🎀 [English Vocabulary] Are you learning them the wrong way? Memorization techniques to learn twice as fast by understanding how the brain works

"I just can't seem to remember English words..."

"No matter how many times I go over them, they just slip away..."

"Even though I just learned them yesterday!"

If you're learning English, I'm sure you've had an experience like this at least once.

Some people might even be thinking,

"My memory is just bad..."

"Maybe I'm getting older and my ability to learn is declining..."

"I'm just no good at anything I try..."

and blaming themselves, right?

Wait, wait.

If there's anyone out there thinking that,

that is a huge misunderstanding.

Do you know about Ebbinghaus's Forgetting Curve?

This is a concept proposed by the German psychologist

Hermann Ebbinghaus,

who studied human long-term memory,

and to put it simply,

in short,

people forget about 70% of what they have newly learned by the next day.

So,

"It's natural not to be able to remember."

This is the same for both the young and the old.

So there is no need to blame yourself.

However, there are ways to make it dramatically easier to remember.

I think I'll talk about that today.

I have also been studying English for a long time,

and for what it's worth, I have passed Eiken Grade 1 and scored over 900 on the TOEIC.

I had a period where I struggled to memorize words,

and I think I'm someone who has gone through a lot of trial and error.

Even among all that,

"This really works!"

I'll only introduce the things I've personally felt that about.

Oh, I apologize for the late introduction.

This is who I am.

Use your right brain for memorization

The brain has a right hemisphere and a left hemisphere, right?

The right brain governs "sensibility."
The left brain governs "reason."

And

the brain also has areas it is good and bad at,

and when it comes to memorization,

the right brain is good at remembering things that are visualized.

That's how it is.

So, when you memorize things, using your right brain makes it dramatically easier for them to stick in your memory.

So,

here is the actual method.

When memorizing,

✔image-based memory

✔episodic memory

it is easier to divide it into these two.

Image-based memory is

a method of memorizing things as visuals, like photos or videos.

For example,

when you hear

"apple",

instead of the word

"apple" (in Japanese),

visualize it so you can recall it.

Nouns and adjectives are easy to visualize, so they are well-suited for image-based memory.

Episodic memory is

A method of memorizing events as a story by visualizing the content.

This doesn't necessarily have to be something you've experienced yourself.

Using your imagination is fine.

However, what's important at that time is

to attach emotions to it

When you recall the emotions you felt when you memorized something,

it becomes easier to recall the information from that time,

so make sure to always attach emotions when you are memorizing.

Verbs and adverbs are well-suited for episodic memory.

Creating sentences yourself is also good,

and if you are memorizing phrases,

it's a good idea to put emotion into it

while imagining yourself actually using those phrases.

For example,

In the only phrasebook I own,

there's this one,

and when you memorize this, you should do it like this

Actually,

to this extent,

"The tomato is rotten! Oh, what a shock!"

it's good to memorize it while putting that feeling into it.

You could even actually open your own fridge and do it.

It's effective if you add gestures and body language.

It sounds like memorizing words is going to get really noisy, right? (lol)

But this is actually the most effective way.

Timing is also important for memorization

Did you know that there are times when it's easier for humans to remember things?

For memorization,before bedis best.

It has been scientifically proven that while you sleep, your brain organizes what you learned that day

and solidifies it into memory.

I've tried this myself, and

the level of memory retention was completely different.

Try doing it for just five minutes before you go to sleep.

To summarize:

✔Use your right brain for memorization

✔Using imagery to memorize is highly effective

✔Use image-based memory for nouns and adjectives

✔Use episodic memory for verbs and adverbs

✔Memorization is most effective before bed

Thank you for reading until the end.

I would be so happy if this helps with your English studies.

If you thought the content was good!

If you click the "Like" button,

I'll do a little happy dance♪

Next time,

I think I'll talk about the truth behind

why English beginners often fall into the "three-day quitter" trap.

Being a "three-day quitter" might not actually be

about your personality or tendencies,

but there might be another reason for it.

That's what I'll be talking about.

If you're interested, give me a follow and stay tuned♪