Learning Norwegian through Mnemonics and Visual Imagery (Part I of II)

Interacting Images
Beginning language learners, of course, often haven't had time to build up a repertoire of these interactions. Another way to build these associations is to learn vocabulary by pairing words with images. This can be done by labeling objects in a house, by drawing pictures of activities and matching these with activity words, or by simply mentally labeling these activities as you perform them yourself. Another interesting way to keep your vocabulary straight is to design ways of writing words that correspond to their meaning. The word elefant, for instance, could be written so that the "F" looks like a raised elephant trunk. These kinds of strategies can be mixed and matched in a variety of ways.

Geographic Locations
An alternative to these methods is that of geographic pairing and organization. In this strategy, you create a mental walking path through a series of people, objects or actions. Imagine, for instance, that you are at a banquet, seated at the same table with nine other people. By mentally walking around the table, you are able to remember that the person seated to the left of you is a lawyer, followed by a doctor, a nurse, a student, a taxi driver, and so on. An experiment done by Ross and Lawrence (1968) showed that this type of method allowed college students to memorize up to 40 items on a shopping list after seeing the list only once.

PART II OF II (WITH REFERENCES) WILL APPEAR NEXT WEEK

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