Four Ways to Improve Student Memory and your own

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Four Ways to Improve Student Memory (and your
own!)
Marilee Sprenger brainlady_at_gmail.com
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Number OneWork Working Memory Adults After 5
weeks of training, brain activity increased
(Nature Neuroscience) Children Working
memory workouts showed improvement in a range of
cognitive abilities and Higher IQ scores (8)
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Those with low working memory capacity should
make every effort to work in a distraction-free
environment, to clear their minds of distracting
thoughts, focus on only one goal at a time, and
reduce the amount of information theyre
processing at one time as much as possible. And
the most useful way in which you can improve
your working memory capacity is by becoming
sufficiently skilled at particular tasks so that
they take up less working memory
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Number Two Storytelling
Humans are not ideally set up to understand
logic they are ideally set up to understand
stories. Roger C. Schank, Cognitive scientist
Fact the queen died and the king died. Story
the queen died and the king died of a broken
heart. E.M. Forster
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Number Three VISUALIZING         Create a map
of the U.S.         Draw a picture of the inside
of a computer         Draw a picture of a
concept, such as freedom         Create a
blueprint of the school or your
classroom         Play Pictionary        
Create symbols for certain concepts, such as a
torch for freedom
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Number Four Mnemonics
Acrostics
Acronyms
Roman Rooms
Daily procedures
Peg Systems
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• One is bun Pat your hands like a bun
• Two is shoe With two fingers point to your feet
• Three is tree Put your hands up in the air
• Four is door Open the door
• Five is hive Bat at the bees
• Six is bricks Lift a heavy brick
• Seven is heaven Point up to the sky
• Eight is gate Hop over the gate
• Nine is line Draw a line in the air

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11. Goalpost Hold up your two pointer
fingers 12. Eggs Crack an egg 13. Black
cat Pet the cat 14. Heart Make a heart with
your fingers 15. Fame Spread your arms and say
Fame! 16. Driving Drive a car 17.
Magazine Turn the pages of a magazine 18.
Vote Make a check mark in the air 19. Remote
control Click the remote to change the
channel 20. 20-20 vision Make circles over your
eyes like glasses
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Body File

• Head
• Nose
• Mouth
• Shoulders
• Arms
• Hands
• Waist
• Thighs
• Knees
• Feet

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References Baddely, A. (1998). Memory Sprenger,
M. (2005). How to Teach so Students
Remember Sprenger, M. (2006). Differentiation
through Learning Styles and Memory Sprenger,
M. (1999). Learning and Memory, The Brain in
Action Thwait, B. (2007). The Big Learn