The twenty-eighth book that I’ve finished reading this year is Brown, Roediger III and McDaniel’s memory book “make it stick: The Science of Successful Learning”. Reading through this book took me back to my first year in university, where I learnt the various memory techniques that I will share below.

In contrast to common belief, rereading and massed practice are rather low-efficiency study methods compared to strategies that incur higher feelings of difficulty, such as testing yourself (a type of retrieval practice) and elaborating what you’ve learnt to someone else without a textbook to fall back on, ideally spaced across longer time periods (e.g. weekly). These desirable difficulties help to strengthen our neural pathways (which in essence is similar to a memory palace), making future retrieval easier, though this is a long-term process compared to short-term cramming and may take a while to show positive results. Students often feel unconfident using retrieval practice as they feel that they’ve lost their footing in the subject, though many research studies cited by the authors (who are renowned psychology professors themselves) suggest the usefulness of these desirable difficulties. Furthermore, although rereading materials brings a secure feeling of understanding, these are often illusory and disappear quickly when scaffolding resources are removed. Therefore, the most beneficial methods are often those that require higher efforts and involve greater setbacks as they allow learners to grow from their mistakes and reflect on how to move forward.

One common problem that many learners may experience is the difficulty of planning a clear study schedule that caters for spaced learning and revisits to priorly learnt material; there is simply not enough time to fit everything in. In these cases, the ability to prioritise the most important information above less relevant ones are crucial; this is also a skill that comes with multiple trials and errors, though it is necessary to undergo such difficulties in order to develop higher order skills. Having the courage to step out of one’s comfort zone is the first step.

Reflecting on the strategies I’ve employed in the classroom, it is definitely worthwhile to keep the weekly cumulative quizzes that enable students to retrieve prior learning, and continue designing reflection sheets for students to contemplate on their performance after each major assignment and track their own progress. In the future, other plenary methods may include free recall, writing summary sheets and learning paragraphs to bolster memory connections, though applying these to language based subjects may require further adaptation compared to applications in knowledge based subjects.

All in all, this is a great book for students, teachers and lifelong learners. I would especially recommend it to students who are interested in studying psychology as many prominent studies are?mentioned, along with strategies to evaluate and?pick them apart. Most importantly, it provides a brief idea about how to think like a psychologist; best to get a taste before plunging into this ?enigmatic?discipline!