@docraymund, I have been a teacher and have developed around 35 semester-based or intensive week-long courses with lesson plans, lectures, and exercises. I thought doing some memory exercises for some friends would be fun. I was wrong. It was possibly the most difficult task I have done. Computer programming books (
O’Reilly) and all the textbooks that I’ve used in my colleges and my trade school are well organized and often all it took was finding the right book. Mnemonic books are not in textbook style. They are more like a large FAQ. There are no modern books that I’ve found take the approach of a textbook for classroom training. (I plan on changing that.)
I ended doing a grueling systematic analysis just so I could write a lesson plan and exercises. The curriculum extended to about ten modules but I was able to completely write out the first two. Then I offered the modules to anyone who wanted to take them through me free here on the forum
I would like to add a few steps to the course design and development process that @metivier started. I agree that you need a large project to master to understand the system. I picked the Bible and after five years I think it’s doing well. I might release the fully rewritten New Testament in visual mnemonic terms eventually.
It is follows the similar style that Jerry Lucas, co-author with Harry Lorayne of the The Memory Book, developed in his Remember the Word, but made it extremely difficult by ignoring some cardinal mnemonic principles. I also added stories to reinforce the system and simplify his mostly bizarre imagery. He rewrote the Gospels but I’m a little the way through John and will keep going I hope.
The three steps I would add for course design and development are that after you understand the system, you have to be an outside observer who assumes nothing and listen and watch your brain for the process as you walk through the progression of the material. You have to be the student and the teacher at the same time. Then you have to document that process that you heard with clear structured technical writing.
Also, you have to illustrate your process with examples and exercises that show each step of the way, sometimes in multiple ways so that the student doesn’t get the idea that there’s only one way to do it. The process of exercises is
- Show them a fully completed exercise (a walk-through) from start to finish if possible as an example to use if they get stuck. My computer students copied my code as I wrote it.
- Give them a very simple exercise to complete in multiple ways for one concept. I walked the classroom to help stuck students or correct mistakes.
- Expand the exercise to include more concepts, repeating the basic concepts.
- Build on the exercises to finally get to where it becomes of practical use.
- Offer more difficult exercises for those students who become bored doing the simpler exercises.
The end result of the beta exercises after many months was that I took several high-quality students through the first module until they ran out of steam. (I do require my students to work and I’m sure it was more than they expected.) I was very pleased with the results they gave and the feedback I got. They would have gotten an A grade if this were a real college. I’d offer you the lesson plan but it would be useless since it’s dependent on all the analysis of the material from my perspective with SEA-IT and psychological concepts. You can find the outline in the linked post above.
Finally, you must get some teacher experience under your belt first before you think about developing a course so that you know what works and doesn’t work. Offer yourself as an understudy to a polished instructor first and don’t go it alone. The college system uses teaching assistants to learn the trade. My technical school had aspiring instructors to sit one class for two to three times with an experienced instructor before attempting to teach it. Even then they sometimes co-taught it with that instructor taking over half the modules. They were not allowed to vary from that instructor’s material. For the first time, and the second if they requested, they always soloed while the experienced instructor watched, took notes, and gave feedback after every day of training.
I hope you got some insight to the process that it takes to get up to speed for teaching others. In my school, we were able to ramp up new instructors after three to four months and I think they matured after about one year. Good luck to you!
Doug