How to memorize

You memorize something by saying or writing it from memory, on more than one day. Three things make that work for a speech, a list, lines in a play or new words.

1. Test yourself. Read it once or twice. Then cover it and say it, or write it, from memory. Look again only to check what you missed.
2. Spread it out. Practice for a few minutes today, again tomorrow, and again a few days later.
3. Make it mean something. Know what each part says, and say it as if you are telling it to someone.

Here is how that looks. Maya has to give a short speech on Friday. On Monday she reads it and works out what each part is for. Then she puts the paper face down and says the speech out loud, as if to a friend. She does the same for ten minutes on Tuesday and on Thursday, and once more on Friday morning.

How you test yourself depends on what you are memorizing.

Testing yourself helps you memorize more than reading it again does. It also shows you which parts you cannot yet say without looking.

In one study, students learned words in Swahili with their English meanings. Some kept testing themselves on a word after they first got it right. The others stopped once they knew it. A week later, the first group remembered more than twice as many of the words (Karpicke and Roediger, 2008).

So keep testing yourself on the parts you already know. The page on active recall tells that study in full. It and the page on the blurting method show more ways to test yourself.

Memorizing spread over several days works better than the same practice done in one day, and it takes no extra time.

In one study, students learned hard English words from cards on a screen. They went through one stack of cards a little on each of four days. They went through another stack just as many times, all on the last day. A day later they remembered 54% of the words they had spread out and 34% of the others (Kornell, 2009).

The page on how to study effectively shows how to plan the days for a whole exam.

Saying a text as if you mean it helped students remember more of it in one experiment. The idea comes from actors, who have to learn long parts word for word.

Two researchers who studied actors found that they rarely learn their lines by repeating them. Actors first work out why the character says each line (Noice and Noice, 2006).

The researchers tried this with students. Working out the meaning was not enough on its own: students who did only that remembered less than students who simply memorized the text. Then the researchers told students not to memorize a text, but to read it as if they were telling it to someone who needed to hear it. Those students remembered 60% of the text. Students who memorized it in any way they liked remembered 50%.

So when you practice a speech, say it to someone, or picture a person who needs to hear it.

To memorize something fast, test yourself on all of it a few times in one evening, and once more in the morning.

Go through all of it each time.

Do not repeat one small piece many times before you move on. In one experiment, students learned words from cards. They went through one big stack of cards four times, and through small stacks four times each. The next day they remembered 49% of the words from the big stack and 36% from the small stacks (Kornell, 2009).

Stop at your usual bedtime.

Then go through it once more in the morning.

What does cramming cost?

Memorizing something the night before can get you through the next day, but much of it does not last. In one study, students read two short texts. One they read twice. The other they read once, and then wrote down what they remembered of it. Five minutes later they remembered most of both texts. A week later they remembered less of both. Of the text they had only read, about half of what they first remembered was gone (Roediger and Karpicke, 2006). The page on active recall shows the numbers.

So if you need it next week or next year, come back to it on other days.

Every source below was read in full for this page.

1. Karpicke, J. D. and Roediger, H. L. (2008). The Critical Importance of Retrieval for Learning. Science, 319(5865), 966 to 968.
2. Kornell, N. (2009). Optimising learning using flashcards: Spacing is more effective than cramming. Applied Cognitive Psychology, 23(9), 1297 to 1317.
3. Noice, H. and Noice, T. (2006). What Studies of Actors and Acting Can Tell Us About Memory and Cognitive Functioning. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 15(1), 14 to 18.
4. Roediger, H. L. and Karpicke, J. D. (2006). Test-Enhanced Learning: Taking Memory Tests Improves Long-Term Retention. Psychological Science, 17(3), 249 to 255.