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My mind does not remember vocabulary? | ||
Tags: Memory | Vocabulary learning | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Learning Techniques, Methods & Strategies |  | |
| basica Senior Member Australia Joined 3323 days ago 157 posts - 269 votes  Studies: Serbian | Message 9 of 12 12 July 2015 at 2:37pm | IP Logged | ||
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If you work harder, not smarter, even then you can memorise at least a couple words a day. By this I mean if
you wrote out a word and then its translation say 20 times every day you will notice it stick, it has to. That being said, there are smarter ways of learning. Here are my suggestions in a nutshell: * Use Anki - it uses something called spaced repetition. It makes learning new words easier because you are not spending needless extra time and effort. I think if you did this alone, you would notice a significant improvement over the amount of words you're able to memorise now. * Use mnemonics - If the word looks like something similar to a word in your language, make a little story or picture in your mind to help you memorise it. I did this for many words in Esperanto and Serbian but I have forgotten most of the stories since then, but remember the words. One little mnemonic I remember using was for the Esperanto word for "barely" which is "apenaux" which I memorised as the phrase "barely an ape" and this hooked into apenaux. * Speak the language, if not with others than with yourself. When I am in the car I sometimes act like a crazy person and have conversations. I talk about what I see on the road, what I want to do when I get home / to work and so on. All this helps you keep the words in your mind. 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Lucie Tellier Diglot Newbie France Joined 3257 days ago 21 posts - 27 votes Speaks: French*, English | Message 10 of 12 13 July 2015 at 12:08am | IP Logged | ||
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Basica's suggestions are surely good for some people, but I've never used mnemonics in my life, and I don't feel like I've learned vocabulary more slowly because I've not used this particular "trick".
IMHO, to learn vocabulary, there are only a couple of popular options which will work for most people. Other methods like mnemonics won't help certain types of learners (like me). You can read a lot (including bilingual books), write a lot, speak a lot, listen to the language a lot... and/or use some kind of flashcards. There are other methods that I won't detail here, but repetition is key. From your messages in Spanish and English, I deduced that you're an ESL learner and also Spanish learner. I don't know what your native language is, but I'm pretty sure you used over 200 words in your messages in Spanish. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
 Iversen Super Polyglot Moderator Denmark berejst.dk Joined 6490 days ago 9078 posts - 16473 votes Speaks: Danish*, French, English, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch, Swedish, Esperanto, Romanian, Catalan Studies: Afrikaans, Greek, Norwegian, Russian, Serbian, Icelandic, Latin, Irish, Lowland Scots, Indonesian, Polish, Croatian Personal Language Map | Message 11 of 12 13 July 2015 at 10:23am | IP Logged | ||
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I do feel that I have learned more vocabulary when I have used wordlists, and maybe as a result of my scientific learnings I have even measured my progress by making word counts before, under and after a 'wordlist campaign' in a given language. But it isn't just a matter of doing rote memorization. You don't learn the important things about 'grammar words' from wordlists or Anki - and hardly even from reading or listening unless you deliberately focus on the way language is constructed, not only on what it means. And if you only memorized single words or word combinations like 'grandfather clock' then you might not even notice the all-important idiomatic expressions that help you to keep a conversation going.
Formal vocabulary learning methods have two main purposes: they organize the repetition process, and they make you focus on learning words - and this includes making associations. A word isn't just a coin with a signifiant and a signifié, as suggested by Saussure (probably the most influential linguist before Chomsky). There is a physical expression of the word (the signifiant), but the signifié is more like a mesh with threads running out in all directions. The denser this network is, the higher the chance that you can recall it when you need it (and use it more or less as tradition prescribes). So while memorizing a new word you should turn it in your head and ask yourself how you can remember it, using etymology, related words, associations based on sound and maybe even a situation where you know that you have met it. Anything goes. And then next time you see it in a proper context you will be better armed. Rare words may be common in specific contexts or even specific books. For instance muggles are much more common in Harry Potter than in all the works of William Shakespeare combined. So I daresay you will learn this word with its meaning by just reading one book in the series. But let me ask: if you encounter a new word in a context where it isn't absolutely esential that you know the exact meaning, what will you do? Well, probably skip it and read on. And next time you see the word may be in another book two months later where you already have forgotten that you skipped it in book one. Not all rare words are common enough somewhere the be learnt simply by exposure. That's why formal methods are good (if you can stand them) - they make sure that such a new word has at least some chance of being recognized and understood when you a lucky enough to see it in the real world. I do understand that some persons can't stand doing Anki or wordlists. After all it would be a failure and probably result in an angry walk-out if somebody asked ME to learn vocabulary through silly games, roleplays, songs (brr I shudder at the thought!) or by reciting things in chorus under the supervision of an almighty teacher. But when used properly the formal methods is the equivalent of cultivating a field instead of searching for berries and mushrooms in the woods. Edited by Iversen on 13 July 2015 at 10:29am 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| basica Senior Member Australia Joined 3323 days ago 157 posts - 269 votes Studies: Serbian | Message 12 of 12 13 July 2015 at 11:10am | IP Logged | ||
I want to clarify that I was not decreeing mnemonics is for everyone, or even that it was inherently fast. As I mentioned to the OP, even writing out by rote would result them in memorising more words than they are now so I'm not really sure what they're doing to memorise words. Lastly, I was also not suggesting you will learn slower if you don't use mnemonics. For me they are a last resort as I typically memorise vocabulary without much effort but it seems like OP needed some pointers, and that was on of them. In any case, any method or trick will result in more than a couple hundred words memorised in a year if you stick with it. Anyways, I'm not sure if you thought that, but that's the feel got from your comment so I wanted to clear any further potential misunderstandings. 1 person has voted this message useful |
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