Here are some key factors for improving your overall capacity to remember new terms and expressions!
1. Interest
In order to improve your ability to recognize and memorize new words and expressions you need to be interested in and passionate about what you are doing. Cultivating an interest in a particular field and constantly reminding yourself why you are doing it provides an incredible boost in your learning process. Emotions enhance memory
2. Attention
Concentration and attention are key factors in the learning process. In the Internet era, concentration is diminished due to multitasking. So, avoid distractions such as music radio, tv or social media and you will focus on the task at hand.
3. Comprehension
We only learn what we can understand. Whenever you fully understand a sentence or a concept, you also understand its single parts and the connections among them. If a language learner understands a given sentence, he will remember the words better.
4. Association
Our brain is a huge network of neurons: So, if we want to make the best of learning processes we should adapt them to the way our brain is structured. One of the most effective tools for doing this is association is linking new information with old information, which is stored in our long-term memory. For example, associate words with the same root: you learn a new word: ‘useful’ so you can associate it to a word that you already knew ‘use’.
5. Visualization
One of these ways is through images. Our brain also processes information via colors, forms, etc. If you link a given word with an image, that word will be more likely to be linked with other information already stored in our memory. As a result, we will remember it better.
6. Consolidation
Take the time to process and store information. One of the best and simplest ways to do this is simply to review what you have learned at regular intervals. Repeating something makes your brain realize that it might need that information and it helps you to fix that information in a much more effective way.
7. Context
It is important to always learn words in their context which helps your brain to form images, associate the word to other words. Search the new word in contexts, you will also find collocation, so you will use in the correct way.
8. Multiple contexts
Reading makes us connect the dots. When we read a lot, we enormously raise the possibility of finding the same word in different contexts, which enormously reinforces our capacity to retain it.
9. Dynamic
Learning a language is a skill that we acquire. A dynamic learning process is preferable to a static “study” of the language. Search online games or create flash cards to learn your new vocabulary.
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