Rain or shine, we're out here walking our dog—turns out that helps with memory! A recent NY Times article reports that daily walks, even as short as 10 minutes, can give your memory a boost. Read the article, and Cathy's musings, here.
Read MoreFighting Palace Fatigue with Interleaved Practice
Interleaved practice is great for keeping things interesting and making sure you can do a quick mental jump to the relevant locus. Research has shown that training this way can improve learners' problem solving abilities.
Read MoreHow to Use Memory Palaces to Learn Chinese: Handling Characters & Homonyms
I've been focusing on spoken Chinese, but I've gotten some questions about character memorization. Here's how I'd approach characters with the help of memory palaces.
Read MoreWhy I Never Erase Old Memory Palaces
You might consider making an active effort to erase "ghost images"--images on loci you want to reuse. I never actively clean palaces, whether for memory sports or learning projects. Here's why.
Read MoreHow to Use Memory Palaces to Learn Equations: An Updated Guide
In the case of equations, true understanding should be achievable, so memory techniques should generally take a backseat. That said, I do use memory techniques for specific pieces of equations I find difficult to remember. Here's how.
Read More3 Reasons Why You Should Be Using Memory Palaces (and Not Only Standalone Images)
Standalone mnemonics are also a relatively simpler yet still effective way for, say, an absolute beginner to pick up new foreign language vocab. When it comes to carefully learning structured material, however, I’ve found there to be three main arguments in favor of palaces.
Read MoreHow to Use Memory Palaces to Learn Chinese: Putting the System into Practice [Video]
In this video, I walk through a memory palace-based learning session, focusing on examples and the different tools I use. This one builds on my earlier two blogs describing the system. Here's how to make tricky tones and endings really stick. (26:02)
Read MoreHow to Use Memory Palaces to Learn Pharmacology: Tetracyclines [Video]
In this video, I discuss my memory palace-based mnemonics for learning high-yield facts about the antibiotic class tetracyclines, as taken from the medical student review book First Aid. Here's how to make pharm really stick. (18:09)
Read MoreWhy You Shouldn't Stress Over Visual Clarity
Here's a question I've gotten a lot recently, in some form or another: How clear should my visualizations be? The visuals themselves aren't that important. Here's why.
Read MoreHow to Use Memory Palaces (& Memrise) to Learn SAT English Vocab [Video]
In this video, I discuss how I use memory palaces—with a little help from Memrise—to learn English vocabulary. Here's how to make SAT vocab really stick. (21:38)
Read MoreHow to Use Memory Palaces to Learn Chinese: Part 2
In Part 2, I discuss the memory palace-based Chinese system in more detail—complete with examples, tweaks I made to Serge’s approach, and issues I faced. I'm over a year in and still loving it.
Read MoreWhy You Should Learn Memory Techniques, No Matter Who You Are
Back to basics for this week's Question of the Week: What are applications of memory techniques? Why should I learn to use them?
Read MoreMy Home for Spaced Repetition: What My Anki Setup Looks Like
My Anki is broken into three parent decks: Medicine, Languages, and Memory Sports, each with a few subdecks (e.g. Pathology, Chinese). Here's what my day-to-day home for spaced repetition looks like.
Read MoreWhy Double-Encoding Is a Double-Edged Sword
I often run into scenarios in which the same piece of information pops up in different contexts. Here's why encoding info multiple times might not be the great idea it seems.
Read MoreDo Memory Palaces Hinder Learning? Our Top 3 Don't-Miss Tips
If you're someone struggling to apply memory palaces, look no further. Here I discuss my top 3 realizations about memory techniques as they pertain to learning—the ones that took my approach from frustratingly ineffective to invaluable.
Read MoreHow to Memorize All 44 Presidents in 15 Minutes (and Remember Them a Week Later) [Video]
In this video, Alex walks you through a special memory palace to help you remember all 44 U.S. presidents. 15 minutes + a few reviews = never forget another president! (16:22)
Read MoreHow to Keep a Clean Memory Palace: What to Do When You've Got Too Many Arms & Legs
Memory palaces getting congested? Using lots of people, so your palaces are full of arms, legs, blood, and urine tanks? Here's what to do.
Read MoreHow to Learn the Branches of the Trigeminal Nerve with a Memory Palace
The Trigeminal Nerve: a beast of a nerve if there ever was one. It no doubt gives most medical students headaches. Luckily, memory palaces work really well for this type of thing. Here's how to do it.
Read MoreLearning Chinese with Memory Techniques: Part 1
Here’s a quick intro to a project I’m really excited about: learning Chinese. I’ve been giving it a go for about 3 months now. Here are some strategies, thoughts, and struggles.
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