Reprint from the 'Linda Christas Counselor Comments' Blog, located here:
http://lindachristascf.blogspot.com/
To: LaTracy
From: Mrs. Sonia Lopez, Teacher, Linda Christas
One of the things I was sadly aware of when I was teaching in the public
schools was that many of my students would not take notes in class because
they were afraid of appearing as though they were interested in the
material.
The students' social groups would often ridicule or ostracize anyone in
the classroom who appeared to be attempting to understand what was being
said. Consequently, many of my students, who otherwise would have been
doing very well academically, were just getting by. Because I wanted to do
something to address this issue, I decided to teach some simple but
powerful techniques to all my classes, so that those who wanted to could
remember the material without taking notes, if note taking was impossible
for them for whatever reason. After applying these techniques for a few
weeks, the students who secretly wanted to do well had improved 100% in
terms of retaining the material we covered.
I would like to use this space to briefly explain the techniques. They
will help anyone understand and retain material whether they are listening
to a lecture or reading. They have been proven effective thousands of
times in hundreds of information sharing situations.
There are three things that a person must activate in order to have a high
probability of remembering something:
First, he or she must be engaged in the experience.
Second, there needs to be emotion and/or action involved.
Third, a picture needs to be made mentally that corresponds to what is to
be remembered. (The human mind likes to make pictures. For example, if I
say Yellow Cat, the mind does not put that in memory as
T-h-e-Y-e-l-l-o-w-C-a-t. No, we make a picture of a yellow cat in our
mind. That's the best way to store information.)
So, the first thing to understand regarding a lecture that you are
listening to is that your mind needs to be engaged in what the instructor
is saying. It needs to lock in emotionally if you wish to remember what is
being said.
In order to accomplish this, in your mind's eye, pretend that you are the
only student in the room, that the teacher or instructor is talking to you
and to you alone. The feeling you will get when you do that is very
different from the feeling you have when you are in a classroom with
twenty or thirty other students. By pretending you are the only student
present, you will engage yourself emotionally, and that will make all the
difference in terms of what you retain. (Don't feel foolish doing this. No
one will know except you, and you will suddenly start doing better on
those feared pop quizzes.)
Another technique, if you don't feel you can ask a question because of
your friends (or for any other reason), is to ask a question or rephrase
the material silently in your mind. Just say to yourself, "How could you
(directing the question to the teacher silently) rephrase that to make it
clearer?" Give yourself the pretended answer silently if you can. Even if
you can't, you will retain the question, which can be asked in private or
researched.
When reading in class or elsewhere, if you want to retain more than twice
what you ordinarily remember, pretend that you are reading the material TO
an audience. At first, this may be extra work for you, but I guarantee
that if you will just pretend to read the material to a person sitting in
front of you, you will remember a great deal more of what you have read.
If it helps, pretend the person you are reading to is your boyfriend or
girlfriend.
Whether reading or listening to a lecture, if there is a particular idea
that you want to retain, make a picture of it in your mind -- the more
ridiculous the picture the better.
As an example, suppose you want to remember the term "cilia" in biology.
Those are the hair-like structures that our organs wave, usually in one
direction, to encourage things to move along the canals. As a suggestion,
you could make a picture of those waving tails tickling your toes or each
of the tails with a face on the end giggling hysterically, that is, being
"silly." When you need to recall that term on a test, the picture of the
funny faces being silly or tickling your toes will remind you of the
"cilia." ...........again, guaranteed.
You can also use this general technique to remember larger pieces of
information. Let's say you want to remember Patrick Henry's, "Give Me
Liberty of Give Me Death." In this case, and in all others where you want
to remember something, you want to make a picture in your mind that is as
ridiculous as you can make it. Try to involve as many senses in the
picture as possible. At first it will take perhaps ten to fifteen seconds
to think of the ridiculous image, but later on, you will be able to do it
in less than five seconds. And, the memory WILL stay.
For Patrick Henry and "Give Me Liberty or Give Me Death," I have just made
a picture of a giant patting the Statue of Liberty on the head. He is
giving her a cup of tea that she is bringing to her lips because it
contains an antidote for the poison that will kill her if she doesn't
drink it quickly.
Get that image in your head. Why did I make that up that way? Well,
because it evokes IN ME a lot of emotion. You might have a completely
different scenario that will do the trick for you.
Let me explain my image. The Ms. Liberty statue is obvious, but the tea
and lips rhyme with lib and tea (liberty). Patting on the head will
trigger Pat-rick Henry, and if she doesn't drink the antidote, liberty
will die (death). I know this may sound strange because it is my image.
Why don't you try something? Go to the telephone book, and open the white
pages. Run your finger down the page and stop anywhere. Suppose you have
stopped at the name "Giles Hendrix." How would you remember that name?
Again, link it to the strangest concept you can think of. For example, off
the top, I am thinking of "Guy" and "Hen" = Rooster. If you do that, I
know that someone asking you that name a week from now will be impressed
with your sharp memory. And, you can do the same thing with any piece of
information.
These techniques will take some practice, but if you will do them in class
for about a week, suddenly the techniques will become second nature, and
your grades will improve. After a while, you will be doing them
automatically, and people will be surprised how wonderfully smart you
really are.
And, it can be fun if you make it that. No one other than you will know
you are making strange pictures, but your subconscious will appreciate
your making it easy for it to remember things. As a bonus, making pictures
like this will actually make your mind a lot quicker and smarter over
time, since, if you exercise the brain, the neuron connections become more
responsive.
Good luck with this.
Mrs. Lopez
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