10 Strategies to Enhance Students' Memory

By: Glenda Thorne

The memory demands for school-age children are much greater than they are for adults. As adults, we have already acquired much of the knowledge and skills we need to function day to day. Although the knowledge base for some fields such as technology changes rapidly, the new information is generally highly specific and builds on existing knowledge. On the other hand, school children are constantly bombarded with new knowledge in multiple topic areas in which they may or may not be interested. Additionally, they are expected to both learn and demonstrate the mastery of this knowledge on a weekly basis. Thus, an effective and efficient memory is critical for school success.

Many students have memory problems. Students who have deficits in registering information in short-term memory often have difficulty remembering instructions or directions they have just been given, what was just said during conversations and class lectures and discussions, and what they just read. Students who have difficulty with working memory often forget what they are doing while doing it.

For example, they may understand the three-step direction they were just given, but forget the second and third steps while carrying out the first step. If they are trying to solve a math problem that has several steps, they might forget the steps while trying to solve the problem. When they are reading a paragraph, they may forget what was at the beginning of the paragraph by the time they get to the end of the paragraph. These students will look like they have difficulty with reading comprehension. In facts, they do; but the comprehension problem is due to a failure of the memory system rather than the language system.

Students who have deficits in the storage and retrieval of information from long-term memory may study for tests, but not be able to recall the information they studied when taking the tests. They frequently have difficulty recalling specific factual information such as dates or rules of grammar. They have a poor memory of material they earlier in the school year or last year. They may also be unable to answer specific questions asked of them in class even when their parents and/or teachers think they really know the information.

The following ten general strategies are offered to help students develop a more efficient and effective memory.

1. Give directions in multiple formats

Students benefit from being given directions in both visual and verbal formats. In addition, their understanding and memorizing of instructions could be checked by encouraging them to repeat the directions given and explain the meaning of these directions. Examples of what needs to be done are also often helpful for enhancing memory of directions.

2. Teach students to over-learn material

Students should be taught the necessity of "over-learning" new information. Often they practice only until they are able to perform one error-free repetition of the material. However, several error-free repetitions are needed to solidify the information.

3. Teach students to use visual images and other memory strategies

Another memory strategy that makes use of a cue is one called word substitution. The substitute word system can be used for information that is hard to visualize, for example, for the word occipital or parietal. These words can be converted into words that sound familiar that can be visualized. The word occipital can be converted to exhibit hall (because it sounds like exhibit hall). The student can then make a visual image of walking into an art museum and seeing a big painting of a brain with big bulging eyes (occipital is the region of the brain that controls vision). With this system, the vocabulary word the student is trying to remember actually becomes the cue for the visual image that then cues the definition of the word.

4. Give teacher-prepared handouts prior to class lectures

Class lectures and series of oral directions should be reinforced by teacher-prepared handouts. The handouts for class lectures could consist of a brief outline or a partially completed graphic organizer that the student would complete during the lecture. Having this information both enables students to identify the salient information that is given during the lectures and to correctly organize the information in their notes. Both of these activities enhance memory of the information as well. The use of Post-Its to jot information down on is helpful for remembering directions.

5. Teach students to be active readers

To enhance short-term memory registration and/or working memory when reading, students should underline, highlight, or jot key words down in the margin when reading chapters. They can then go back and read what is underlined, highlighted, or written in the margins. To consolidate this information in long-term memory, they can make outlines or use graphic organizers. Research has shown that the use of graphic organizers increases academic achievement for all students.

6. Write down steps in math problems

Students who have a weakness in working memory should not rely on mental computations when solving math problems. For example, if they are performing long division problems, they should write down every step including carrying numbers. When solving word problems, they should always have a scratch piece of paper handy and write down the steps in their calculations. This will help prevent them from losing their place and forgetting what they are doing.

7. Provide retrieval practice for students

Research has shown that long-term memory is enhanced when students engage in retrieval practice. Taking a test is a retrieval practice, i.e., the act of recalling information that has been studied from long-term memory. Thus, it can be very helpful for students to take practice tests. When teachers are reviewing information prior to tests and exams, they could ask the students questions or have the students make up questions for everyone to answer rather than just retelling students the to-be-learned information. Also, if students are required or encouraged to make up their own tests and take them, it will give their parents and/or teachers information about whether they know the most important information or are instead focused on details that are less important.

8. Help students develop cues when storing information

According to the memory research, information is easier retrieved when it is stored using a cue and that cue should be present at the time the information is being retrieved. For example, the acronym HOMES can be used to represent the names of the Great Lakes — Huron, Ontario, Michigan, Erie and Superior. The acronym is a cue that is used when the information is being learned, and recalling the cue when taking a test will help the student recall the information.

9. Prime the memory prior to teaching/learning

Cues that prepare students for the task to be presented are helpful. This is often referred to as priming the memory. For instance, when a reading comprehension task is given, students will get an idea of what is expected by discussing the vocabulary and the overall topic beforehand. This will allow them to focus on the salient information and engage in more effective depth of processing. Advance organizers also serve this purpose. For older students, Clif Notes for pieces of literature are often helpful aids for priming the memory.

10. Review material before going to sleep

It should be helpful for students to review material right before going to sleep at night. Research has shown that information studied this way is better remembered. Any other task that is performed after reviewing and prior to sleeping (such as getting a snack, brushing teeth, listening to music) interferes with consolidation of information in memory.

What Is Word Retrieval?

Click here to download the PDF word retrieval worksheet for these strategies!

Word retrieval means a person’s ability to think of the right word when he/she needs it, such as during conversation. We all have those moments when we can’t think of the right word, in that instant, we’re having a word retrieval problem. Some children have a wonderful vocabulary but in conversational speech they have trouble coming up with the right word. This may cause them to have unnecessary pauses, use filler words like “um” and “like”, or use non-specific words like “that thing” or “that stuff”. Here are some activities that you can do with your child that will improve his word retreival and ability to come up with the right word when he needs it.

Word Retrieval Activity One: Fill in the Blank Associations

Have your child fill in the blank with common phrases and sentences. This will teach your child to use other words in the sentence or phrase to trigger the word he wants to get to. Here are some examples of fill in the blank associations you can use with your child. Try these while you’re riding in the car or waiting in line somewhere.

• A pair of _____
• Peanut butter and ______
• Close the _______
• The elephants live in the _____
• Head, shoulders, knees, and ______

Click here to download the PDF word retrieval worksheet for these strategies!

Word Retrieval Activity 2: Rapid Naming from Categories

Have your child list as many things as possible from a certain category. For example, have your child list as many foods as he can or as many clothes. You could write down how many he thought of each time so he can see the progress he makes as he does this activity more and more.

Word Retrieval Activity 3: Providing a Word from a Definition

Define a word for your child and see if he can guess what it is. For example, you could say “it’s a red fruit that is juice and sweet and sometimes comes in green and yellow” and see how long or how many cues it takes for your child to guess apple. You can switch this around and have your child define a word for you as well.

Word Retrieval Activity 4: List Things Needed to Complete a Task

Tell your child the name of a task and ask her to tell you all of the things she would need to complete that task. For example, if the task is swimming, your child could say “goggles, swimsuit, floaties, innertube, pool toys, towel”.

Word Retrieval Activity 5: Finish Similes

A simile is when you say that something is ____ as a _____. Provide the descriptive word for your child and have him finish the simile. For example, you could say “sticky as a ____” and your child might fill in “peanut butter sandwich”.

Word Retrieval Activity 6: Antonyms and Synonyms

Tell your child a word and have her come up with one synonym (a word that means the same thing) and one antonym (a word that means the opposite).

Click here to download the PDF word retrieval worksheet for these strategies!

Doing all of these tasks on a regular basis will improve your child’s word retrieval and ability to recall words when he needs them. Many of these exercises can be found the Linguisystems HELP-2 Handbook for Language Processing.

Where to Find More Info:

This guide, along with 38 others, is included in Ms. Carrie’s E-Book: Speech and Language Therapy Guide: Step-By-Step Speech Therapy Activities to Teach Speech and Language Skills At Home or In Therapy. This guide includes detailed information on teaching various speech and language skills, including this one, along with worksheets, handouts, sample IEP goals, data collection, and video demonstrations. You can also Click here to download the PDF word retrieval worksheet for these strategies!

Auditory Memory Strategies

Written by Helen Coleman

Memory is a complex thing and has been the subject of lots of research. We all find some types of information easier to remember than others. Some people are great at remembering faces, others seem to have an almost inexhaustible capacity to remember dates. I’m sure most people reading this can identify things they find quite easy to remember and other things they really struggle with. For example, I am quite good at remembering what I have done, but dreadful at remembering trivia facts or directions.

There are many different kinds of memory – for example, auditory memory (remembering what you hear), visual memory (remembering what you see) and kinaesthetic memory (remembering what you experience – tastes, smells etc). There is also often a difference between short-term memory (recalling something for a few seconds), working memory (remembering something long enough to process and use it) and long-term memory. No wonder we are all different in the way our memories work!

So what strategies can help with auditory memory? Here are some ideas:-

• Repetition – this is the strategy I described above for remembering a postcode. Repeating something over and over again helps us to remember it. This may seem obvious, but children often need to be specifically taught to do this. Demonstrate the strategy to them by repeating things aloud yourself. For example, I often play games with small children where they have to remember a list of 2 or 3 items to “buy” from a pretend shop or put in a particular location. I usually introduce repetition by getting them to take a turn at asking the questions – most kids love playing teacher, so this usually goes down well. So the child might say to me, “buy bread, cheese and carrots”. I pause for a moment, and say “bread… cheese… carrots….bread…cheese… carrots…” then say each word again as I pick the items up. Occasionally I will then get it wrong, and see if they can identify that I have made a mistake. We talk about how repeating it helped me to remember, and I suggest that they try it. Once they have mastered repeating aloud, they can then start to repeat things mentally rather than aloud.
• Visualising – variations of this strategy are often used by people who remember hugely long sequences, such as the sequence of an entire pack of cards. They often attach a mental picture to each card and then visualise each one, maybe along a particular path or in a story, to help them recall the order. Of course, this is quite abstract, and we are not going to start off at this level with young children, but the fact that so many memory masters use it shows that it is a powerful strategy. I often start off by encouraging children to picture objects in their mind as I say them. For example, I might ask them to find 3 things from around the room and as I say them, ask them to think about where each thing is and where they need to go to get them (make sure they are things that the child knows the location of well and their memory isn’t going to be disrupted by having to hunt for the objects!).
• Chunking – give instructions a few at a time and pause between them to give the child time to process and recall them.
• Write or draw – encourage older children to write things down to help them to remember them. They may find it difficult to identify what they need to write down so will need adult support to begin with. In lessons, it can be useful to give the child a sheet with the most important points already written down so that they can recall them and refer back to them.
• Use colour and mind maps. Mind mapping is a great strategy for word-finding and story-telling as well as memory. A topic for more detail another day maybe, but in the mean time I do recommend this book
  • if you think this would be a helpful strategy for your child or a child you work with. Mind maps help you to note down information, identify what is important, sort it into topics and remember it. Many people find them useful for enabling to recall lots of facts more easily (such as for an exam).

Auditory Memory: In one ear and out of the other?