The Most Effective Memorization Techniques For Learning Italian

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We're always being told that memorizing is old-school. It's often considered an obsolete way to retain information.

It's not, and there's only one reason why people generally believe it's old-school--it's hard. But like everything that's hard, it works. Or rather, everything that works is hard.

In this article I'll introduce you to six effective memorization techniques that can help you speak a language. The following techniques are more efficient than rote memory.

EVERYTHING ALOUD

This is the number 1 and most essential requirement. Foreign languages MUST be practiced aloud. Along with the multiple benefits of practicing this way--to which there is NO OTHER VALID OR KNOWN ALTERNATIVE--repetition out loud is what ensures mental retention.

One should only be reminded that most of our cultural heritage was passed down generation to generation for thousands of years of human history with one means only--voice.

SPACED REPETITION + ACTIVE RECALL

This is great to memorize vocabulary.

Spaced repetition consists in reviewing and repeating a set of words you're trying to memorize at increasing intervals. For example, if your goal is to memorize 40 words (it's not a lot), you can repeat them aloud a few times over a 15-minute session earlier in the day. Then you let them sit there for a little and do another 15-minute session in the evening of that same day. Let them rest some more and take them back after one day. Rest, and take them back after 2 days, then after 4, then after a week.

For more complex content that requires a bit more effort to retain, you can continue and run more repetition sessions after 2 weeks, then after a month, then after 90 days.

Always, always, always--did I already say "always"?--use active recall when memorizing. It's a simple but effective concept. If you cannot remember a word--or a part of whatever you're trying to memorize--do not peek. Make an effort and try your best to yank that out of wherever it's hiding. If that doesn't work, leave it where it is and forget about it (metaphorically speaking) until your next session. Then go again, and keep using active recall. Peeking is always the last resort.

CHUNKING

For larger amounts of information, use chunking to break it down into smaller groups. This also works for longer vocabulary lists. It becomes especially useful to divide words into categories. This forces you to separate traveling vocabulary from grocery store vocabulary for example. Memorization becomes easier and you maximize retention this way.

TEACH SOMEONE ELSE

This method is especially useful to remember structures and concepts. However, it only becomes effective as long as you simplify down to the bare bones. To do that, simply imagine you're explaining the concept to a ten-year old.

THE MEMORY PALACE OR METHOD OF LOCI

This method dates back to over five-hundred years BCE. It was used by the most famous orators of the ancient world, including Cicero and Quintilian.

The Method of Loci (Latin for "places") works by imagining a familiar place, for example your household. By using each room-space within your house or apartment, you can pick five or six spots (in the kitchen, it could be the main table, stove top, sink, one particular cabinet, one shelf, etc.) which you will then number from 1 to 6--or however many spots you chose to use. This is going to create a set order that you're never going to change again. Each spot will contain an image, sign, or symbol to help you remember a part of or concept of what you're trying to memorize.

This method works particularly well when you're memorizing rhymes, songs, poems, paragraphs or entire chapters from books, or a speech.

If some day you were to commit to memory a few cantos from La Divina Commedia, you're going to need this method.

Memorizing is not only useful--it is essential.

The art of memorization is quickly going extinct because the educational system does not encourage it anymore down from grade school and up to university. In fact, it considers it an old relic of a pre-digital era.

The truth is that memorizing is not only a way to retain information that will otherwise go lost, but it is also an effective way to keep our mental faculties constantly in use and to stay sharp.

As for the kind of technology everyone praises as the ultimate way to learn things--the truth is it won't help you learn. In fact, it will learn for you and instead of you.

Now that is one step closer to extinction.