Take Effective Class Notes

Taking excellent lecture notes is an essential skill. Unfortunately, high schools often do not prepare students properly for taking notes in a college classroom environment. This can be a serious disadvantage, as effective notetaking is just as important as learning how to write a term paper or take an exam. And if you go to a big university, taking good notes is especially important because you're going to have to take large lecture hall classes.

Here are some notetaking survival tips for college students.

1) Active listening. "Passive" listening is what you do when you watch a sitcom or have a casual conversation. In contrast, active listening is when you listen carefully to make sure you understand and learn the information that is being conveyed. Here are some things you should do to listen actively.

* Listen for the main point and major subpoints. Don't just write everything down. Listen carefully and make sure you understand what the purpose of this lecture is. As you take down notes, keep the main point in mind and make sure you understand how these notes are related.
* Listen for an organizational structure. Unless the teacher is a terrible lecturer, his or her notes are probably organized into some kind of outline. Listen carefully to figure out how the ideas are organized and they will make more sense. Of course, if your professor provides an outline by writing on the board or using PowerPoint notes, take advantage of this.
* Pay attention to organizational cues. Listen carefully for words and phrases that reflect the organizational structure of the lecture. Pay close attention to the introduction, as it will probably indicate how you should organize your notes. If the lecture begins with, "Today I'm going to talk about three ethnic conflicts in the Middle East," then you have a good idea of what's going to follow. Listen for "signpost" words to indicate a transition for one point to the next, such as "next" and "finally" and numerical signposts like "first" or "third."
* Listen with your eyes. Speakers communicate information through nonverbal communication. Watch the professor, and be aware of how he or she uses hand gestures, eye contact, and other body language to convey points.
* Remove distractions. Don't tempt yourself! Put away the campus newspaper, your Sudoku puzzle, your cell phone, and anything else that might be more interesting than the lecturer.
* Practice. Learning to concentrate and listen actively is an endurance skill. Make yourself do it, and it will get easier over time.

2) Proper techniques for writing and lecture notes. Learning to write down all the important information in an organized way is a challenge as well. Here are some tips to help you out:

* Write down the date and the topic of the lecture. This will help trigger your memory when you are studying.
* Learn to write quickly. Or type quickly, if you're using a laptop. Use lots of abbreviations. Don't worry about getting down every word, especially words like "a" and "the." Don't worry about writing neatly. As long as you can understand your notes, it's neat enough.
* Write down definitions. If your instructor defines a term, make sure you write it down and understand what it means. .
* Don't copy outline or PowerPoint notes word for word. Here's a common problem: a teacher puts a PowerPoint slide up, and students are so busy writing down every word on the slide that they stop listening to the lecture. This causes them to miss information that was discussed in the lecture but not written on the slide, and it also makes active listening impossible. Instead, use the notes to help you follow along.
* If your instructor indicates that something is important, mark it. This is a strong clue that something may be on the test.
* If your instructor is going too fast or is unclear, say something. Even the best lecturers get a little garbled sometimes. There's nothing rude about asking your teacher to clarify a point.
* Err on the side of writing down too much. Excess notes are probably not going to hurt you on the exam. Not writing down enough will.

3) Reviewing your notes. This is very important, but students don't do this nearly enough. Review your notes to make sure you understand all the information and to keep it fresh in your head. Here are some note reviewing tips:

Week 2 Assignment: Smart Notes

This week we’re focusing on taking notes in class. To better target my advice, I’ve identified three major types of classes: non-technical (history, english, etc.); technical without math (biology, psychology, etc.); and technical with math (calculus, macroeconomics, etc.). Below, I’ve provided a specific notetaking strategy for each of these three types. This week, I want you to adopt the appropriate strategy for each of your courses.


(1) Streamline Your Notes in Non-Technical Classes

Adopt the Question/Evidence/Conclusion format first presented in part 2 of the red book. The concept is simple: instead of transcribing exactly what the professor says, capture the big ideas. To do so, reduce your notes to a series of questions paired with conclusions. Between each question and conclusion should be a collection of evidence that connects the two.

In this scheme, the question is the setup for the big idea being presented by the professor, the conclusion is his conclusion to the question (it’s probably not a definitive answer), and the evidence are the arguments he used to get from the question to the conclusion. This takes practice. It also helps to spend 5-10 minutes after class cleaning up your thoughts.

To study using these notes: proceed from question to question. For each, try to recreate, without peeking, the conclusion and a sampling of the connecting evidence. Say your answers out loud, as if lecturing a class. If you can do this without major errors, you’ve mastered the big idea. If you can’t, review your notes and try again later. (This is what I call the quiz and recall method.)

For more information on this strategy read this article or see the example in the first step of part 1 of the red book.

(2) Streamline Your Notes in Technical Classes Without Math

The key here are focused question clusters. This approach works as follows:

1. Take notes in the form of short questions followed by short answers.
2. Group together the questions that cover the same topic into a cluster.
3. Add a few general background questions regarding the topic at the end of the cluster (e.g., asking you to overview the topic or explain how it differs from other similar topics).
4. If the professor is using powerpoint slides — for example, to show graphs or diagrams — reference the slide number in the questions that refer to it (e.g., “What does the red line in the graph on slide 19 indicate?”)

To study using these notes: print each cluster onto its own page. Format the answers so that they’re not on the same line as their question. Proceed through the cluster, trying to answer each question out loud without peeking at the answer. (I use a sheet of blank paper to block the answer.) If you get more than one answer wrong, then treat the entire cluster as unlearned and return to it later.

For more information read this article.

(3) Streamline Your Notes for Technical Classes With Math

The key here is to record as many sample problems as possible with as many intermediate steps as possible. When you don’t understand a step made by the professor, either raise your hand to ask about it or make a note to ask after class. When the professor makes a particularly difficult leap in the proof, annotate it in your notes with an explanation so you’ll remember the insight later.

To study from these notes: create a practice test that includes at least one sample problem from every major topic covered. If you can solve a problem from scratch, replicating the intermediate steps, and truly understanding the insight behind these steps, then you’re done with that problem. Otherwise, review your notes, review your textbook, and, if needed, meet with the TA, to bolster your understanding. Then return later and try to solve the problem from scratch again.

Coming Up…

That’s all for week 2. If you have questions or want to report on your progress, please leave a comment on this post so the other students can learn from your experience. Next week we’re moving on to the biggest time sink of all: your assignments!

Study Time Paradox

Tower Room

A common complaint I hear goes something like this: “I studied for hours and hours, reviewing every practice problem I could find, or re-reading every assignment and all my notes, and then, when I sat down for the test, I had no idea how to answer the questions!”

I call this the Study Time Paradox because no matter how hard these students study, their grades don’t seem to improve. In this post, I want to describe a solution to this problem; a simple hack that requires 5 – 10 extra minutes a day but can produce significantly better grades.

Story Time

Lurking behind the Study Time Paradox is the following truth: there’s a difference between knowing information and understanding concepts. This should sound familiar. This is the same observation that motivates the use of question/evidence/conclusion note-taking and quiz-and-recall test review instead of transcription and rote memorization. (See here and here for more on the Study Hacks approach to note-taking and exam prep, respectively.)

The piece of advice presented here, which I call the Story Telling Method, is a complement to these strategies. It can be described as follows:

* After each class, tell a “story” about the material covered—a five minute summary of the concepts that drove the lecture.
* Don’t bother writing it down. Instead, just say it to yourself while walking to your next class. Treat it like you’re a literary agent or movie producer pitching the lecture at an important meeting.
* Cover the big picture flow of ideas, not the small details. Answer the question “why was this lecture important?”, not all the information it contained. Play up the flashy or unexpected.

For example, after an Art History lecture, you might tell the story of early renaissance artists clashing in Italy, and how and why Cimabue and Gitto—the superstars of their era—were able to break out. You can do the same for technical material. After a calculus course, for example, you could talk about what problem a derivative solves and how integration extends the idea to do something even cooler. You don’t need to review the chain rule, instead explain why the hell someone would want to know the slope at a point on a curve.

Constructing a Framework

The Story Telling Method has an important benefit: it takes the large volume of information you just received and organizes it within a coherent framework. Not surprisingly, this makes it much easier to retain this information. Later, when you approach exam studying, having this narrative framework reduces review to a simple task. By contrast, if you approach studying with just a large pile of notes — even if they are taken carefully in the question/evidence/conclusion format — you might have some long nights ahead of you.

Note from DavidBroken Pencil

I recently received an e-mail that caught my attention. It was from a reader named David, and it outlined a set of unorthodox study habits he had used to tackle his final years of university. One habit, in particular, shone through: he doesn’t take notes.


To quote David:

I changed my attitude on note-taking. Basically, I don’t.

Just to keep things interesting, I should also add that David scored six perfect A’s at the end of the first year of his no note-taking experiment, and, by the way, he also had a kid; three weeks before final exams. So before you complain that you’re short on time just remember this: he has much, much less free time available than you.

Could You Go Note-Free?

In this post, I want to briefly describe David’s note-free studying method. It won’t work, of course, for all class types, and certainly not for all student personality types, but, if something about this decidedly Zen Valedictorian style approach sparks a glimmer in your eye, it’s worth taking out for a test drive.

David’s Note-Free Study Method

We’ll let David explain the system in his own words. I’ll occasionally interject my commentary to keep things appropriately over-intellectualized.

I recorded every lecture and occasionally wrote down a few points if I thought they were important enough. This meant I was paying full attention in class: unconcerned with taking everything down. This is key: I could engage fully, and even if I forgot the details, I absorbed the big picture.

A great insight lurks here. The idea of paying attention fully — complete engagement, no energy expended on typing notes or remembering some point that sounded important — seems novel compared to the standard college classroom experience. But imagine the effectiveness with which you could absorb big ideas if your full attention was harnessed to the cause?

When it came to review, I didn’t have to wade through piles of notes, stripped of their context, and try to make sense of them. I had one sheet for each class, onto which I added a few-lines of abstract for any important texts we used that week: names, dates, and main arguments.

Now comes the cool part…

My technique was to take a quick look at one such sheet, and then listen to the lecture on an mp3 player as I went about my business — walking to work, washing dishes, drying diapers, even, on occasion, in the pub. Much of my studying was spent in the garden or walking by the river — no stress, no effort. But as I listened, it went in. Things the lecturers stressed once or twice began to leap out as important on re-listening.

This is worth reiterating: he studied in the pub! And also in the garden, and while doing chores, and while walking by the river. David has taken our tentative adventure studying concept and pushed it to a new level of comprehensiveness. You simply glance at a one-page summary and then re-experience the lecture, listening carefully. By the time a test arrives: you’re an expert.

Trouble-Shooting the Note-Free Studying Method

Some common objections that we can easily address:

* My class has a lot of material that has to be memorized!
Separate the memorization from the big-idea ingraining. You can flashcard or focused-cluster the material to memorize and save the listen and think approach for the big idea learning.
* I’ll never remember the important little details if I don’t write them down!
That was David’s fear too. However, he was surprised by how the combination of listening to the lecture carefully the first time, plus one or two subsequent careful listening — with a few notes jotted down for the main arguments and sources — really stuck the material in his mind. You might want to try adding a quiz-and-recall element to the process. Every 10 minutes or so, stop the recording and try to summarize the main points, out loud, hopefully without startling your pub mates.
* Is this different from stealth studying?
Yes. It’s similar in spirit, but stealth studying still has you take classical Q/E/C notes. I think of note-free studying as a cool variation of the stealth method — one that goes where I was too afraid to go before.
* This technique will never work for my science/econ/anatomy/math class!
You’re right. It won’t. Save it for liberal arts classes that center on papers, essay exams, and big, interesting ideas.
* I don’t have time to listen to full lectures more than once!
Think critically about how much time is taken up by the studying this method replaces. Also remember: David has a baby…

Conclusion

The technique is not for everyone. But it’s cool. And it highlights just how much flexibility you have when you reject standard study conventions and start experimenting for yourself. David’s a great example of the Zen Valedictorian philosophy in action: reject a deferred rewards approach to school; demand a good life now; then squeeze as much as possible out of the time you spend working.

Maximizing Your Holistic Learning

Understanding holistic learning is one thing, putting it into practice is another. I’ve been learning very close to the extreme of complete holistic learning for so long that my web is pretty well interconnected. But if you haven’t been really interweaving your web, then the best way to improve your ability to learn is to start now.

Here are a few suggestions for how you can better interlink your web:

1) Ask Questions

When you are learning something, you can make associations simply by asking yourself questions. How does this information relate to what we’ve been studying? How does this information relate to other things I’ve already learned? How does it relate to other subjects, stories or observations?

Be creative and try to find several different points of reference for every idea you learn. Figure out not only what things are similar too, but why they are what they are. As this becomes a habit, you’ll find that you automatically remember information because it fits into your web of understanding. Ask yourself after you hear something whether you “get it”. If you don’t go back and ask yourself more questions for how it fits it.

2) Visualize and Diagram

One of the best ways to begin practicing holistic learning is to start drawing a diagram that associates the information you have learned. Better than taking notes during a lecture is drawing a picture for how what you are learning relates to anything else you have already learned. Once you get good at this you will be able to visualize the diagram before it is drawn, but start drawing to get practice.

When I try to understand economics it often helps me to visualize the relationship between different factors. I view cycles of money, GDP or price levels as a structure that combines all the different elements. If you can’t immediately create vivid pictures of the information, try drawing them first.

3) Use Metaphors

Anything you are learning should be immediately translated into a metaphor you already understand. When reading Niccolo Machiavelli’s The Prince, I understood his writings by relating all the examples of statecraft and war he offered to areas of business and social relationships which I already understood.

While visualization creates tight webs that interlink within a subject, metaphors create broad webs that link completely different ideas. You might not realize how that blog article on fitness you read two weeks ago relates to math, but through making metaphors you have a huge reserve of information available to you when you need it.

4) Feel It

Another technique I’ve experimented with to improve my holistic learning is feeling through ideas. This one is a little more difficult to explain, but the basic idea is that instead of associating an idea to a picture or another metaphor, you associate it with a feeling. I’m a visual learner, so I’ve found it to be ineffective for large pieces of data, but it is really helpful for data that is otherwise hard to relate.

I used this process to easily remember the process of getting the determinant of a matrix. For you math buffs, you probably already know that the determinant of a 2×2 matrix is basically the left diagonal minus the right diagonal. I was able to associate this information into my web through a feeling by imagining what it would be like to move my hands through each diagonal on the matrix. This is an incredibly simplified example, but feeling ideas can be very useful.

5) When in Doubt, Link or Peg It

Questions, visualization, metaphors and feeling should cover about 99% of the information you need to learn. They are the most effective ways to interlink ideas. But if you still need to memorize some information that you can’t understand or relate, your fall-back can be the link and peg system.

Explaining these memory systems is out of the scope of this article, but the basic idea of the link system is to create a wacky, vivid picture relating two seemingly unrelated ideas so that a connection between them is forced. The peg system takes it a step further creating a simple phonetic system for storing numbers and dates. You can learn more about these systems here.

Dirt Roads and Superhighways

An effective web should heavily interlink between ideas of a similar subject, but it should also have links that extend between completely different ideas. I like to think of these two approaches like comparing dirt roads and superhighways. You need lots of cheap dirt roads to interconnect closely related areas and a few superhighways to connect distant cities.

When I was learning history I would make dirt roads connecting the aspects of one particular time period and culture to itself. Linking the artistic achievements of the Song Dynasty with their political situation. But I would also make highways and superhighways. I would compare Song China to India and to the politics in the United States.

Some people build a lot of dirt roads but forget the highways. They understand things well within a subject, but they can’t relate that subject outside of the classroom. Hamlet is one of my favorite literary works because in the classroom where I learned it, our teacher went to great lengths to help build superhighways. We would discuss how aspects of Hamlet related to our own life, politics and completely different areas. As a result I remember more from that play than almost any other piece of literature I studied.

The End of Studying

Studying should be like stretching before a big race. It isn’t a time to get in shape. I lied a bit when I wrote the title of this article. I do study. But I don’t do it for the same reasons that other people do. I study to ensure my web is functioning, not to start building it. Even when I do study, it is just a quick review, never an all-night cramming session.

Some of you may read this article and start thinking that going to the trouble of drawing out diagrams and thinking hard about metaphors to practice holistic learning is going to take too much time. I believe the opposite is true. I have saved a lot of time using these techniques so that school has become just a minor time investment in the overall work I do each day. Practice holistic learning and you can spend less time cramming and more time actually learning.

Looks like I can’t help but start a bit of controversy. ;)

I’ve addressed many of the confusions and concerns this article has generated with a follow up post on what holistic learning is, precisely, and how you should really be using studying to learn. Ultimately holistic learning isn’t about passing exams but understanding anything, a skill anyone can use.

Check it out here: Studying and Holistic Learning

Edit: April 26, 2006 – Wait! There’s more. Check out the Holistic Learning E-Book for 27 Full Pages. Full color illustrations and best of all, it’s completely free.

Check it out here: Holistic Learning E-Book

Edit: September 10, 2008 – Still want more? I’ve written a full e-book guide covering holistic learning, answering common questions, dozens of techniques, productive studying skills and exercise templates to get you started onto holistic learning. Plus, if you don’t love the book, it comes with a 120-day money back guarantee.

Check it out here: Learn More, Study Less
http://www.scotthyoung.com/blog/Programs/HolisticLearningEBook.pdf

Pegging

Whenever the subject of why some people learn faster comes up, I get a whole host of common answers:

1. Some people are just naturally smart. (Often implying you can’t improve)
2. Everyone is “smart” in there own way. (Nonsense, research indicates different “intelligences” often correlate)
3. IQ is all in the genes. (Except IQ changes with age and IQ tests can be studied for, like any other test)

There may be some truth to these claims. But, I don’t believe that means that average learners are doomed to mediocrity. I’ve met and heard of many people who went from middle to spectacular students after changing their learning habits and finding motivation.

Considering the upcoming launch of my rapid learning program, I wanted to share my favorite tactics to learn faster, retain information better or just enjoy the process of learning more:

Genius (or Crazy?)#1 – Pegging (or How Mental Magicians can Perfectly Recall Hundreds of Numbers)

One of my favorite learning tactics, that is rarely mentioned, is pegging. This is a great tool for remembering numbers, provided you practice it.

The systems I’ve seen typically work with a special cheat sheet. This is a list of the digits 0-9 which each correspond to the sound of a consonant. All you need to do is memorize the corresponding consonant and digit match (e.g. 0 = t, 1 = s, 2 = k, 3 = r, etc.)

From there, you can translate any series of numbers into a series of letters. Now all you need to do is make groups of letters into nouns by adding vowels between the consonants. So 201 becomes, k-t-s, which can become “kites”, for example.

Then, once you have your string of nouns, you just need to create a story that combines each of the nouns in a sequence. To translate them back you only need to remember the story and decompose the objects back into their original digits.

#2 – Metaphor (Juliet is the sun… or is she a chemical formula?)

Here’s a quick way to separate the rapid learners from the average learners. Ask them to give you an analogy for whatever they are learning. The rapid learners probably have already thought of at least one analogy, application or metaphor. Slower learners usually are baffled by the question.

Linking ideas allows you to retain them longer and understand them better. Shakespeare isn’t the only one who should be making connections between ideas.

#3 – Total Immersion (Or How a Guy Can Become Fluent in 8 Languages)

Benny Lewis became fluent in eight languages in under a decade. More, his current goal is to become fluent in a new language in under 3 months. When I asked him how he achieved this his answer was straightforward: “I stop speaking English. I do everything in the language I want to learn.”

When you’re totally immersed in a subject (or language), even if you’re lost, you’ll learn far faster than everyone who just dabbles.

#4 – Visceralization (What does a derivative look like?)

When we were kids, we played with crayons and drew pictures of fantastic things that never existed outside our imagination. What happened?

Now most of us feel embarrassed if we try to imagine anything exciting or creative with what we learn. This is, I believe, a key reason many people struggle scholastically. They try to memorize exactly the way they were taught, instead of visualizing the material in an inventive way.

When I recently had to write a test on international labor law, a key topic was the International Labor Organization. Rather than memorize facts, I drew a picture of a creature which had three heads for each of the sections of the ILO, one with 4 mouths for each of the different delegates. In all, I managed to incorporate a page of notes into one picture.

Learning only needs to be boring because you make it that way.

#5 – Linking (Or How to Remember a Grocery List Without the Paper)

Like pegging, linking is another trick mental magicians use. The idea here is that you form a chain, linking each item in a sequence to the next item. You form these links by imagining bizarre and surreal pictures which combine the two elements.

For a simple list like Milk -> Honey -> Apples, you would need to form a link between milk and honey, which you could imagine a giant cow that had bees which came from its udders instead of milk. For the honey and apples, you could imagine an giant apple beehive swarming with tiny apple seeds.

Like pegging this technique can go far beyond the scope of this article. I’ve used it successfully to remember lists of abstract principles that need to be memorized in a sequence for tests.

#6 – The 5-Year Old Method (Try explaining quantum physics to a first grader)

Most rapid learners know how to simplify an explanation. Obviously, actually explaining your masters thesis to a first grader might be impossible. But the goal is to reduce the complexity, by explaining, breaking down and using analogies, so that someone far below your current academic level could understand it.

If you can teach an idea, you can learn that idea.

#7 – Ambiance Catalysts (Or How Drinking a Pint Can Improve Your Studying)

Cal Newport, wrote about the importance of context when studying. If you lock yourself away in a library to get work done, no wonder you’re going to hate it. If the ambiance is appealing, it can push you to get working.

He suggests even going to a quiet bar with your reading material and ordering a beer.How’s that for a more inviting study setting?

#8 – Diagrams (Who said doodling in class was wrong?)

It turns out doodlers perform better in mental retention tests than non-doodlers. I would add even that if the drawings you create in a class are related to the course material, you would probably learn even better.

#9 – Speed Reading (Or How to Read 70 Books in a Year)

Speed reading is less about speed and more about control. Just as racecar driving is more about controlling speed for tight turns, rather than just hitting the accelerator.

If you want to speed read, the basics are:

1. Use your finger as a pointer to underline the text as you read it. This reduces the impact of saccades and distractions in slowing your reading time.
2. Practice reading books faster than you can comprehend, by moving your finger faster. This “practice skimming” helps you improve your comprehension at higher reading rates.
3. Stop subvocalizing. Practice reading faster than you can say the words aloud in your head. Subvocalization can help at slower speeds, but if you require it to read, you’re top speed will be reduced.

Memory Skills

I do this too, but when I try to explain this to other people they chalk it up to me being ‘nerdy’ or exceptionally ’smart’, and go back to their cramming.

Basically what works the best for me is to use whatever comes to mind whenever I first encounter a piece of information and link it to the actual definition, meaning, or application of that information.

Whenever I see, hear, or encounter anything at all, my mind cannot help but have some kind of reaction to it, a knee-jerk reflex thought that comes up. This reflex thought is usually totally unrelated to the idea being learned. I then do a little linking of that reflex thought to whatever is being learned. What then happens is that the next time I encounter that same information, if I haven’t already learned the true meaning or application of it, then at the very least the same knee-jerk reflex thought will pop up. From there it’s a simple matter of recalling that little link I manufactured to the actual information.

Once the information has been truly learned, I find that the knee-jerk reflex thought fades away and is replaced by the actual information.

Of course when in class sometimes the new information comes so quickly that there is no time to sit and think of a way to link the reflex thought to the information, or there’s no time to even have a reflex thought, so I have to take the time to do the linking myself at home when I’m studying the info at my own pace.

A little example, the Chinese term for ‘Hello’ is ‘Ni Hao’. Now my reflex thought at the moment for the sound ‘Hao’ used as a greeting is an American Indian like you see in the movies waving his hand in the air and going ‘How’. So now I imagine a really flexible Chinese kung fu guy meeting someone on the street, lifting his knee in the air to wave it and going ‘Knee How!’ as a greeting.

So what’s in that little image there. First I linked the sound by finding two other words that sounded the same but had a different meaning for me. I also added the detail of a Chinese guy so that I know it’s the Chinese language, and the kung fu added in for good measure because in my mind a kung fu guy is really flexible and can lift his knees really high, and kung fu originated in China so there’s that link to the country again. Now the next time I hear or see ‘Ni Hao’ in Chinese I have so much stuff in my brain to link to, aurally and visually, that it’s almost impossible for me to not remember what it means or how to use it. If I were a tactile learner I would even go so far as to imagine meeting someone on the street, lifting my own knee in a circle and saying ‘Knee How!’. And it’s a funny, interesting image for me, so I have fun thinking it up and have no trouble recalling it.

So where in there am I being ‘nerdy’ in any way? I’m actually linking the information to stuff I watch in my free time, to movies I watch for fun. I didn’t have to study anything before to have something to link the Chinese word to.

If you’ve lived for any length of time and can use your memory, then there are millions of moments, images, sounds, smells, and other tidbits in your mind that you can draw from and use when learning new information.

For me all it really requires to be able to create these kind of connections is to be playful enough to let yourself be silly for a while. I think everybody has the ability to imagine, play, and be silly. Weren’t we all kids before? Anybody can do this, you just have to disregard what you’ve been taught in school to be the proper way to ’study’ and do something that really works.

It’s just that ’studying’ in our minds has become so far detached from the idea of ‘fun’ and ‘play’ that we refuse to allow the two to become linked together, and studying becomes a boring and tedious chore for us. When it becomes boring and tedious, then learning becomes difficult.

Your brain doesn’t like boring and tedious, it likes to be stimulated, it likes fun and interesting! So why work against your brain when it’s so much easier to work with it?

It’s like taking your car up a mountain. You could turn the car off and push the car up the mountain. You’d probably still get to the peak if you persevered, but the car really wasn’t meant to be used that way. You’d have it much easier if you just got in the car, put on some music, turned on the ignition and cruised your way up.

The Link Method

This is the first post on memory techniques that I personally have used as a student, I claim no ownership of any of the techniques, but have found them extremely useful and feel that they should be shared and known widely.

The Link Method

This is useful for remembering a list eg. Chores or a shopping list. By necessity, it’s ordered so it can be used to memorize lists which must be in a specific order. Presidents of the United States for example.

You may wish to memorize the last 5 Presidents of the United States in reverse order

• George Bush
• Bill Clinton
• George Bush Snr
• Ronald Reagan
• Jimmy Carter

What you do is create visual images that are easily memorable, the wackier the better. You also need a trigger which will help you know that you’re recalling the correect list.

I would personally use the American flag, being English, it’s less common to me and therefore more memorable.

Follow through the story to memorise the above list.

Picture a glorious waving American flag, but theres a small Bush fire and somebody uses the flag as a desperate attempt to put the fire out, waving frantically. He then realises, hilariously may I add, that the only thing he has lots of is Bills! So he starts throwing all his bills onto the fire: Gas, Rent, Electric. Lots of red-titled FINAL REMINDER letters . But the Bush fire spreads to more bushes, becoming larger and mysteriously growing a beard (Bush Snr)!

A fire engine comes in with a howling squeal and Ronald Mcdonald appears in familiar clothing and make up and puts the fire out with a hose. As his fireman coworkers drive off, Ronald is left alone with a sad look on his face (painted), he hops into a Formula 1 styled go-Cart (Jimmy Carter), and rides into the sunset.

Run through that story in your head a few times. Can you remember the trigger, the story, the list? If you can then well done, if not then you may need a little more help from the following list.

Keys to effective memorisation

• Be in a relaxed state of mind before you begin - It is hard to focus a noisy mind.
• Really get into the story - Laugh, get upset and outraged if you have to. Emotional involvement helps memory alot.
• If you wish to commit these stories to Long-term memory, I’d reccommend reviewing them at decreasingly regular intervals eg. in 2 days, 5 days. 2 weeks after that, 6 weeks after that. This will suit you if you’re taking a 3 year course at University but if you want to memorise just to pass an upcoming exam then you should use the same method, but over a shorter period of time (1 day, 3 days, 1 week…).
• Have a memorable trigger - What usually works well as a memory trigger is the first thing that comes to mind. This can be fun in its own, kind of like a word-association game. If you wanted to remember the order of the Zodiac for an exam, what first comes to mind? Use that. Let’s say that its the moon. In an exam, if the question “What comes after Aries in the Zodiac?” comes up, you immediately remember your trigger and the rest falls into place like proverbial dominoes.
• Its effective to pick links to the things you’re trying to memorise before you actually start creating a story as you may start a story and then realise that you have no picture for a certain item, or that you do but it doesn’t fit in with the rest of your story.

The most important step

Run through your mental stories, writing out the list regularly. I can’t tell you how important this stage is. As cliché as it sounds, memory IS like a muscle, you must work it regularly to reap the benefits. Also, eventually you will realise that the story isn’t necessary and the links have been made in your brain and its an automatic process, this feels great.

Limitations

This works well for ordered lists, but for longer lists, and lists that don’t have to necessarily be in order there are other more effective techniques. You can’t skip to a position and remember it either, you have to go through Bush, Clinton, and Bush to get to Ronald Mcdonald, whilst in other techniques you don’t.

It’s fun

You’ve got to admit, this is way more fun that rote memorisation, trying to pound information through your brain tissue. It’s a fun process! honestly, you have to become really creative. The worst that can happen is that its less effective than your current technique of memorisation, the best that can happen is that you have fun whilst revolutionising the way you look at memory. Do you feel lucky, punk?

http://richardshelmerdine.com/blog/2009/09/29/advanced-memory-the-link-method/