Mnemonics: Good or Bad? (Learning Techniques, Methods & Strategies) Language Learning Forum

Mnemonics: Good or Bad?
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Language Learning Forum : Learning Techniques, Methods & Strategies

27 messages over 4 pages: 1 2 3 4

BjornarNystrom
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Norway
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Message 25 of 27

10 September 2011 at 5:06pm | IP Logged

I've used the method in many other areas apart from language learning. Might not be exactly on topic seeing as the use of these techniques in relation to language learning is the main theme, but I'd like to add my experience with mnemonic techniques anyway.

Naturally I don't have much experience when it comes to language because I've just started out, but in general I've found it incredibly helpful when it comes to remembering combinations, numbers and chemical stuff. I work in a diving firm and I am also a plastic-welder. Not too intricate, but when I started out I hated checking my notes in order to remember how different plastics worked and what procedures were required, so I made sets of visual stories that helped me recall a whole lot of it with great ease.

I think of it as basically just being a mental note that you keep and after you've checked it a couple of times you discard it because you remember the stuff instinctively.

It also depends, I guess, on whether or not you're mainly a visual thinker.

Also the information has to be stored systematically and not randomly, and I guess most people know this but it is nonetheless important. I've mainly used buildings I'm familiar with and sometimes cities in order to store sets of knowledge. I'd pick a particular area, ex. my old high school, in order to store my friend's phone numbers and birthdays. No other sets of knowledge are stored in those places as it would lead to confusion.

But it can be overused and should be reserved for particular combinations and pieces of knowledge that are related to each other. That's my idea.

In regards to language it can sometimes take a whole lot of time because you're struggling to find associations, in which case it might be a waste of time. Sometimes the associations are easy and come by themselves, in which case it's nice to use the technique.
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montmorency
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United Kingdom
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Message 26 of 27

11 September 2011 at 12:33pm | IP Logged

Jeffers wrote:

jdmoncada wrote:

Thanks, Jeffers. That made me remember the kind of memory tricks learned in English, such as "There's a rat in separate." It helps me remember to spell it correctly. So yes, I have a few of those tricks after all. I just didn't realize they were considered mnemonics.

Mnemonics are any thing you use to remember something. Some people think mnemonics are the complicated things like, to remember that French for horse is cheval, I think of a man (because the word is masculine) on a horse carrying a shovel. However, if remember a word because it sounds like another word, that's still a mnemonic. For example, I learnt vous avez and nous avon because they sound like a French person would say "have" (dropping the h).

That last rings a bell with me. If you are old enough, you may remember a TV advert featuring a one-time, fairly well-known actor (although I've forgotten his name) with the tagline:

"Do 'ave a Dubonnet!"

There was also a famous PG Tips advert that had one of the chimps supposedly in the Tour de France, stopping and asking (in a northern English accent...) "avez-vous a cuppa?"
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learnvietnamese
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Message 27 of 27

11 September 2011 at 2:49pm | IP Logged

Mnemonics is for re-production in case it's hard to store the stuff concerned directly in memory.

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