I am attempting to remember 1st level divisions of every country/ sovereign state. I have just started snaking around Africa from Egypt and Algeria has been the first challenge with 69 wilayah. I do the districts/ provinces alphabetically. My method is as follows:
Adrar - A dinosaur roaring
Aflou - the dinosaur turns into an eagle and flies away
Ain Defla - A sniper aims at the eagle and the eagle dodges deftly.
So on and so fourth.
I guess this is a mixture of link and story method (?) Anyway, i have memorized all 69 but i am lost if i miss any when trying to recall. Is there an easier way of doing this before i get to far along? How could I make the connections stronger? Is it just through spaced retrieval/ repetition or are there any techniques that would make this task Im attempting easier then what i am already doing? I was thinking that these could be memorized in a way that I can easily scan through my recall pattern to find where i made a mistake? Thanks in advance!
Use the location of the district within Algeria. This can help you eliminate most possibilities if you’re trying to recall, as you can think of general spatial location. You can try using the order north-south, west to east instead of alphabetically to strengthen connections, as having a different order forces you to know the districts more intensely.
Use the shape of each district. Do any of them look like particular animals? objects? You can then link your imagined shapes to the already-built stories you have.
Assign relationships between two or more districts. Do two of them share a long boundary? You can then memorize them together.
Chunk into groups of ~10 to 15. For instance, you could have a cluster near the capital Algiers, a cluster in the south in the Sahara, and so on.
If you want to test yourself with recall, print out a blank map of Algeria with districts, and try to write in the name for each of them. To make it harder, start from nothing and draw the map of Algeria and the districts, then write the name. These are very tough challenges but will get you to where you want to be.
For geography I find it useful to use the map itself as a memory palace.
I like this method: Visualizing World Countries Map - #5 by Antelex - start with the biggest country (or province or whatever subdivision) then second largest and go clockwise… I had to tweak it a bit for my needs but the basic principle still stands.