Hey,<\/p>\n
There are some things you just have to see to believe.<\/p>\n
When I first heard about Benny Lewis, I thought for sure he was a
\nfake. Not only did he claim to speak 8 languages fluently, but he
\nsaid it was possible to reach that point in only three months.<\/p>\n
I was six months into learning French and still felt total fluency
\nwas a far away. Three months bordered on incredulity.<\/p>\n
It wasn’t until I saw Benny in action that removed all doubts in me.<\/p>\n
Mingling at a boat party, Benny’s German was impressive after just
\nover a month. One person even lamented that Benny’s fluency outpaced
\nhis after *four years* studying in Berlin.<\/p>\n
How is this possible?<\/p>\n
—<\/p>\n
Now Benny’s method certainly can’t be reduced to a single tactic.
\nHis unorthodox methods eschew studying for socializing and he
\ndogmatically avoids English from his first step into a new country.<\/p>\n
But even with his friendly Irish attitude and intensity of practice,
\none things still couldn’t escape me–how do you remember all those
\nwords?<\/p>\n
To speak fluently in a language involves knowing thousands of words,
\nand knowing them fast enough to speak without stumbling.<\/p>\n
I know students that complain about being tested on 100-200 pieces
\nof terminology before a test. How did he remember thousands without
\nfail?<\/p>\n
—<\/p>\n
The method Benny taught me was simple, yet a definite improvement
\nover rote memorization.<\/p>\n
With conceptual understanding, moving to metaphors and diagrams
\nisn’t too unusual. However remembering words, definitions and
\nterminology seemed destined to be a painful exercise of flashcard
\ndrills and repetition.<\/p>\n
After learning about this method, I decided to test it against rote
\nmemorization. To conduct my admittedly unscientific experiment, I
\ntook hundreds of unfamiliar French words to me (50 per day) and
\nsplit them into two batches–one memorized with rote for a set
\namount of time, the other remembered using Benny’s method.<\/p>\n
I even created a simple computer program to randomize tests for me
\nI could run at the end of each week.<\/p>\n
What was the result?<\/p>\n
My recall rate using a strict memorization approach was 35%. Hardly
\nideal, but I was doing 50 new words per day with only 30 minutes of
\ninvested time (most of which was spent finding words to translate).<\/p>\n
But with Benny’s method, my recall rate jumped above 70%. More than
\ndouble the results with the same amount of effort.<\/p>\n
What’s more, this new method was more interesting. While drills are
\nboring, this made the task less painful, which in itself made it
\nsuperior to drills.<\/p>\n
—<\/p>\n
How to Double Your Vocabulary Recall with One Method<\/p>\n
The method is fairly simple, although it takes a little practice
\nbefore it is quick. Basically you want to create a visual image
\nwhich links the terminology to a definition word (or translation in
\nthe case of languages).<\/p>\n
Some possible pairs of words:<\/p>\n
gare -> station
\npara siempre -> forever
\nchien -> dog
\nad hominem -> personal attack
\nratio decedendi -> legal rationale
\ncalcaneus -> heel bone<\/p>\n
Once you have your terminology word and definition word, you need
\nto create an image for each word.<\/p>\n
The best way to do that is to use the “sounds like” method, and to
\nthink of the first image that sounds like the word in question.<\/p>\n
Benny’s example for me was in remembering the French word “gare” for
\ntrain station, the first “sounds like” image was the cartoon cat,
\nGarfield.<\/p>\n
The next step is to link the images for both words in an incredibly
\nvivid, bizarre scene in your head. Try to pick scenes which are
\nunrealistic and fantastic, since those will form better links in
\nyour mind.<\/p>\n
With Garfield in mind, he then imagined a scene where Garfield was
\nracing to get to the *station* in order to get to a lasagna eating
\ncontest.<\/p>\n
Sometimes the definition word itself is hard to visualize. Using
\nthis tactic to remember the Spanish word for, “forever” is harder
\nsince “forever” is an abstract concept.<\/p>\n
Here you can try to come up with a symbol that will represent that
\nconcept immediately in your mind. For me it’s a giant hourglass with
\nsand that never runs out.<\/p>\n
Using this method, then, I imagine a parasite praying (sounds like
\npara siempre) next to a gigantic hourglass which never runs out of
\nsand.<\/p>\n
The steps are fairly simple:<\/p>\n
1. Pick a TERMINOLOGY word and DEFINITION word
\n2. Create images for both words using “sounds like” or symbols
\n3. Link the two together in a bizarre scene<\/p>\n
—<\/p>\n
Mastering This Technique for Terminology<\/p>\n
This tactic is just one of several that I teach in Learning on
\nSteroids for remembering vocabulary and other details. It can take
\na bit of practice to master, but once you get in the habit (as I
\ndid, during my month long, 50-words-per-day experiment) you can go
\nthrough each one in 15-20 seconds.<\/p>\n
Creating the mental link doesn’t mean that zero review is required,
\nbut once you form the links, you immediately save yourself a lot
\nof flashcard-style review, and get higher accuracy.<\/p>\n
—<\/p>\n
Contest Winner for Metaphors<\/p>\n
It was great reading through the hundreds of responses for the
\ncontest on metaphors.<\/p>\n
There were lots of good first starts, but the majority were still
\nfairly rough. With practice and coaching, however, I’d expect that
\nmost people could begin accelerating their learning in just a few
\nweeks of training.<\/p>\n
Choosing the best was hard, since many were excellent, but my
\nfavorite was from Yael, a biology student:<\/p>\n
“A gene in the DNA is a code for a program. When the ‘transcription
\nfactors’ press play the program starts running. The running program
\n(on your RAM) is the RNA, and it tells a robot called ribosome how
\nto put together different colored beads called ‘amino acids’.<\/p>\n
A Short string is called a Peptide, and a long one is called a
\nProtein.”<\/p>\n
Not only was the metaphor simple (DNA as a robot) but it’s easy to
\nvisualize and focuses on the underlying concept, rather than as a
\nmemory aid.<\/p>\n
Congrats to Yael for winning a free copy of Learn More, Study Less!<\/p>\n
Of course, the BEST metaphor is what works for you, so keep at it!<\/p>\n
—<\/p>\n
Get Free Coaching Before the Week is Over<\/p>\n
One of the reason space is restricted in the program, is that I make
\nmyself available to offer email coaching to any student in the
\nprogram.<\/p>\n
Since I want to help as many students as possible during this 1-week
\nbootcamp, I’m making the same offer to you.<\/p>\n
If you have any questions about applying tactics for your studies,
\nusing any of the techniques we’ve mentioned so far, or advice, hit
\nREPLY and I’ll do my best to get to everyone.<\/p>\n
As always, if you have questions about the full program, Learning
\non Steroids, for when it reopens, I’m more than happy to help.<\/p>\n
Even if you don’t have any questions at the moment, I’d appreciate
\na quick REPLY to tell me what you think so far for the bootcamp.<\/p>\n
—<\/p>\n
This is the last day of LEARNING tactics in the bootcamp. Tomorrow,
\nI’ll be posting the second video module, this time on how you can
\nbecome ruthlessly productive, get more work done and escape the
\ngrind.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Hey, There are some things you just have to see to believe. When I first heard about Benny Lewis, I thought for sure he was a fake. Not only did he claim to speak 8 languages fluently, but he said it was possible to reach that point in only three months. I was six months […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.scotthyoung.com\/members\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/615"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.scotthyoung.com\/members\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.scotthyoung.com\/members\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.scotthyoung.com\/members\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.scotthyoung.com\/members\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=615"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.scotthyoung.com\/members\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/615\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":616,"href":"https:\/\/www.scotthyoung.com\/members\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/615\/revisions\/616"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.scotthyoung.com\/members\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=615"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.scotthyoung.com\/members\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=615"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.scotthyoung.com\/members\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=615"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}