Although there are many so-called Memory Technique Courses, but learning a language can not depended merely on memory, knowing the meaning in your language doesn't mean you have learn that word. Now we talk about the advantages and disadvantages of the approach we usually used:
1 The Method of Homo-phonic - Words are linked with similar sound, such as: French word "Digne"mean "Worth", which sound like English word "Dinner", memorize "This dinner is worth having", it is easy bare in mind. The problem is that when you want to master a language, generely speaking, you have to recognize about 5,000 words, learn five thousand homonym, even which easy to remember, in terms of quantity alone can made you sick. With this method, the effect is limited, at most, you can achieve the primary level only.
2. The Method of Chaining - Some words are spelling quite similar, such as the French word "Chômage" means "Unemployment", "Dommage" means "Miserable", "Fromage" means "Cheese", all of them are ending with "mage", we can chained them into a sentence "(Unemployment) is (miserable), no (cheese) to eat." If you want to further simplify them, you can use the Method of Compressed Chaining. German word "Dicht" means ""Thick", "Gicht" means "Gout", "Nicht" mean "No" , "Sicht " means "Vision," "Licht" means "Light" ,and "Wicht" means "Dwarf ", all have the same ending "icht", T for Thick, G for Gout, N for No, V for Vision, L for Light, D for Dwarf, when combined became "ToGather N(and) V(we) buy LD(Laser Disc)." How to chain is up to you, just use your imagination. The method is easy to use, but there are a prerequisite, within all of the chained words at least on of them you are familiar with already, linking what you know to what you don't know, otherwise it would have no effect. Only those who are with certain level can be benefit from this method.
3. The Method of Root - It is known by many people that European languages are derived from Latin and Greek, for example, "Education", verb "Educate", come from Latin "educatus," combined by "ex"(means out ) and "ducere"(means drawing or pull), that means pull out the original potential. By the source of word "Ducere" we have "Produce", "Reduce", "Conduct", "Abduct" , "Introduce", we can say that almost no need to memorize, to understand is just enough. However, with the progression of history, the development of the etymology is quite complicated, both the Latin or Greek have a lot of vocabulary, to bear them in mind is quite a tough task, guessing the meaning according to the source of words would usually making mistake.
4. The Method of Background - In term of learning a language, this method is the most effective. The most general and most clumsy way, is to recite word by word, such as: "Souris"(French) is "Mouse", "Souris" is "Mouse", ....... this is useless, within a moment it will be forgotten. You should recite the whole sentence: "Chat attraper souris"(Cat catch mouse)", "Elephant peur des souris."(Elephant scare of mouse) etc. Whenever you forget what "Souris" is, think about what is the cat catching and you will know it immediately. But, at least you already known what means"Chat", "Attraper", "Elephant" and "Peur", otherwise this method is useless for you. In other words, this method is also the most difficult one.
All of the mentioned four methods have their pros and cons, how to choose? Well, I must mention a scientific theory called "Quantitative Change cause Qualitative Change".
Cold water becomes hot, is quantitative, the quantity of temperature; heated to a certain extent, it becomes steam, is qualitative. Aspect of mastering of vocabulary is also similar. Quantity refers to the language level, quality, indicate the suitable learning methods. In other words, learning method are varying according to the level of proficiency. For your convenience, they are roughly divided into five stages: 1 Elementary, 2 Primary, 3 Intermediate, 4.Higher, 5. Advance. The following are respective suitable methods:
1. Elementary - When you have totally no background in a language, it is the best to use the Method of Homo-phonic to remember the first one hundred words, how to choose? Very simple, one hundred basic verbs, in a usual reference books can be found. About the reason of choosing verbs, in my essay "Strategies for Language-learning", within the item:"1. Familiar with Verbs at the beginning " I have already explained in detail, no need to repeat it here. Please look up it yourselves. Only memorize 100 words is not demanding at all. Review the same material every day, continue in a week, then review once a week within a month, after a month or two review it once, then which will become your long-term memory.
Prepare a notebook, in each page write only one word you want to learn.
2. Primary - When you can memorize one hundred basic verbs, you can use the Method of Chaining to memorize more words. With the notebook mentioned above to supplement the words you want to chain up. For example, the English word "come" can link up with "Coma ", "comb", "combat", and so on. Using "Mind-Map" to link them up.
There are seven type of Chaining:
i. Words with same Beginning - As mention above, "come", "coma", "comb", "combat" are begin with "com", they can chained together to made a sentence, as describe at the beginning of this article.
ii. Words with same Ending - Needless to say, they have the same spelling at there end, for example, "Dear", "Bear", "Hear", "Near", "Gear", "Fear ", "Tear"etc, are end with "ear".
iii. Words with same Cover - Namely, covered by same alphabet, for example, "Geld", "Gild", "Goad","Gold", "Good", "Grid", both are covered by G and D.
iv. Words with same Internal - "Good", "Boot", "Foot", "Pool", "Noon", "Cool", "Door", "Hoof ", "Look", "Mood", "Roof", "Soon", "Took", "Wood". The middle of the above words are included with OO.
v. Words with same Consonant - Consonant of "Computer" is c, p and t, words with same consonants are "Capital". In addition, words like "Picnic", "Peanut", "Panel", "Penal ", "Pineal", "Poniard", "Punnet" also have same consonant.
vi. Words with same Vowels - "Market" has vowels of AR and ET, with the same vowels we got "Target", "Garnet". "Favour" and "Labour" are also words of same vowels.
vii. Words with same Components - That mean these words are combine by same alphabets. "Cat" and "Act", "Dog" and "God" composed of same alphabets. "Polo", "Pool", "Loop" are also.By the seven types of chaining mentioned above, you are able to draw a Mind Map yourselves, a word can be linked up with a lot of other words, and the words which had linked can further linking up with other words also, like this, each page can be connected dozens of words.
3. Intermediate - When you have already memorized a few hundred words with the method of chaining, if you continue to link more words into sentences, even you use the method of compressed chaining, the load of memory would be overwhelmed your brain, your progress will thus slow down, so you need to switch to other methods.
When reading ability is still far from satisfactory, at this stage, you should not use the background method, at this moment you are batter use the method of root.
As the word "education" which mentioned earlier, the root "ducere" can develop a lot of other words, it is helpful for digesting many vocabulary, no need to made an effort to recite. However, in English, for example, some roots are extending only to a word or two, they are not so helpful. Moreover, some words are come from the names of someone, such as "Narcissus", "Sandwich", "Boycott", which has there origin stories, if you are not studying history, to bare in mind such a lot stories is quite a suffering.
Do not forget that many European languages are the system of Indo-european, that meas besides they are come from Latin and Greek, there are from Sanskrit also, included further the source of Angle and Saxon dialect, as well as Gaulish and various Germanic language, we can say that the etymological development is quite complicated, let alone just Latin can be divided into two systems as nobles and civil. Therefore, in the method of root we only select the most important roots, the rest of them are batter ignored.
Besides memorize the whole sentences, as far as possible, learn more idiom or proverb. Assuming a foreigner are learning Chinese, the daily used words such as "work", "food", "busy" would be quite familiar, but some words such as "badger", "ostrich" would not be used once in a year, even having learned, it will be forgotten in a short period. In term of mastering a language, you have to acquaintance with vocabulary of astronomy, geography, birds, insects, fish, flowers and trees etc, unless which are too specialized.
However, there are ｢一丘之貉｣(Badgers of the same mound) in Chinese idiom, means "A tarred with the same brush" or "Cut from the same cloth" in English. Whenever you see two people or behavior with very similar style, this saying can be applied, you would found that everywhere there are opportunity to applying this, a day may have a several chance to apply. ｢鴕鳥政策｣(Ostrich policy) also, or even we have done it ourselves. When you know "Badgers of the same mound", "Badger" no longer be a strange word for you, once talking about the "Ostrich Policy", the word "Ostrich" never be forget. Such saying as ｢肝膽相照｣(Liver and gallbladder facing each other), ｢肺腑之言｣(The talk from the lungs and bowels), ｢肚滿腸肥｣(Full bally and fat intestinal) are worthwhile to recite.
5. Advanced - Memorizing word by word would have poor effect, therefor we recite the whole sentence, it is the elementary method of background. By the same token, if there are too many sentences to recite, efficiency will decline, applying the same principle, we grouping sentences into a whole article, it is a further step, called further method of background.
German word "Begegnen" can be translated as "Encounter", if merely repeated:Begegnen is encounter, even with hundred times, the effect is very little, because the word "Begegnen" has no clue enables for you to remember. If you have read an impressive essay there is Begegnen in it, when you read that article several times, every time you meet the word Begegnen, you will associate with that essay, even you by chance forget the meaning, you will remind yourself of the topic of that essay and the position which you found that word, which give you a hint to trace you memory. A word can remind you of the whole article, likewise, an article may remind you the words which contained. In other words, a memory of a word can activate the impression of a lot of other words. This is a sort of "Hologram" of thinking.
Someone who longing for love will be impressed by an essay about "Begegnen" of lover, religious people would impressed by an essay about "Begegnen" of spirit or angles, ambitious guy will be impressed by an essay about "Begegnen" of business opportunity.
Only find the content you are interested and familiar with, otherwise having the problem as follow:
i. Do not attract you, you do not have the impulse to read it frequently,
ii. Difficult to concentrate when you read it,
iii. You got on feeling after you have read it, when no feeling there would be no memory.
Select the things that suit you, repeat a few times, regularly review, the words they used will naturally form your long-term memory. Attention, don't recite word by word, sentence by sentence, whenever finish the reading recall the content, what the message is, what did you feel. Moreover, from time to time recall that feeling.
Remember, the memory of the feeling is the most profound. Instead, something of knowledge and information is easy to forget. According to this reason, people good at studying history have a Strong feeling in historical events, there emotions are affected. Things that have an effect on you emotion will make you remember.
In such a manner, memorize a thousands of words is no longer a tough task. Then you are ready to conquer the next language now.
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