How We Memorize

Shortly before we began homeschooling all our children, I was inspired to add memorization to our day. A thought came into my mind about my grandmother's house and the artwork on her walls. I remember many things that hung throughout the house, and many of the words found there are etched on my brain. I realized that though I had learned those words as a young child, they still stuck with me as an adult. In fact, they would come to my tongue at interesting times. In the kitchen hung...

Too many cooks may spoil the broth in some kitchens, but not mine. I like help.

My mother has the next one memorized as well, at least that's another memory etched in my mind...

My mother says she doesn't care

About the color of my hair

Or if my eyes are blue or brown

Or if my nose turns up or down

It doesn't really matter....

That one keeps going, but you get the idea. I thought of all the words that could fill my children's minds as they learned to navigate life. What words did I want to fill their heads?

Taylor Swift's latest hit...

Popular movie quotes...

Junie B. Jones vernacular...
(thanks, time spent at public school...no Junie B. at this house!)

Scriptures

Church hymns

Quotes by good, honest people from history

I am sure you can guess which list I chose. Oh yes, we still know things from that first list, but there is rarely a day that something from that second list doesn't pop up in conversation. So that is how we dove right into memorization, and if you know my children, you know they are pretty serious about it!

How to memorize:

I heard about the Charlotte Mason Memorization Box method so I looked it up. Basically, you use a index card box and set up dividers for today, odd and even days, days of the week, and days of the month. Now write the first thing you want to memorize on an index card. Practice it daily until you know it, then move it to either odd or even.  Start a new card in the daily spot. After you memorize something else you continue moving your cards back so that first card goes to even, then makes its way through the days of the week, then finally ends up in a day of the month. Today was Tuesday May 10th so we practiced our daily card, our even card, our Tuesday card, and all the cards behind 10. I keep extra cards for future memorization in the very back, and the thing to memorize next in front. I love how organized this method is!

I've discovered that we can easily learn something new by repeating it in threes.  I will have the children listen to the new card we are memorizing while reading it.  Then we listen to it three times, and try to say any words we remember.  The next day we do it three times again.  By the third day, we've been able to remember a good portion of it, and by the fourth day we've usually got it down.  You'll know you've finally memorized it when it is stuck in your head all day, especially if it's put to music.

We start our day with family scripture study and memorization box on Mom's and Dad's bed.  We used to keep the memorization box at the kitchen table but everyone wanted to eat so we weren't very good at reciting.  Doing it in the morning has become a good routine for us.

Some things we memorize:

• Scripture Mastery - important scriptures that 9th-12th graders will learn in Seminary, a religious class offered by our church. These are already printed on cards to download! We memorize these to music, then my youngest sings them at the top of her lungs while playing outside. (This is now referred to as Doctrinal Mastery.) (The link to music no longer contains the songs we used, but it does have some cute songs there. I can no longer find the ones we used, they were by the Sons of Ammon. All I can find is a few videos of them. I know there is an app available but I'm not sure if it's the right songs.. it's on iOS and we're Android.)
• Quotes from prophets and apostles
• Mottoes and similar phrases like the Scout Promise, Young Women Theme, etc.
• Phone numbers, address, and anything else important for the youngest ones to know
• The Living Christ - We memorized this as a family and I was pretty amazed that the kids did it!  They begged to do the next one as soon as we finished.
• The Family Proclamation -This one was harder to do but we did it!
• (You can find bloggers who have made those last two easy to memorize by creating printables that break them down into sentences and phrases.)
• Poetry - Linguistic Development through Poetry Memorization (Here's our review of this), and poetry we've picked up from various places (school lessons, church, General Conference.)
• Historical documents like the Gettysburg Address, the introduction to the Declaration of Independence, etc.

I love this collection from American Heritage School.  I'll be printing some items off to add to our box when we need more to memorize. (That link doesn't work anymore. They printed two books and sold them for a short period of time from that material. If it becomes available again I'll correct the link.)

Memorization is worth every minute!

Memorization takes very little time each day, but it does take some brain power to want to do it. It is worth it though. It's so wonderful to listen to talks at church or General Conference* and have your children turn to look at you with wide eyes as they mouth the scripture or quote the speaker is reciting. It's especially exciting when your 3 or 4 year old does it too, or quotes things she's memorized in her daily conversations with you. Not to mention the benefits to a growing brain, the increased vocabulary, and the mental stimulation, all of which I'll touch a little more on in another memorization post next week.

* A religious meeting broadcast twice a year; anyone can attend, watch, or listen to hear revelations given to the living prophet and apostles that pertain to all people.