MTJ: My Journey to Memorize 10,000 Words in 3 Months

Memory Training Journals
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First of all, a little disclaimer: I am not a native English speaker, so to make this text more grammatically correct, I used ChatGPT to revise it.

Inspired by my countryman who was able to memorize 15,000 words of the German language, I’ll try to achieve a similar feat, but with the Latin language. My goal is to memorize around 10,000 words. Last week, I tried to replicate the method our colleague detailed in his post, but for me, it didn’t work very well: I’m really bad at encoding abstract words into images and then placing them in a memory palace. Also, while I think that memory palaces and journeys are wonderful tools for memorizing things in order, for me, the order of the vocabulary is not important — it would be if my goal were to memorize a dictionary, for example. However, since the Latin vocabulary book I own has words grouped by common roots (derived and compound words), I’ll use the memory palace for those cases. My main method will be the linking method, trying to associate the Latin word with its meaning in Portuguese (which is my native language).

I started last week, trying to memorize 100 words per day, but I became demotivated due to the difficulty of memorizing abstract words and words that didn’t trigger any connection with my native language or past experiences. I was spending more time trying to create associations for individual words than actually memorizing them.

But, as they say: it’s in difficult times that we become more creative (do they say that?). Nonetheless, I decided to come up with a PAO System to memorize letters and a method I call the “Morpheme System”, in which each fixed morpheme (like prefixes and suffixes) is associated with an image. So, my goal is to be able to recall both my PAO system and my Morpheme System with a certain level of ease, and then be capable of memorizing approximately 10,000 words in 3 months.

I’ll try to update this weekly, documenting my progress as well as the problems and solutions that I encounter throughout the week!

Wish me luck!

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Do you speak spanish? How many fue you ve learnt by now?

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No, I don’t speak Spanish. My mother tongue is Brazilian Portuguese, and English is my second language.

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Ah es muy parecido al español si querés podemos hablar acá yo algo de portugués entiendo. Así que vos le pones una imagen para mostrar el final de la palabra? Y como sería? Como scotland usas una imagen y para scotish usas dos?

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Exato! Scot-land e scot-ish usa a mesma raiz “scot”, com sufixos “-land” e “-ish”, o que eu faço é associar cada um com uma imagem, por exemplo: -land se torna uma lanterna, porque é próximo sonoramente", -ish lembra-me “enxada”. Qual o benefício disso? Bem, se eu mudar o radical para “Eng-”, o sufixo -land vai estar fixado (England) e eu já vou ter uma imagem pronta para essa porção da palavra, agora só preciso me preocupar em memorizar a outra parte “Eng-”. O mesmo equivale para “English”. Quando eu não conseguir realizar nenhuma associação rapidamente, eu vou utilizar o PAO para gerar uma imagem. Por exemplo, para "Eng-" seria “Edward hackeando uma lasanha” e agora associo a ela a imagem da lanterna.

Outra coisa, como a raiz “scot-” é usada tanto para a primeira palavra quanto para a segunda, eu não preciso criar outra imagem. Se a imagem que usasse para essa raiz fosse “Scooby descobrindo os braços mecânicos do Otto Octopus”, eu usaria a mesma tanto para “scotland” como para “scotish”:
“Scooby descobriu os braços mecânicos do Otto montado em cima de uma lanterna-monstruosa”; e
“Scooby descobriu os braços mecânicos do Otto enquanto arava o campo com uma enxada”.
É claro, eu tornaria essas imagens mais bizarras e memoráveis, além de associar com o significado. Eu posso imaginar o Scooby vestido como um escocês, por exemplo.

Since the explanation above is important, I’ll translate it into english so everyone can understand it.

Exactly! Scot-land and Scot-ish use the same root, “scot,” with suffixes like “-land” and “-ish.” What I do is associate each of these suffixes with an image. For example, -land becomes a flashlight because it sounds similar to lanterna (the Portuguese word for flashlight), while -ish reminds me of enxada (a hoe). What’s the benefit of doing this? Well, if I change the root to something like Eng-, the suffix -land is still present in the word (England), so I already have an image ready for that part. Now I only need to focus on memorizing the other part, “Eng-.” The same goes for English. When I can’t quickly come up with an association for a root, I use the PAO (Person-Action-Object) system to generate one. For example, “Eng-” could be Edward hacking into a lasagna—and now I can attach the flashlight image to that.

Another thing, since the root “scot-” is used both for the first word and the second, I don’t need to create another image. If the image I used for this root was “Scooby discovering Otto Octopus’s mechanical arms,” I would use the same one for both “Scotland” and “Scottish”:
“Scooby discovered Otto’s mechanical arms while riding a monstrous flashlight” and
“Scooby discovered Otto’s mechanical arms while plowing the field with a hoe.”
Of course, I would make these images more bizarre and memorable, and also associate them with the meaning. I could imagine Scooby dressed as a Scotsman, for example.

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Hola gracias. Yo sienpre me pregunte como usar el método Pao para cosas que no sean números. Es ingenioso. Pero se me hace complicado. Después lo voy a leer bien a ver si me sirve. Y esas cosas las pones en el Palacio de la memoria o usas otro método?

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De nada!

Para falar a verdade, também me pareceu algo muito dispendioso de se fazer. Mas na verdade é só prática: o pessoal utiliza o PAO para memorizar baralhos em segundos,então é questão de praticar intensamente todos os dias. Quanto àquilo que chamo de “Sistema de Morfemas” a parte difícil é encontrar todos os prefixos e sufixos da língua que você quer aprender, depois disso é só associar cada morfema a uma imagem, tal qual o método PEG.
Pretendo treinar estes dois sistemas o máximo que conseguir até a próxima sexta-feira, no sábado quero começar a memorizar as palavra utilizando eles (mas obviamente vou manter o treino deles, mas dedicando um tempo menor).

Não, não coloco em Palácios de Memória. O que eu faço é imaginar um local para o significado, imagine que eu quisesse decorar ager, que significa campo em latim, eu simplesmente pego a imagem que eu criei para palavra ager e a coloco em um campo e tento sentir a brisa, o cheiro da relva, etc. Depois, jogo a palavra no anki e fico revisando.

Eu testei este sistema (PAO + Morfemas) em algumas palavras latinas e funcionou maravilhosamente bem, agora é treinar para ficar “fluente” neles.

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Es interesante el método. Por acá estaban diciendo de usar imágenes con ia. Todavía no puedo lograr que la ia haga lo que le diga pero ayuda mucho para crear imágenes con muchas cosas. Yo dibujo y funciona bastante.
Podrías usar tu método para memorizar frases fáciles también o partes de poemas o canciones q sin fáciles.

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Pensei em fazer isso, mas demoraria demais. Como eu quero memorizar cerca de 100-150 palavras por dia, e não tenho muito tempo, ficaria muito demorado. Mas realmente é uma boa, principalmente se a imagem que você tá imaginando for muito complexa.

Sim,sim. Especialmente se combina com a jornada e palácio de memória. Ajuda até memorizar dicionários mais facilmente.

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Update #1: The PAO System, Morpheme Technique and my overall perfomance

So, during these last days I've been training the PAO system, since the Morpheme Method will be less demanding, I'll be starting it only tomorrow.

For the PAO, the first thing that I did was to make some physical flashcards and use a stopwatch to see how I was performing. After some days, I’ve had the idea of using some artificial intelligence to create a little website where I could train the recall of PAO, and I’ve been using it since then.

When I started training the recall, I was taking more or less 60 seconds for the whole alphabet, focusing only on person, action, or object per session. Today, I was able to recall all persons associated with each letter in 15s, this was my record (this really motivated me, because I know if I become faster at this, I’ll spend less and less time in encoding the words). The recall of the actions and objects for each letter is, on average, 25-30s, and I intend to achieve an average of 15s for both.

On June first, I will start memorizing the words. From tomorrow until Sunday,my focus will be getting “fluency” in my Morpheme Technique. I also intend to continue to train the PAO and Morph daily, together with the sessions focusing on memorizing vocabulary.

Below is an image of my performance for now.

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OBS: Sorry for the grammar mistakes; English is not my mother tongue.