Strategies for Improving Concentration and Memory

There are some specific skills that can be learned to improve ones success as a student.

Once something is stored in our brain, we never forget it. We may, however, have difficulty recalling the information.

Good concentration will enhance our memory.

Concentration Basics Study Environment

Distraction free no matter if studying biology or playing pool, focus

on the task at hand and eliminate distraction.

No friends

No computer games or TV

No phone calls

If you like music in the background, okay, but dont let it be a distraction.

Concentration Basics Conditions

Chair Is it comfortable enough that you can sit for 45 to 50 minutes at a time?

Desk do you have adequate space to spread out?

Lighting should not cause eye strain.

Temperature should be comfortably cool.

Concentration Basics

Improve your attitude Some subjects may not be of high interest to you. Some subjects may not seem relevant to your field of study. You must maintain a positive attitude . To get your degree, you must pass all these courses, not just the ones you like.

Attend to the task Concentration is a must for successful reading. Concentration is improved if you study when you are the most alert, least tired and in good physical health.

Activity

Read the 12 words on this page.

Glass Speaker Fall

Ready Basket Frame

College Shoes Medium

Spoil Hello Final

Activity (paper and pencil needed)

On a piece of paper, write down as many of the 12 words as you can recall.

How did you do?

Were you able to recall all 12 words?

Remembering Information

Techniques for Remembering Information

Techniques for Remembering Information

Repetition Mind Picture

Grouping Rhyme

Acronym Acronymic Sentence

Repetition

Read the facts.

Write the facts.

Say the facts.

Repeat the steps three or more times.

Use repetition when you want to remember a few facts, usually not more than 4 or 5 facts.

Repetition

Using the repetition technique, try to remember the following underline facts.

An explorer named Columbus is said to have discovered America in the year 1492.

Repetition

Which words would you underline?

Marco Polo explored Asia and traveled to China in the late 1200s.

Ferdinand Magellan is famous for sailing around the world in the early 1500s.

Repetition Fill in the blanks to show what to do when using the repetition

technique. First (1)___________ the facts.

Second (2)__________the facts.

Third (3)____________the facts.

Finally (4)____________the steps.

Mind Picture

Mental image or picture created in the mind, which later can be used to recall information.

Say the facts.

Create one or more pictures in your mind.

Focus on the picture(s) and say the facts.

Recall the picture(s) when you need to remember the facts.

Mind Picture

Which ones would be easy for you to remember using the mind picture technique?

The years 1914, 1940, 1953, 1986

Something you saw on TV

The most interesting thing you did yesterday

The names of the last 5 presidents of US

The events that took place in the last story you read

What you ate for your last meal

Mind Picture

For foreign language vocabulary select the foreign words you need to remember, then identify an English word that sounds like the foreign one. Now imagine an image that involves the key word with the English meaning of the foreign word.

Example: In Spanish the word cabina means phone booth. Invent an image of a cab trying to fit in a phone booth.

When you see the word cabina you should be able to recall this image and retrieve the meaning.

Mind Picture

Image-Name Technique: invent a relationship between the name and the physical characteristics of the person.

Example: Shirley Temple her curly (rhymes with Shirley) hair around her temples.

Grouping

Technique for remembering facts that go together in some way.

Look for ways that facts to be remembered can be

grouped together.

Write a name for each group.

Write the facts that go with each group.

Grouping (paper and pencil needed)

Group the following facts. Write a name for each group. Then write the facts under the name of each group.

pencil, paper, magazine, pen, book, chalk, chalkboard, poem, cardboard, newspaper

Grouping

Sorting large amounts of information into categories can help you remember information more accurately and retrieve information faster.

By sorting terms into major categories, you will place a value on the terms and give them meaning. Otherwise, these concepts would be difficult to learn and remember if you were merely trying to memorize the individual terms.

Grouping

Suppose you had to learn the following concepts for a business class:

tools, labor, trees, wildlife, human resources, minerals, machinery, capital, resources, factories, tractors, water, power plants, manpower, natural resource, typewriters

Grouping

Natural Resources Capital Resources Human Resources

Minerals tools labor

Water machinery manpower

Trees power plants

Wildlife factories

tractors

typewriters

Rhyme

Use of verse to remember information such as the following:

In fourteen hundred and ninety-two

Columbus sailed the ocean blue.

Thirty days has September,

April, June, and November

Rhyme Technique

Write a line that ends with a word to be remembered.

Write a 2nd line that ends with a word that rhymes with the word to be remembered.

Repeat steps 1 and 2 for other words to be remembered.

Rhyme technique

Here is a rhyme to remember the names Harry and Mary.

My friends name is Harry.

His sisters name is Mary.

Rhyme Technique

Fill in the missing words to complete the rhyme.

Christopher Columbus was not a tailor.

He was a good old______________.

He sailed across the ocean blue

And discovered American in the year _________.

Rhyme Technique (pencil and paper needed)

Write a rhyme that will help you remember the following facts.

William Shakespeare was a very bright English fellow who wrote a play with the title King Lear. He also wrote a play with the title Othello.

Acronyms

Acronyms are formed using the first letter of each fact to be remembered. The letters are arranged to form a pronounceable word.

The acronym may be either a real word or a nonsense word.

Acronyms

1. Write the facts.

2. Underline the first letter of each fact.

3. Form an abbreviation using the underlined letters.

Acronyms

CALF is an acronym that is a real word. It can be used to remember the names of these states: Arizona, California, Florida, Louisiana.

LEAT is an acronym that is a nonsense word that can be pronounced. It can be used to remember the names of these US presidents:

Adams, Eisenhower, Lincoln, Truman.

Acronyms HOMES is an acronym for remember the geographical location of

the Great Lakes.

Huron, Ontario, Michigan, Erie, Superior

ROY G. BIV helps science students remember the colors of the visible spectrum

Red, Orange, Yellow, Green, Blue, Indigo, Violet

Can you think of an acronym that you have used?

Acronyms (paper and pencil needed)

Form an acronym for each of the following sets of facts:

Delaware, Indiana, Michigan, Nevada

Finch, owl, lark, wren

apple, tomato, lettuce, endive

Acronymic Sentence

A technique for remembering facts by creating a sentence from words whose first letters help you remember the facts.

Please excuse my dear Aunt Sally.

Parentheses- E xponents- M ultiplication- D ivision- A ddition- S ubtraction.

Acronymic Sentence

The following acronymic sentence was created to remember that Minnesota, Wisconsin, Illinois, Indiana, Ohio and Michigan all have a seaport on one of the Great Lakes.

Indians were mining ore in May.

Illinois Wisconsin Michigan Ohio Indiana Minnesota

Acronymic Sentence

Create an acronymic sentence to remember the following information:

Fruit and vegetable group: apple, pear, orange, banana, carrot, bean, radish

Polar bears caught racing after big otters.

Remembering Information

We have looked at six techniques for remembering information.

Repetition Mind Picture Grouping Rhyme Acronyms Acronymic Sentence

Lets decide which technique to use with a given set of

facts.

For each of the following write the name of the remembering technique that would be most appropriate to use to remember the

facts.

Facts easy to visualize ______________________ A short list of facts you can remember quickly and easily. ______________________ Facts with words that sound alike ______________________

For each of the following write the name of the remembering technique that would be most appropriate to use to remember the

facts.

Facts whose first letters can be arranged to form a pronounceable word

________________________

Facts that can be organized into categories

________________________

Facts that can be remembered by creating a sentence from words whose first letters help you remember the facts

________________________

Remembering Information

Which technique was used?

Billy created lines of verse that ended with words that sounded alike.

____________________

Rosa organized a set of facts into categories.

____________________

Remembering Information

Susie created a sentence from the first letters of facts. _____________________ Luis formed images in his mind.

_____________________

Elizabeth wrote and repeated facts several times.

_____________________