go for a memory walk

Now we are going to re-establish the contacts with the Greeks and Romans (page 75). The memorizing technique that was ˜invented by Simonides, which was described by Cicero, is called the ˜Loci method after the Latin word locus which means ˜locality or ˜place = ˜a method built on the use of places .

Think of a place or an environment you are very familiar with “ it could be your home, your workplace, the daily stroll to the newsagent or whatever. Choose ten objects in this place and write them down, each with a number from 1 to 10. What you have done now is to construct the logical part in this specific

memorizing technique. You now have a list that corresponds to the ten rhyming words in the technique we tried previously. It is these ten places/objects you will now use to associate with the words you are to remember. Make your images ridiculous, exaggerated, vivid , moving, humorous , etc and it will work.

Before you start the exercise below, read through your list again and make sure you have clear mental pictures of all the objects in your list.

exercise

Take the words from your own list and associate them one by one and in turn with the words in the list below. Make up your own mental pictures in your head, not by writing them down.

You have two minutes to do the exercise and when you are ready, turn the book round and write down as many words as you remember.

1 soap	6 feather
2 sugar	7 letter
3 cake	8 snake
4 ruler	9 glue
5 video film	10 politician