES for Huron, Ontario, Michigan, Eerie, and Superior. The mnemonic ‘Super Man Helps Every One‘ lists the lakes geographically from West to East.
There are many other interesting discussions out there. CNN has hosted a few discussions on how to train your mind to remember anything:
http://www.cnn.com/video/#/video/us/2012/06/08/ted-joshua-foer-feats-of-memory.ted
http://www.cnn.com/2012/06/10/opinion/foer-ted-memory
There is a good lecture by the US Memory Champion Ron White on how we can memorize plenty of things in an efficient manner. Here is a clip on his ads: http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=oNFWmaPRpJQ.
Memorization is a task that requires constant exercise. Once you can manage it well, you’ll enjoy it.
