How to Improve Children Memory Power? Some Simple Techniques

Memory retention is a complicated process. Improving memory is also a lengthy act, where you may need to use several methods in combination to enhance working memory. One simple technique is improving different senses in your children and refine the learning enhancement techniques to induce memory retention. Intelligence in children is a manifestation of different senses like touch, sensory, sight, visual, verbal and auditory. Processing these senses will help your children develop better memory.

To perform better in the classroom, children may need to develop their short-term memory. Another important memory is the working memory that helps children in storing, indexing, organizing and manipulating information on a temporary basis. It is just like the random access memory in a computer that accesses the memory right on the spot. Short-term memory is an absolute necessity, because the brain can store information in the memory chest for immediate and short-term retrieval. The information retrieved in such a manner will help the children remember lessons and write their tests in an effective manner.

Hence, it is very critical to enhance and improve short-term memory in children. More often, experts around the world use the basic technique of integrated mnemonics, where sensory information derived from abilities like color, shades, sounds, tastes, touch, language and emotions, diction, reading and imagination play an important role. The main goal is to infuse or instill the best of all these senses into the children's brain, so that information and knowledge generated could be stored for immediate and long-term retrieval. Another approach is to connect all these senses together, so that triggering one will result in triggering other senses, which eventually result in better memory power.

Here are some simple techniques that help you to train your children for better memory power.

Using acronyms could help your children remember information in an easy manner. There are several types of acronym games in the world. Acronyms might lead to the formation of words and syllables. When your children create a word by using a game board, he or she will be able remember them for immediate retrieval.

Rhymes, songs, melodies and rhythms are the best sources of verbal exercises. Your children could use thoughtful toys and playthings to learn or they can use their voice to train their brains to remember information. Rhymes and songs should go along with related and accompanying visuals because they impart moving or stationary images to consolidate the memory retention process.

Games are the best tools to enhance memory power in children. Story telling could be used as a form of game to induce better memory retention. Children will be able to remember important points of the story in memory and later recall it very quickly. Young children in their early classroom should be asked to recite a story everyday to help them develop memory power. Stories are very good tools because children create images of events and personalities in their brain. It is very easy for them to recall such images later when needed by them.

Stories are very good play tools too! Story telling works in two different ways - one is by enhancing short-term memory power and the other is by improving long-term memory. When children repeat the story many times, they will be driving home the most important parts of the story (both self-created images and text) in their brain as long-term memory. Story telling is also an efficient method to enhance working memory. Story telling could also be a group event. When there is a close interaction among different participants, children tend to contribute in a better way. The close teamwork will result in better memory retention processes.

Here are some more tips to enhance short, long and working memory in your children:

Note: These simple tips will help children view their working brain as it develops the memory power. In other words, it becomes easy to control the activities of the brain as children learn techniques of memory enhancement and retention.

Stress and pressure could impede flow of information to the sensitive areas of the brain. In fact, several brain intake systems work in combination to carry information into the reactive zone of the brain. When there is a pressure on the brain, the resulting action of the brain will be flight or freezing of information flow to the thinking or conscious parts of the brain where long-term memory is created. Dr. Judy Willis proposed this monumental theory of memory in her child brain research experiments. She recommends enjoyable and entertaining daily rituals like singing, playing card games and tossing the balls or introducing surprises like playing with a fun picture before the real study time so that study experience becomes smoother and relaxed.

Children like something that grabs their attention. Memorable events could help children develop long-term memories. Ask your children to visualize how their next session of class will be. Hang posters that advertise the next lesson. This will heighten the level of curiosity in your children. Curious minds will open their sensory uptake filters to absorb more bits of information.

The sensory filter of brain allows a very tiny part of the information that is made available by the nature. These filters will control the type of data that goes inside. However, any information or data on color and its shade gets access into the brain very easily. Introducing colors and shades in children's early age will help them develop better memory power.

The brain is an efficient organ. It retains details and information in its short-term memory area for less than 30 seconds unless it relates them with an already stored knowledge pool. To develop memory, you should help your children to activate prior knowledge and details by reminding their previous learning or experiences.

The brain is a puzzle and pattern-seeking organ that creates a storehouse of information based on the information available. When your children create connecting patterns between new and old knowledge stored within the memory sectors of the brain, then its power to retain and enhance memory power becomes two or threefold. Making charts and comparing them, mnemonics and playing with games that works on analogies will help create patterns among old and new information stored within the cerebral cortex of the brain.

Better memory means better classroom performances. Children who are adept in the art of memory development and retention could easily outclass their peers in scholastic and academic domains.

Helping Students Remember, Includes CD-ROM: Exercises and Strategies to Strengthen Memory
By Milton J. Dehn, Ed.D

A practical workbook designed to assist students whose academic learning is suffering due to a memory deficit or ineffective utilization of their memory capabilities, Helping Students Remember provides numerous strategies and methods to strengthen memory, including chunking, organization, keyword, self-testing, pegword, loci, and mnemonics.

Drawing on the author's extensive training and experience, this useful resource presents effective techniques and lessons on:

How memory works
Memorization methods
Goals for improving memory
Repetition
Using cards to build memory
Grouping words by category
Study skills that help memory
Using arithmetic to build memory
Using music to remember
Improving recall during tests
Creating and using review sheets
Picturing verbal information
Using context cues
Plans for using memory strategies

With an accompanying CD containing all of the worksheets and word lists for reproduction, Helping Students Remember is the first workbook of its kind for general psychologists, school psychologists, and special education teachers, offering practical, easy-to-implement, and evidence-based methods for working with children with memory impairments.