Flashcards are cards with a word (or phrase) on one side and its translation on the other. You can buy ready-made flashcards, and these can certainly be helpful, particularly if you're inexperienced at learning another language. However, it is more effective if you make them yourself. Not only will the cards be customized to your own use, but the activity of selecting words and writing them down help you learn them.
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The Seattle Longitudinal Study of Adult Intelligence has followed a group of more than 5000 people for well over four decades. The program began in 1956 and participants have been tested across a whole gamut of mental and physical abilities at seven year intervals since that date.
The study has found:
"I'm terrible at remembering names"
"I'm great with names, but I'm hopeless at remembering what I've read."
"I always remember what people tell me about themselves, but I'm always forgetting birthdays and anniversaries."
There is no such thing as a poor memory!
There will be memory domains that you are less skilled at dealing with.
Information comes in different packages
Think about the different types of information you have stored in your memory:
Most mnemonic strategies use visual images. But as I say in The myth of imagery, while there is no doubt that imagery can be an effective tool, there is nothing particularly special about it. The advantage of imagery is that it provides an easy way of connecting information that is not otherwise readily connected. However, providing verbal links can be equally effective.
I was recently asked for advice in the case of increased “brain blocks” — failures to retrieve information that should be readily accessible. This question is, I suspect, of interest to many of my readers, so I thought I would answer it here.
There are many possible causes for an increase in this type of memory failure. These causes fall into three main categories: physical, environmental, and strategic. Let’s deal with the physical first.
Does photographic memory exist?
"Photographic" or eidetic memory is said to occur in some 8% of children, but almost all of these grow out of it. The phenomenon is extremely rare in adults, and indeed the very existence of photographic memory is still somewhat contentious. However, it may be that particular brain abnormalities can lead to ways of processing information that are dramatically different from the normal (see the case of Kim Peek).
What do we mean by word-finding problems?
Here are some examples:
- increasing use of circumlocutions rather than specific terms (e.g., "I wonder where the thing that goes here is")
- use of empty phrases, indefinite terms, and pronouns without antecedents (i.e., referring to something or someone as "it" or "him / her" without first identifying them by name)
- increased frequency of pauses
These problems are all characteristic of Alzheimer's, but also, to a much lesser extent, of normal aging.
The two types of first-letter mnemonics
First-letter mnemonics are, as their name suggests, memory strategies that use the initial letters of words as aids to remembering. This can be an effective technique because initial letters are helpful retrieval cues, as anyone who has endeavored to remember something by mentally running through the letters of the alphabet can attest to.
There are two types of first-letter mnemonic:
To use a strategy effectively, you need to understand why it works, how it works, when it works and when it doesn’t.
For example, all students take notes — not everyone knows how to do it well. Research into the effectiveness of note-taking has found — surprise, surprise — that sometimes note-taking helps you remember information, and sometimes it doesn’t1.