Learn your vocabulary words. Memorize mathematical formulas. Recite a fable. Remember phone numbers. These are all examples where the memory is solicited. Learning by heart: a challenge for many young people! Here are some tips.
Tip o 1: Repeat, repeat and repeat
There is only one way for long-term memory to store information: repetition. At the start of learning, the multiplication table of 7 for example, the interval between repetitions must be closer, that is to say every day (or almost). Then, we space them out little by little until perfect control.
Revisiting and practicing a little each day leads to much better results than studying a few days before an assessment or worse, than having an all-nighter the day before an exam. Why? Because the brain needs rest to do its job well and store knowledge forever.
Tip o 2: Avoid getting bored
1492: discovery of America by Christopher Columbus. 1608: founding of Quebec. 1763: Treaty of Paris. Repeating historical dates and events ad nauseam is not very motivating.
To learn, your child must first understand. The information to be memorized must make sense to him. In history, for example, they must begin by understanding the logical sequence of events that follow one another.
Read and rereading the same documents over and over again quickly becomes boring. It is therefore necessary to break with the monotony by varying the learning methods: transcribing your notes, writing a question and answer, then practicing with your parents or friends, becoming a teacher to explain concepts, listening to a film, a television series or a documentary on a given subject, play an online educational game, etc.
Tip no 3: Using mnemonic tricks
Mné-mo-tech-nique: such a difficult word to pronounce, but oh so useful! A mnemonic device is a method that allows you to memorize by association of ideas. There are a few techniques.
- Making Stories: Napoleon Cheerfully Ate Six Chickens Without Snapping Money gives the third row of the periodic table of the elements: Na (Sodium), Mg (Magnesium), Al (Aluminium), Si (Silicon), P (Phosphorus), S (Sulfur), Cl (Chlorine) and Ar (Argon).
- The rhyme: The square of the hypotenuse is equal, if I'm not mistaken, is the sum of the squares of the other two sides.
- The acronym: CASMOQ, to remember the order of the provinces (British Columbia, Alberta, Saskatchewan, Manitoba, Ontario, Quebec).
Help your childcreate their own crazy phrases or stories. It's time to let go of your creativity!
