<em>This week our ‘Memory Man’ James Paterson, psychology teacher at independent school LVS Ascot, looks at a powerful memory technique and gives an example of how it can be used in a geography revision context.</em> <em>This week our ‘Memory Man’ James Paterson, psychology teacher at independent school LVS Ascot, looks at a powerful memory technique and gives an example of how it can be used in a geography revision context.</em> Last week we looked at the story method, remembering lists of words and facts by simply creating a story between each item.

Whilst this is useful, overusing it could lead to confusion. One way to get around this is by using the oldest and most powerful memory technique which is known as the memory palace technique (or location method).

The idea with this is that you think of a route around a place that you know well, for example, walking around your own home. At each point (or location) you imagine an interaction between the fact you wish to remember and the location itself. We teach this technique to students and it was instrumental in one LVS Ascot pupil reaching the final of the UK Schools Memory Championship Final last year.

For example, in geography, if you wanted to learn the names of the top 10 countries in order of population size (China, India, USA, Indonesia, Brazil, Pakistan, Nigeria, Bangladesh, Russia and Japan) you would imagine yourself at the front door of your home and create a visual link between the first location and the first fact.

In this case, you may imagine a china plate being smashed on your door. This will help you to remember China in the first position. Then, you move into the hallway and imagine a big pot of curry on the floor of the hall (India). Move into the living room and see the Statue of Liberty on the sofa (USA).

Remember your own associations are far more memorable than I could suggest to you. You may be more likely to use an image of an American footballer or an astronaut to represent USA. For that reason, I suggest you give your own imagination a workout now by looking at the 10 countries in the list and imagine such a journey around your own home, creating your own associations. Once you have finished, all that you need to do to recall all of the facts is imagine yourself at the start of your journey and mentally retrace your steps, picking up the facts as you go.

The strength with this technique is that if you want to use it again, all you need to do is use a new set of locations.

If you practise using the memory palace technique, you will be able to assign whole buildings to whole subjects. The ability to recall all of the information quickly and easily becomes a very motivational revision technique.