Teaching secondary
aged students

Memory

What and Why?

Memory is obviously crucial in language learning. How memory comes about, however, is still something of a mystery to us. We know that the memories which last the longest are often complete experiences - research has also shown, for example, that many language learners are able to say when they first heard a word and describe the scene at the time - where they were, what the weather was like, what they were doing, and so on.
In practice, we can think of two basic ways to bring about memorization. One is through rote learning, that is, 'learning by heart'. The other is through 'activation', that is, through use or building connections with other knowledge and experiences. In the past, much language learning concentrated almost solely on rote learning: students were encouraged to learn words, phrases, and dialogues by heart, often without fully understanding them. This approach has been heavily criticised in recent years although there are benefits in some rote learning. Where, for example, we need frequent mental reference to 'fixed' information - such as multiplication tables in mathematics or irregular verbs in a foreign language - it may be efficient to learn by heart. Secondly, it is often psychologically comforting at any age to learn a piece of text, for example, a poem or a song by heart, particularly if this is done in a group.
The benefits of rote learning, however, are quite different from those achieved through 'activation' - that is the use of language in a variety of contexts, to express and understand meanings, particularly those that are significant to the student, with a variety of tasks. Memory achieved through activation is usually transferable to other contexts; memory achieved through rote learning generally has a more limited value. Rote learning is more effective for short term memory needs but retention rapidly falls. After one year as much as 75% of rote learned information is beyond recall. Long term memory requires understanding, frequent revision, personal involvement and varied opportunities for use and application. In language learning, it is vocabulary with makes most demands on memory.

Practical ideas

• You can encourage students to think about what kind of memory they have: some remember images well, others remember spoken or written text, some may remember smells or bodily experience well. You can ask the students to picture in their mind an event in the recent past when they heard people talking. Ask them to write down anything which they remember about it: the weather, the room, the clothes, the words people said, what they could smell, how they felt etc. Their memories will give clues as to the kind of memoriser they are and the kinds of learning strategies they will be able to use to help them remember new information. Students who remember visual details well may find it helpful to visualise new words in a picture or film. Those who remember verbal details, what people said for example, may memorise new words best by fitting them into a narrative.
• You can ask students to experiment with the ways they use their language record. The words can be written in different coloured pens: red may be more memorable than blue for example. Or written in different shapes: words about 'the environment' may, for example, be written on a globe; words about 'the news' could be written on a tv screen.
• You can ask students to classify words in different ways: putting nouns, verbs, adjectives in separate lists or in alphabetical order, or lists of opposites, or the short words first and then the long ones.
• Students can also experiment by writing the words in different places: in their diary, on the back of an envelope, on a postcard, around an advertisement cut from a magazine, on the side of cardboard box, on a bus ticket or chocolate wrapper.
• The place of learning might also be important: students can experiment with learning language in different places: in different rooms of the house, or outside, in a busy cafe or a quiet library.
• You can also encourage students to build learning into a 'complete event'. For example, if they are trying to revise for a test they can play some music at the same time. Later, if they listen to the music it may help to bring the ideas back to them.
• Some students like rhymes. Learning new words can be helped by rhyming them with a word they already know.
• Encourage students to create different ways of using new words while and after they learn them: by writing a puzzle or recording a dialogue on the tape or writing a letter.
• Allow time in class to discuss the different experiments the students have carried out so that they can evaluate their successes and failures.
• An experiment that you can try is to give the same vocabulary test again later in the term or even in the next term and see which words have been remembered best. Then discuss with the students why some words are more easily remembered than others.