You may face situations where at some point, you think you know the answer to a question in an assessment but are unable to recall it at the moment. Even after continuous brainstorming, you feel like it is going to take forever.
Studying and memorising the curriculum becomes challenging if an individual doesn’t utilise an approach towards it. And no matter their effort, they still struggle to memorize things at a specific time. While it is somehow normal to forget the items you have gone through before, it is also imperative to find ways to sort these things out at the earliest. In this case it is important to create your personal knowledge management system.
For those who want to fill their mind with tidbits, here are the ten most effective study hacks to improve your memory – proven by science.
Imparting Knowledge to People
Teaching others and delivering the learned concepts is highly effective in improving memory. But before you can teach someone, you should have a complete understanding of the subject to instill adequate knowledge and clear their doubts. When you learn by yourself, you can believe in understanding the concepts by overlooking the materials. It will also help you in the exams as you already have the mastery of the concepts, which will reflect in your writing without difficulty.
Read Out Loud: Unusual but Useful
According to research, reading your study materials loud boosts your memory, retaining the power to a large extent.
Research says the mind is prone to bizarre and strange things and can remember them instantaneously. So, when you utter the lessons loudly, it stores them in your memory and produces them when needed. So reading out loud is way better than reading silently. However, you shouldn’t go all out for this, especially in the libraries, and make a list of important information that you need to memorize and read out loud.
Memorize by Breaking into Parts
Think of a pizza. You can’t eat it without slicing it. Similarly, the mind prefers working with an adaptable unit of information to process them effectively. So when you learn your study materials over time and break that into smaller units, it becomes easy to learn effectively and recall the information with ease.
Write it Down or Make Notes
Yes, you heard it right; in this century, where everything is digitized, revolutionary technologies are at your fingertips, going physical and writing notes sounds unusual. But it helps in committing information to memory. The paper and pen way of writing is a great way to adopt information and memorize the key concepts. It may not be faster than taking notes on your laptop, but it is way more effective.
Visual Aids & Mind Mapping
Diagrams, colors, and visual arts are better than the texts to memorize. So when you study through graphic formats, it becomes easy for you to grasp the contents. Moreover, it becomes relatively easier for your brain as well to connect visually with the information.
The diagrams and visuals become more comfortable to store in your brain and retrieve as and when required. You can use mind mapping to memorize things, primarily a useful tool or a graphical way to represent various concepts. It helps in better understanding, analyzing, and structuring multiple information.
It is more likely a makeover of note-taking, where the structured information looks like your brain’s actual function, so it becomes easier to remember things. Mind mapping is beneficial for the science and history subjects where you can place the items visualizing the timeline or diagrams.
Paying Attention is the Key
Attention is one of the most integral elements of memory, as it is highly essential while the information gets transferred from short-term memory to long-term memory. You have to be on all ears and stay away from the destructive elements for having a better memory.
Music Sets the Background
If you think listening to music while studying is distracting, then you need to think again. Soothing and good background music improves mood while learning. It also enhances your focus and minimizes the stress and burden. In addition to that, a piece of good music offers much-needed relaxation while taking notes and memorizing the concepts.
Aromatherapy, the Good Practice
Without a doubt, the sense of smell is the most potent among all the senses in the human body as it is directly associated with the brain. To be more precise, we can say the receptors inside the nose make a perfect communication with the parts of your brain that stores memory. So, aromatherapy or even scents can enhance your memory power and make you more focused and attentive.
You can use peppermint to boost your alertness and concentration. Besides, this can enhance the preciseness in your memory. On the other hand, cedarwood promotes your brain patterns and decreases inattentiveness. Moreover, inhaling aromatic elements can provide you with cognitive benefits such as mental clarity and vigilance.
Study Breaks at Fixed Intervals
You may feel this is normal, but most of the students don’t adhere to it. Remember, your brain is one of the most delicate organs, and you need to take extra care of it. When you take regular intervals during the study, it processes the previous information and gets ready to incur new information. Following this, you can refresh your brain and grasp the complexities of the subject effortlessly.
8 Hours of Sleep is a Must
Sleep is essential if you want to memorize your lessons and portray that in your exams. Burning those night oils will lead to health risks, nothing else. You need to go for adequate sleep so that your mind becomes free from ambiguity and boosts your cognitive performance. According to a study, you can lose the ability to learn and memorize new information by 40% without sufficient sleep.
Moreover, when you provide the necessary rest to your body, your brain goes back to the memory house and sorts recent memories based on the necessity. For this reason, you should curtain your daily activities and hit bed on time.
Wrapping Up
A general assumption of some people is that humans only use 10% of their entire brain. In contrast, others believe that a significant portion of the brain stays active throughout the day. Despite all the advancements in technologies, there are still countless possibilities that are yet to be discovered about human memory.
For many students, it is a challenging task to memorize the things considering the workload and assignments. Of course, there are various resources available online where one can easily find assignment help. Meanwhile, we hope that the above points will prove useful. In case we missed something, do share it in the comment section below.
