A guest post by Mike S from our trusted partner, MyGuru.
Whether you’re studying for your big biology test or working on building your vocabulary in Spanish class, you are likely finding yourself having to memorize information to get that great grade.
But if you aren’t in the habit of memorizing, it can be hard to figure out where to start. There are some classic memorization techniques like using flashcards and making mnemonic devices — little phrases and acronyms that help you recall information — but sometimes those techniques just don’t seem to cut it.
Fortunately, there are simple some study habits and memorization techniques that are easy to adopt and will help you memorize information for the rest of your life. Memorization doesn’t just have to be a frustrating exercise in forgetting what a particular type of cell does every single time you check your flashcard!
1. Practice, Rinse, Repeat
Have you ever tried cramming for a test only to show up the next day and realize you don’t remember anything? The human brain actually does a terrible job absorbing a huge amount of information all at once. Maybe you’ve experienced this phenomenon while watching a really dense movie with tons of characters and plot points (like Inception). You just end up confused (like what’s up with the airplane in Inception?)
Instead, the brain does a much better job absorbing information in small chunks over a long period of time. The absolute best way to study anything is to take a consistent amount of time to practice every day. So if you have to memorize a bunch of vocabulary, you’ll do a lot better studying for 1 hour a day across 5 days than you will studying for 5 hours in one day.
Setting a study schedule is one of the surest ways to make memorization easier, and you can set up that schedule however you’d like. Maybe you want to do 30 minutes in the morning and 30 minutes in the afternoon. Maybe you want to do an hour all at once. Maybe you have a specific amount of information you want to learn each day. That’s totally up to you.
2. Get Someone to Quiz You
Memorization can be harder when you try to do it yourself.
Let me give you an example. When I was a young piano player, I used to have to memorize pieces for recitals. I would practice and practice every day, thinking that I was nailing this music. But if I played the piece for my mom, or my teacher, or a friend, I would find out about an incorrect note that I was hitting, or dynamics I ignored, or the fact that my tempo kept speeding up.
When you memorize alone, you might gloss over your weaknesses. So get someone to quiz you! It’s really helpful to get that outside perspective, since it’s often hardest for us to recognize our own weak spots by ourselves. Get someone to quiz you and you’ll always be surprised by what you do and don’t have memorized.
3. Study in Unusual Settings
One of the funny things about memory is that it is related to specific locations. For instance, you might remember the name of a painting that you saw in a museum better than you would from simply seeing it printed in a text book.
If you study specific information in a novel environment — like your Grandma’s house, a McDonald’s, in new room of the library — you’ll have some association between that information and where you studied it. So you may go, “Oh, Newton’s 2nd law of thermodynamics, I studied that at the YMCA,” and then recall what that law is based on your image of where you were when you learned it.
One of the really common tactics that Jeopardy! contestants used to memorize trivia is related to this. It’s called a memory palace. People who use this technique will actually build an elaborate house in their heads with a bunch of different rooms and associate certain pieces of information with specific rooms.
So maybe when you’re studying for your U.S. History exam, Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s policy all exists in a kitchen. You could attach what you know about the New Deal to the blender, have your knowledge about his reaction to World War II in the fridge, and set his Supreme Court policy on the kitchen table.
But even if you don’t use a memory palace, remember that spaces and facts go together wonderfully.
About the Author
Mike S
Mike S. is one of MyGuru’s top test prep tutors, with years of experience and high test scores. For Mike, great tutoring is always rooted in listening to a student's needs and concerns and working with that student as a team to solve those problems. This approach has helped his most committed students increase by 9 points on their ACT and over 400 points on the SAT as well as similar results on the GRE. Contact MyGuru to learn more and to be connected with Mike or a similarly qualified tutor in your area.
