Does anyone else use nonsense mnemonic techniques?

I think Mnemonic techniques are very effective, but I don’t have time to make a lot of them so I don’t always put a lot of effort into mine. For example the word triturar in spanish has the sound “treat” in it, so I think of treats getting crushed in a bowl. But others I’m more lazy on like the word “Capullo” which means “Cocoon” I think of the words “cap” and “poop” so I just think of a peice of poop with a cap on it inside a cocoon. I mean they don’t make sense half the time, sometimes I just lay the image of what the sound of the word reminds me of with the meaning I want it to convey, and it always works pretty well. It seems there is always a part of the word that sounds a little familiar to me. Just whatever comes first to my mind. I just think it helps somehow to identify with the sounds better and find that place in my brain that connects them to meaning then replace it with what I want it to mean.

I did this for about a month when I was first learning German and was using Anki as my main vocabulary learning device. I found it great for helping me get through the flashcards but I don’t know to what extent it helped me actually learning the words in the way that I want. Probably it was useful. In the end, I gave up because I was too lazy to do it.

I’m currently using it to help learn kanji and it has been very effective.

But for individual words? I don’t bother. It takes too much time and I find that I’m muddying the waters with too much English in my mind, if you know what I mean.

It is hard, but over time it becomes a habit.

Mnemonics are not effective for the long term.

Some links to studies:
http://bit.ly/1EgiGMZ
http://bit.ly/1xoM9Sg

Perhaps just give LingQ a try?

Your username makes me hungry.

I don’t use mnemonics. Unless you have a picture or something to learn basic vocabulary, then go for it. With all due respect, I feel like with your method, I would spend even more brain calories trying to remember the mnemonic just to remember the word.

Rhetorical question, do you use mnemonics for English vocabulary?

The only time I remember using mnemonics, was asking my Russian friend where the rum was. He said холодильник which means fridge. For some odd reason, I couldn’t get that out of my head so I never forgot what the Russian word for fridge was.

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I think it is more helpful to spend time watching vocabulary videos on YouTube where Spanish speakers will say the word while displaying an image that that fits the word.

I have found it helpful - provided I can spontaneously come up with an association. Most recent example - I had a problem learinng the Turkish word for foot - “ayak”. I had repeated the word at least a dozen times, and it just didn’t stick. Then I had a flash of inspiration - I saw my “ayak” in the “kayak” - canoe, and then the word “stuck” in the very best sense. I “looked” at my foot in the bottom of the kayak, and I “owned” a new word in Turkish :slight_smile:

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