This blog is about the process of memorizing definitions. It is about taking a long, hard look at how people learn and how we can improve our study techniques to learn more efficiently, so that we spend less time, less energy, and less money.
Trying to memorize definitions, when studying, can be a daunting task. This blog is here to help you through that process. I am a student who spent many years in school trying to memorize definitions while studying. I took notes and made flash cards just like everyone else did and I found it was hard work and felt very inefficient. My goal here is not to make you feel bad about yourself if you are doing things the way everyone else does, but rather to provide some challenge to your current methods in order to get the most out of your study time.
This blog will not just tell you what to do but it will also give you reasons why it works better than other methods. This way you can make an informed decision as to whether or not this method is for you or not. As well as give tips on how to implement these techniques into your daily life as efficiently as possible.
The following are some of the topics that will be covered in this blog:
How does this work?
A helpful way to remember definitions is to associate them with something that you already know. That’s not always easy, since a definition is a kind of label for something you don’t yet know very well. The trick is to find ways of making the new definition mingle more naturally with what you already do know.
How do you use this trick, when studying? Well, if you’re learning the definition of a key word in your field, think about the words around it, in the sentence where it occurs. What else do those words have in common? Is there a pattern? If so, what is it? This will give you an idea of what the definition might be trying to express, and help you to memorize it.
Introduction to the art science museum
At the art science museum, you will find a vast collection of interesting and funny terms that are used when studying. These terms are known as “definitions”, which is what they mean. When you study using flashcards, you will memorize these definitions by using them as the cards’ content. For example, if a card has “metaphor” written on it, you would say: “A metaphor is…”. After some time, you will be able to remember the definitions without having to read the cards again.
Tutorials for the art science museum
The artscience museum is divided into several rooms, each with its own set of subjects and cards. A map of the museum is provided at the entrance hall (the main page). The rooms include: biology room, chemistry room, literature room and physics room. You can find explanations about how to use each room in their respective pages.
*How to use this page – Click on a subject’s name or icon to find out more about it in another page.
All tutorials are written by FlashCardExpert staff.*
When you are studying in a classroom setting, you will be given the definitions to memorize. In some classes, you will be given the definitions to memorize by your professor, and in other classes, you will be given a textbook. When this happens, it is important to know how to properly study for the class and how to retain what you have learned.
TIP
The main thing to do is to associate the definition with some other, simpler definition. The simplest associations are opposites. In the case of “art,” you might remember that it is not “science.” If you’re having trouble remembering a word, try associating it with another word that you do know how to remember.
I also like to associate definitions with people’s names. This seems to work best if they have names that are somehow related to the words they define. For example, I’m going to remember the word “cognition” by associating it with Alex Cognition, and “transcribe” with my wife Lisa Transcribe, because cognition means thinking and transcribing means writing. The words in parentheses are there just so you don’t think I’m making this up.
But there are lots of other ways of making associations. You can use numbers (1 = in, 2 = out), or colors (red = stop, green = go), or pictures (an apple = apple pie). Some associations will be easier for you than others; that’s all right. You’ll get better at this as you go on.
You can use a similar technique when trying to memorize lists of information, such as “The 10 Commandments
If you’re trying to memorize a list of words, it often helps to learn their definitions. If I want to memorize the word “ephemeral,” for example, it’s easier if I not only learn that it means “lasting a day” but also learn why: because an ephemeron is an insect that lives just a day.
To remember the definition of “ephemeral,” there are several ways you can go: you can make up a story with the word in it (“The ephemeron was crawling through the grass…”), you can use mnemonic acronyms or other tricks involving the first letters of each word (“EVAN is ‘even a new ant'”), or you can associate the word with something else that’s already memorable. These methods aren’t always equally effective, and they all require some work on your part.
The last method, associating a word with something memorable, has an advantage in that it takes no effort on your part beyond learning the association once. If you want to remember that “ephemeral” means “lasting one day,” for example, then all you have to do is think about how long an ephemeron lasts.
The information-rich environment of the Internet is at odds with the way we actually learn. It is a powerful tool to support the process of learning, but if we are not careful it can distract us from that process and keep us from achieving our goals.
The ideal way to learn is to study hard enough to understand the material, and then do practice problems until you can do them all correctly. The problem with this approach is that it takes a lot of time, especially for difficult material.
A more efficient approach is to read the material once, look away, and then practice problems until you can do them all correctly. This reduces the amount of time required to learn something by a factor of two or three.
And yet this approach also has its drawbacks. You may recognize some words without knowing what they mean. You may be tempted by easier questions rather than harder ones. And you may be distracted by all the other topics on the Internet that you could be learning instead.
