tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Sat Jun 20 18:18:43 1998
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mnemonics (was Re: jabbI'ID cha')
ja' Qov:
>Three things:
>1. I have to remember two things: the mnemonic and the word, instead
>of just the word, and sometimes I get the mnemonic mixed up, if I use
>one. Remebering a mnemonic and its word is a two step process, so
>slower. I do use mnemonics, but as a last resort, after I can't cram
>the thing into my brain any other way.
jIQochbe'. It has always seemed odd to me when someone devises a
convoluted phrase as a way to remember a simple list like the order
of planets in the Solar system or the resistor color code. Mnemonics
work fine for me when I'm trying to remember something short-term,
but for a language, it makes little sense to do it the long way around.
And the problem with misremembering the mnemonic is a big one. If I
don't take the effort to learn the fact in the first place, I'm not all
that likely to remember the mnemonic *and* its link to the fact. There
was an article in HolQeD that suggested some ways to remember things,
involving reindeer and a pot of gold, but I don't have a clue what they
were supposed to represent. :-)
I do use them on occasion, but like Qov, only when I've managed to fail
at getting something down after a lot of effort. Ironically, the one I
have used most often is the image of a mother elephant for {qaw}.
>2. I find it simply irritating to have another mental image appear
>along with the word, every single time I hear or use it. I learned my
>words with flash cards, and keep them up with ter'eS's program. The
>flash cards were hand cut with scissors and my vocabulary is still
>haunted with the images of bent corners, and crooked edged forever
>associated with the words. I'd go nuts if they had charghwI"s
>hooligans in there, too.
I learned most of the vocabulary just by reading the word lists in TKD.
Thus, I forever have some of the words' position on the page in my head.
And there are a few odd associations, like {Dej} and {mongDech}, which
have nothing at all to do with each other except that they are adjacent
in the English-ordered list.
One image that keeps intruding on me is the goose from Charlotte's Web,
saying "tee double-ee double-are double-are double-eye double-eff
double-eye double-see see see" whenever I have to spell "terrific".
And my fourth-grade teacher's voice is indelibly etched in my brain, in
the form of a mnemonic that the class was taught when half of us managed
to misspell the word "separate".
>3. Sometimes a mnemonic that associates a word with a vaguely related
>meaning can skew the meaning of the word towars the mnemonic in your
>head. Like if you remember "tardy" means late because you could be
>late by being stuck in tar, you might start thinking that tardy
>applied only to lateness owing to something unforseen that held you
>up, and not for another reason.
That's a danger I had never considered. majQa'.
>The mnemonics I *really* do not recommend are the ones where you
>remember that something is the opposite as you'd expect, because as
>you learn the language better, suddenly it becomes *as* you'd expect
>and your mnemonic messes you up instead of helps you. This is from my
>experience.
Many beginning Klingon students "learn" that Klingon word order is the
opposite of English order, and have to unlearn it later. I'm sure some
of us have been confused on occasion by the odd separation of colors in
the Klingon words {Doq} and {SuD}, because we first learned that it was
weird and then kept thinking of them as weird even after learning them
correctly.
>I also find that learning the first twenty to a hundred words of a
>language is a real struggle, but then suddenly the words seem more
>normal and they fit in my brain better.
Vocabulary has never really been a problem for me, but I've also never
really concentrated on it. I started out by reading entire sentences,
not trying to learn individual words. The vocabulary kind of came by
itself -- which also means that the words I know best are the ones used
most by the people who were posting in Klingon when I arrived here a
few years ago.
>If you learn better with mnemonics, then use them, especially if, like
>SuStel, you can forget them, after learning the word. Definitely try
>studying in different envronments wih different techniques and see what
>works for you.
I know what works for me, and I keep forgetting that not everyone can do
it the same way I do. I also keep forgetting that not everyone already
knows how they learn best. Qov has been one of the greatest Beginners'
Grammarians because she does try to find out each beginner's needs and
tries to tailor her help to them.
-- ghunchu'wI'