How to learn new words well exercises. Idioms and slang expressions

Memory is an important aspect of our life. With its help, we can keep in mind the information that we receive throughout life.

The data that our brain processes comes to us directly through our senses, is processed, filtered, and only then do we remember the necessary information.

You can memorize everything from the words of songs to a large amount of text.

Methods for memorizing text can be different: from simple memorization to using techniques that help you learn the text.

Psychologists distinguish the following types of memory:

visual;
motor;
auditory

Depending on which of these types is better developed in you, methods for memorizing texts are selected.

How to remember large text

It is impossible to say exactly how best to remember the text, since there are many of them, and they all have varying degrees complexities and types (scientific articles, poems and literary texts).

Also very important factor for memorization is the time of memorization.

OVOD methodology

Main thoughts;
Careful reading;
Review;
Finishing.

Now about this in more detail:

First, read the text, trying to highlight the main idea in it. At the same time, do not set yourself the goal of instantly remembering it all in its entirety. Analyze what you read, remembering only the main thing about it we're talking about. If possible, it is advisable to write down the main ideas. Then try to reproduce what you read.
At the next stage, read the text more carefully, pay attention to the little things and details. As you read, connect the text with its main idea, which you identified at the previous stage. There are many memorization techniques you can use here. At the end, repeat the details and main content of the text.
Then you should review the text. Start reading from the end, while analyzing how correctly and accurately you remember the details. You should also already have a rough outline of the text. Remember keywords using the association method.
At the very end, we repeat the memorized material, retelling it out loud to ourselves or our interlocutor. As you do this, highlight any details you missed. Try not to peek at the text.

Analyze the places where you made a mistake, try to remember them using an association with something.

On Vikium you can train your memory with special exercises

It is possible to memorize large texts by using different ways perception of information. It depends on the type of memory you have. One person can remember text simply by listening to it, while another uses visual perception for this.

Features of memorizing text in your native language

These memorization techniques are based on creating an image of what you are remembering. They can be divided into categories:

we write down what we learn;
graphic method;
dividing the text into parts;
constant reminder.

When memorizing texts from a large number terms or formulas, simply re-reading the material will not be enough. For this we use the recording method.

After reading the text, highlight the main points and terms. Then we write them down sequentially. In this case, you can draw an outline of the text and make a description based on it, highlighting the main quotes, theses and terminology.

If you do not have the opportunity to write down, then highlight the main points directly in the text, using a pencil or other highlighting methods.

A schematic representation of the main ideas of the text allows you to remember information much faster. To do this, you can use graphic diagrams, drawings, sketches and pictograms.

This method is effective in memorizing complex technical texts.

Methods for using pictograms to memorize large texts

We highlight key words and expressions.
Then we draw pictograms for each highlighted word, so-called pictures, which will allow you to remember it. These may be your associations with them, but the icons should not be too bulky. When drawing pictures, you cannot make inscriptions. Just draw what you associate with given word or expression.
Use the resulting icons to remember the text. The sequence of pictures should coincide with the main idea of the article.
Psychologists recommend memorizing large texts by dividing them into small parts. The material should be divided into no more than 7 parts, each of which should have a semantic connection.
Memorization should be concentrated on the middle part of the material, since the beginning of the texts generally contains little specific information, and the end is logically clear in the course of the main text.
If time for memorization allows, then you can use the technique of constant reminder. The text that needs to be remembered is divided into parts and printed on paper and placed in places where you constantly stay, for example on the refrigerator, in the bathroom or in smoking areas.

Specifics of memorizing text in English

The process of memorizing foreign texts is much more difficult and takes more time. In order to quickly memorize text in English, you can record it on an audio player and listen to it while doing normal things, while traveling on public transport.

At the same time, it is important not just to listen to the material, but also to think about, analyze and highlight important points. Also, the text will be remembered faster if you describe the plot using drawings and explanations to the text.

An important factor is the time of day when you memorize the material. The optimal time for memorization is four hours before falling asleep and four hours after waking up.

Memorizing texts without understanding their meaning is much more difficult and takes longer. Material in English should be retold in your own words, and not reproduced word for word. Try to memorize in parts, delve into the essence and draw parallels between the content and your life.

Developing memory

To be able to remember large number information we must train the brain. You must develop your ability to remember.

There are many memory exercises. You can choose which one suits you.

Every morning after you wake up, you can count from 100 to 0, and try to do it as quickly as possible. Try to exclude from your everyday life calculator. Count in your head when shopping in stores, do mathematical memory training. Perform different operations on numbers, this will give plasticity to your brain and increase your memory capacity.
The “60 names in 60 seconds” exercise will help you develop your memory perfectly. To do this, you should name every second a word, for example, 60 capitals of the world or the names of plants. At first you won’t succeed at this pace, but don’t despair, talk through it and remember. Every day you will do better. Train and after a week you will feel the results.
The most simple method Memory development is the simple memorization of texts. At first you should memorize small volumes, gradually moving to larger ones. The main thing is not to stop the learning process, but to do it systematically.
Study methods will improve the ability to memorize texts foreign words. During the first week you should memorize 10 words every day. You can teach them in pairs, writing down the words on a piece of paper where you indicate the word and its translation. Then you gradually increase the number of words per day, for example in the second week 20 words per day, in the third 30 words.

The main thing for quickly memorizing texts: constantly train your memory, try to perform non-standard tasks, for example, if you are right-handed, then brush your teeth with your left hand. This will allow your brain to develop new neural connections and make it more flexible to remember.

Words are remembered 10% better if, when memorizing, you shout them out or simply pronounce them loudly.

To simultaneously memorize two or more texts that are not related by topic, try to change the environment while memorizing them. Teach one material in the room, and the other outside or in another room. This will prevent the brain from mixing information.

After the material has been memorized, you should sleep as much as possible, which will allow you to remember the information much longer. It is often recommended to study texts before bed, which promotes better learning.

Play sports, it improves blood circulation in the brain and memory.

Tell me what you associate with the phrase “learn English.” What comes to mind first? What is the most difficult? What do you hate doing most? Of course, learn words. You probably remember how painfully you tried to learn irregular verbs At school, how did you cram new words, write them out in two columns, repeat them over and over again, and still forget them after a couple of weeks? Learning new words takes a lot of time and effort, besides, they are forgotten very quickly and sometimes it seems to us that it is simply impossible to remember them. In fact, it’s not all that scary if you learn the words correctly.

To quickly memorize words, use

Associations

When memorizing a new word, first translate it into your native language, and then mentally imagine the image of this word. For example, you need to learn the word bread. Most often, you will simply repeat bread - bread, bread - bread, bread - bread several times. I don’t argue - this will give its results, but it will be much more effective if you simply imagine a loaf of fresh, still warm bread and, holding this picture in your memory, repeat bread, bread, bread... It’s easier for the brain to remember the image itself than the word and use it when needed word or remember what it means, this image will pop up in your memory, and with it the English translation.

Pictures

Do you know how children are taught English? The teacher shows the picture to the child and says the word. This way the child remembers the image and the word. Of course, most often pictures are used to teach children, but for an adult starting to learn English, pictures can also be useful. Nowadays a huge number of picture dictionaries and color cards are sold. An object, an action, a color are drawn on a paper or cardboard card, and the word that denotes it is written.

Video “How to learn English words”

Cards

The most favorite method of our students, although you will have to spend time making cards. On a small card or piece of paper, a word is written in English on one side, and in Russian on the other. A hole is made in the cards and they are hung on a string. As soon as you have a free minute (for example, in transport, in a queue), take out your cards and start looking english words and remember the translation. If you don’t know the translation, look at the reverse side.

Tags on items

With the help of tags, it is easy to learn the names of everyday items that you have at home or at work (furniture, dishes, clothes). To all items possible, you attach pieces of paper with English translation words. For example, attach a TABLE sign to the table. Seeing this word several times a day, you involuntarily remember it. In addition, you remember an English word not as a translation of a native word, but immediately as an image-concept.

Remembering words in context

In order to better remember a word, it is useful to make sentences with it. For example, you learned a new word car. Now that you know that car is a machine, make up a few sentences using this word. I have a car. My car is new. In this way, you not only learn a new word, but also once again repeat the words you already know that make up the sentence, as well as the grammatical rules used in it.

Books and films

Reading books and watching movies will help expand vocabulary, for those who already have a certain vocabulary. So, choose a book that is interesting to you (if the book is not interesting to you, reading will not yield results). When reading a book, you don’t need to look up every new word in the dictionary. You can guess the meaning of most words from the context. Underline the rest with a pencil, and later write them down on cards. Watch movies with subtitles and write down new words.

Special programs

Nowadays there are a large number of computer programs on the Internet and mobile phone to memorize English words. You can create dictionaries or test your knowledge of words.

Language learning,

Educational process in IT

Vocabulary matters a lot. If you know the words, you understand what it’s about, even without knowing the intricacies of grammar. If you don’t know the words, you communicate like Ellochka the cannibal. Today we are talking about how to remember a lot and for a long time.

Conventional learning of words has low efficiency. For example, in 11 years school curriculum students remember on average 1-1.5 thousand words. To speak like a native speaker, you need to know at least 8 thousand words, Upper-Intermediate level assumes knowledge of 6 thousand words. To understand CNN news, which is created taking into account the interest of a foreign audience, you need to know at least 3 thousand words.

Using traditional methods, it is easy to learn up to 10 words in one go, but only a few can remember 30 or 50 new words in one day.

Everyone who teaches foreign language, face the following problems:

Words are quickly forgotten if they are not repeated;
- it is very difficult to learn many words at once;
- people simply don’t know how to learn words effectively;
- when a word enters short-term memory, a person stops working with it.

Why is this so?

German psychologist Hermann Ebbinghaus conducted research on “pure” memory - memorization that is not influenced by thinking processes. To do this, the scientist proposed a method of learning meaningless syllables consisting of two consonants and a vowel between them, which do not evoke any semantic associations.

During the experiments, it was found that after the first error-free repetition of a series of such syllables, forgetting occurs very quickly. Already within the first hour, up to 60% of all information received is forgotten; 10 hours after memorization, 35% of what was learned remains in memory. Then the process of forgetting goes much slower and after six days about 20% of the memory remains in memory. total number the number of syllables initially learned remains in memory a month later.

After a series of experiments, Ebbinghaus developed the Forgetting Curve (also called the Ebbinghaus Curve) in 1885. Based on this, the following conclusion was made: for effective memorization repetition of memorized material is necessary.

To remember information for a long time, after studying it, you need to repeat it at least five times:

20-30 minutes after the first study;
in a couple of hours;
the next day;
in 1-2 weeks;
2-3 months after the fourth repetition.

Using traditional methods (and repetition is one of them) it will not be easy to achieve a great effect. Effective methods are little known, so learning many words at once is very difficult.

Other traditional methods

- Learn with the help of a dictionary, in order
Boring and ineffective. The words start the same but have different meaning, so they are difficult to remember. Also, you don't know in what context the word is being used.

If you want to use a dictionary, it is more convenient to make a list of words on a specific topic, for example, select the category “Clothing” or “Travel”. Community related words easier to remember.

- Learn using sticker cards
On one side of the card we write the word in Russian, on the other - in English. You need to spend time making cards, but you can carry them with you and repeat the words whenever you have a free minute. If you don’t want to bother with paper, you can download a special application to your smartphone.

- Learn words in context
For example, when watching TV series or movies. For beginners, it’s better to start with TV series; you can watch them with subtitles. There is no need to memorize an unfamiliar word separately. Write down or copy an entire sentence from the subtitles at once. This way you will remember in what situations it can be used.

Method of associations or “Mnemonics”

The Mnemonics method is gaining popularity.
The main principle of this technique is to remember information by building visual connections between a word and its meaning.

Facts about mnemonics:

Scientists have found that the human brain is best at creating visual connections.
- The method appeared 2.5 thousand years ago. It was used by the ancient Greeks, including the famous thinker Socrates.
- Mnemonics gives quick results. Any person, if desired, can achieve a memorization speed of 100 words per hour or higher.

Why mnemonics?

- The visual lobes, which are most involved when using this technique, are the most powerful in the human brain, since they contain the most neurons.
- Any word in a person’s head has a meaning in the form of a specific picture. By building associations, neural connections arise; they can be compared to a wire connecting a word to a picture, for example, when we hear the word “dog,” we imagine a dog.
- Associations are the most shortcut access to any information. For example, you heard a familiar song, and you remember a situation in which you heard it before.
- This technique has shown really excellent results in practice - after a few training sessions you can remember 100-300 words per approach.

Algorithm

Step 1
Present a bright, concrete picture. Let's say you want to learn the word fist, you need to vividly imagine a clenched fist.

Step 2
Find an association with a similar sound to a Russian word. Fist in English fist. You can, for example, imagine a pistachio clenched in your fist. Absurd and funny associations are best remembered: the brighter the better. It is also worth creating your own associations, as they will be more vividly remembered.

Step 3
Combine the association with the picture. The picture depicting the word and the association picture must be visually connected. For example, remembering the word crown, you can imagine a crane lifting a crown. If the crane and the crown are simply next to each other in your imagination, there will be no effect; it is better to imagine that the crane is lifting the crown by the edge or on a rope. It is better to imagine a huge crown, since large objects are better remembered. You can also add a certain sound or music playing in the background, which you would associate with the crown.

Step 4
Repeat the memorized word out loud 4-5 times in English, raising your eyes slightly upward, as if looking at the bridge of your nose. Scientists have found that with this position of the eyes, the greatest number neurons. You need to keep your eyes open, if you remember with your eyes closed, then you will remember with your eyes closed.

Step 5
Repeat the words - at least after an hour or two, every other day and every month. High-quality associations are stored in memory for a month. If you do everything according to the algorithm with repetition, you will remember the words for years.

Common mistakes

- Trying to learn everything at once
Many people start studying intensively, wanting to learn English in a week or a month, and quickly give up. It is much more effective to allocate a little time, for example, half an hour, but every day. This way the brain will have time to process the information and will not be too big break so that the word is forgotten. At the same time, your memory will be in good shape, and there will be no overload.

- Learn right away difficult words that do not correspond to the level of language proficiency
If a word is difficult to even pronounce, there is no point in learning it. Beginners need to learn the most common words, this is about 400 words. More than half of them are verbs. Start easy and increase difficulty.

- Don't repeat what you've learned
Without repetition, new words are forgotten.

- Memorize without understanding the context
You won't be able to use new words if you don't know in what situations they are used.

- Learn incorrect pronunciation
You must first listen to the correct pronunciation, even if you know the reading rules well. A good site for listening is wooordhunt.ru.

- The more practice, the better.
Experience has shown that after 300 words learned, mistakes disappear, associations appear in the imagination very quickly and the ending of a word is well remembered, even if the association is consonant only with its beginning.
- It is important to learn quickly, without delaying.
For example, choose a thematic list, set a timer and read all the words in one minute.
- Increase the load gradually.
- Move from simple to more complex words.
Choose the simplest ones that are easiest to learn. Then take five minutes to learn them and rest for five minutes. Then learn more complex words from this list.
- Combine words into groups by topic and part of speech.
It is better to learn nouns first, then adjectives, then verbs.

And most importantly

Share your successes with friends to keep you motivated.
Reward your successes to get used to the fact that learning is good.
Develop memory in general, not only in English.
Practice the words you've learned in conversation clubs to finally consolidate the words in context.

By the way, we just have an excellent free section on the site. In it we tried to take into account all the components of successful memorization of words. You can choose from ready-made sets of words, as well as create your own. In addition, many more useful things await you: from videos and a blog to conversation clubs and classes with a teacher via Skype.

Bonuses for Habr readers

Online courses

We are giving you access for a year to the English course for self-study “Online Course”.
To gain access, simply go to .

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Among our students there are already students from GeekBrains, ITVDN, Softengi, Netology. Join us! And we only wish successful interviews and career success.

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Do you want to know how to learn English words quickly and easily and remember them for the rest of your life? In this article, we will introduce you to several tricks that can be used when learning not only English, of course, but any language, and which will help you quickly memorize new vocabulary. Choose convenient ways and no longer worry that something is not remembered or not kept in mind.

You want to speak, read, write and listen fluently English speech? Then we are pleased to offer you individual lessons With professional teacher via Skype. We have developed a universal course “” so that at the end of the course you can feel confident in oral and written communication with foreigners, work colleagues and friends, click on the link above to find out more and sign up for a free trial lesson.

Tell me and I'll forget. Teach me and I will remember. Engage me and I will learn.

NB! Don't try to learn everything if you're studying on your own! Study only what you will actually use and talk about. Of course, the topics “home”, “family”, “food”, “work” are required, everyone should know the vocabulary on these topics. However, if you want to learn something that is far from your life and almost never occurs (you are a lawyer, and you learn huge lists of words on the topic “medicine” for the sake of interest), you will only waste your time - your brain is unlikely to let in the information which he doesn't need. Now let's get down to business!

How to learn new English words quickly and effectively.

Let's say one important thing right away: always learn words in phrases and expressions, and never – just one word! Having learned one word out of context, you will not clearly understand how to use this word.

Make cards with words and expressions.

This is a very old method, but proven by generations: you take thick small sheets of paper (so that they do not show through), on one side write an expression in the language you are studying with notes on pronunciation, on the other - the translation, preferably with different pens. Try to write individual words, only if it is a pair of antonyms easy— difficult, in other cases, write down phrases on cards go home or even whole sentences and questions Have you been to…? You need to teach them this way: look at the Russian translation and say the expression out loud, turn the card and check yourself, take the next one. Such cards will not cost you anything; you can store them in an envelope and always carry them with you. They are very convenient: repeat them while you are on the subway going to work or stuck in a traffic jam, and always before you go to bed. Double benefit: the cards will be better understood, and you will have a dream in English or Spanish)

Combine words by topic.

To quickly memorize new English words, try to combine them into semantic groups on some topic. For example, your favorite food:cheese, salads, fish, dry red wine, milk chocolate. The brain is good at remembering what is close to you.

Say words and expressions out loud.

It’s better, of course, to say them in a secluded place - at home or in the office, when no one else can hear you, in order to avoid unnecessary questions and puzzled looks. This method is really effective; by pronouncing words and expressions you train your auditory memory, and it is very important in memorizing. Pronounce the words, try to imitate the manner that you hear in the speech of native speakers of the language you are studying. If you are watching a movie or listening to a song, do not be lazy to repeat the words or phrases you like.

“Build” a new word into your experience.

When young children learn their native language, they begin to notice a new word in a variety of situations, environments, and contexts. For example, when hearing the word “white” for the first time, small child starts repeating it when he sees it white snow, white paper, white sugar. And this is what helps him remember the word quickly and easily. Use a new word more often different situations- try to engage him by retelling the text, doing homework, or fellow students, with native speakers.

Make up examples with new expressions.

When you take a new word or expression, try to write it in a sentence. Firstly, you will remember its spelling, and this is important, and secondly, check whether you correctly understand and use its meaning in context. Read the compiled examples to your teacher or a native speaker friend and check together.

Make up funny stories and absurd dialogues.

If you need to learn a lot of new English words at once, make up a short story or dialogue out of them, funny and absurd. My students and I often use this method. The student writes a story or dialogue at home with new vocabulary and then reads it out in class. We do this at the very beginning of the lesson to relax, tune our brains to the language we are learning and have a good laugh.

Apply labels.

Take a pack of sticky notes and write words from your home or work environment on them. Then glue these leaves to the corresponding objects: “ a bathroom door” - on the bathroom door, “Salt”- on the salt shaker, « a dining table"- on the dining table, “ a laptop” - on a laptop.

The disadvantage of this technique is that you can only apply stickers to accessible physical objects around you; abstract concepts, as well as actions, will not be able to be signed - they will have to be taught in other ways that we have proposed.

Make Mind Maps - intelligence maps.

Mind map- this is a kind of scheme in which we associate certain vocabulary with a concept or event. In this case, new words may belong to different parts speech. Words will be remembered more easily thanks to associations, as well as division into groups.

Let's look at an example of a mind map to understand how it works. For example, you want to learn vocabulary related to work (the activities you perform at work). The main word in this diagram will be work. We will assign the following lexical group to it:

Get to work - get to work
To make a call - call
Chat with colleagues – chat with colleagues
Check email – check email
Reply to letters – respond to letters
Sign documents - sign documents

Surround yourself with the words you study.

Do you know what the apartment of one of our students looks like? Made from paper! When she does, behind her, on the walls, furniture, and almost on the ceiling, there are sticky notes with words and expressions that she is studying. We suspect this is the case throughout the entire apartment! Every morning she brushes her teeth and repeats the words. Prepares breakfast - repeats words. Putting on makeup for work - repeating the words. After some time, she removes the old remembered leaves and replaces them with new ones. The point is that the cards catch the eye and come across where we spend a lot of time, for example, at our favorite computer. Use technology to your advantage: write 5-10 words on the screen saver, in a couple of days you will remember them well.

Connect your emotions.

Emotional connection and imagination are very important in remembering new words. Emotions can even double the amount of information we remember. You should be interested in what you learn! Choose films and books that are fascinating to you in the language you are learning, read jokes and short funny stories. Watch the translation of your favorite songs, and then sing along. Watch news, travel and animal channels, solve crossword puzzles, play The gallows.

You must love the language you are studying; without this, nothing will work. Our teachers will do everything possible to ensure that the “need” with which you came to us turns into a “want” after the first lesson!

How to learn even more new English words? It is necessary to put them in a certain associative row. Let's take for example ride a bike(to ride a bike), imagine that you decided to teach your son or daughter to ride, taught them, and now ride together. Using this expression, remember how much delight the child had when he went on his own without your support...

Using this method, you can always quickly find the desired expression in your vocabulary - it is enough to find yourself in a situation that requires you to have the same emotional associations that were used when memorizing it.

Study on training sites.

If you can’t imagine learning without a computer, then learn new English words with its help. Study on educational resources if this is more interesting to you than classic cards or notebooks with words. We recommend the site lang-8.com, where you can practice the language by writing and sending texts to native speakers who will correct your mistakes and give recommendations.

Read texts out loud.

The more you read, the more often you encounter new words and the more likely you are to remember them. You should not look up the meaning of every unfamiliar word in the dictionary; this will turn reading from pleasure into torture. Choose only those that are often found in the text or without which it is completely impossible to understand the meaning of the sentence.

Install useful applications.

If you don't have time to make flashcards or draw mind maps, you can install a special program on your smartphone or tablet and learn new English or Spanish or any words you like. We recommend using Lingualeo, Busuu or Duolingo - they are free and the classes are effective.

Test your knowledge.

It's good to go through from time to time various tests to the level of vocabulary. For example, you can find excellent tests for training oral and written speech at puzzle-english.com or englishteststore.net. After passing such a test, you will immediately see what has been retained in your memory and which topics or words need to be repeated.

Execute your daily plan precisely.

The average person is able to learn 5-10 new words per day. Follow your plan for learning new vocabulary exactly to see progress. Regardless of which method you choose, it is better to memorize new English words according to this scheme: “ Writing - pronunciation - translation" Remember that classes must be regular. It is better to learn 10 words every day than 100 words once a week.

Memory is like a muscle; it can atrophy if it doesn't work. Most best way train your memory - do constant repetitions. If you want your memory to work well, then make it work a little every day.

If you think that self-study using cards and diagrams is not your method, we invite you to try. They will teach you to memorize words in context, immediately use them in conversation and put them into practice in everyday situations. Learning new English words in Skype lessons with a personal teacher - isn’t it a pleasant and effective way to spend your time?

LF School warns: learning languages is addictive!

Learning English words is much easier than it seems. If you don’t agree with this, it’s probably because at school you were forced to cram columns of words that were difficult to remember and forgotten the next day. Fortunately, now with the help simple techniques, educational programs and easily accessible materials in English, learning words is a pleasure.

Learning English words and learning a language are not the same thing.

First of all, we note that learning a language is not just about memorizing words. Yes, you cannot remove words from the language, but their interaction in speech occurs according to the rules of grammar. Moreover, grammar will not be “brought to life” without practice in reading, listening, speaking and writing. Some of the techniques listed below involve memorizing words specifically in the context of live speech.

Cards with words

Ordinary cards made of cardboard are a powerful tool for memorizing words. Cut out cards of a convenient size from thick cardboard, write English words or phrases on one side, Russian on the other, and repeat.

For greater efficiency, take sets of 15–30 cards and learn words in two directions - English-Russian and Russian-English - in four stages:

Getting to know words. Look through the cards, saying the words out loud, trying to imagine the objects, actions, and even abstractions they represent. Don't try to memorize the words thoroughly, just get to know them, hook them on your memory hook. Some words will be remembered already at this stage, but unreliably.
Repetition English - Russian. Looking at the English side, remember the Russian translation. Go through the deck until you can guess all the words (usually 2-4 passes). Be sure to shuffle the cards! Learning words with a list is ineffective largely due to the fact that words are memorized in in a certain order. Cards do not have this drawback.
Repetition Russian - English. The same thing, but from Russian to English. This task is a little more difficult, but 2-4 passes will be enough.
Consolidation. At this stage, note the time with a stopwatch. Run the deck as quickly as possible, achieving instant recognition of the word without thinking. Do 2-4 rounds, trying to get the stopwatch to show a shorter time with each round. Don't forget to shuffle the cards. Words can be run in both directions or optionally in one (preferably in Russian-English, as it is more difficult). At this stage, you will achieve instant recognition of the word, without mental translation.

It is not necessary to make cards from cardboard; there are convenient programs for creating electronic cards, for example Quizlet. Using this service, you can make voiced cards, add pictures to them, and teach them in different modes, including games.

Spaced repetition method

The method is to repeat words using cards, but at certain intervals. It is believed that by following a certain repetition algorithm, the student consolidates information in long-term memory. If information is not repeated, it will be forgotten as unnecessary.

The most popular program for memorizing words using spaced repetition method - this is Anki. Create a deck of words, and the application itself will select forgotten material and offer to repeat it at a certain frequency.

The convenience is that you only need to load the words, and the program itself will tell you when and what to repeat. But sometimes there is simply no need for the interval method. If you are learning a selection of common words such as days of the week and months, verbs of motion, vehicles, then there is no need to repeat them according to a special algorithm: they will already appear very often in a textbook, when reading, in speech.

Remembering words when reading in English

It makes sense to learn words with the help of cards when the vocabulary is still insufficient even to understand the simplest texts. If you do not yet know such basic vocabulary as days of the week, colors, verbs of motion, politeness formulas, then it is convenient to lay the foundation of your vocabulary by memorizing words using cards. According to linguists, the minimum vocabulary for understanding simple texts and speech is about 2–3 thousand words.

But, if you can already, try to write down words from the text while reading. This will not just be vocabulary taken from the dictionary, but living words, surrounded by context, associatively tied to the plot and content of the text.

Do not write down all unfamiliar words in a row. Write down useful words and phrases, as well as words without understanding which it is impossible to understand even the basic meaning. Write down only a few words per page to reduce distractions while reading. After finishing an article or chapter of a book, you can quickly repeat the words.

They can significantly simplify and speed up the memorization of words. For example, when reading texts online, you can save words with translation with one click and then repeat them using the Leo Translator browser extension.

Memorizing words from video and audio recordings

If while reading it is not difficult to underline or write out a word, then with a film or audio recording it is more difficult. But listening (listening) for learning vocabulary is no less interesting than books. In the live speech of native speakers there are fewer bookish, rarely used words and more popular colloquial expressions. In addition, listening develops not only vocabulary, but also the skill of understanding speech by ear.

The easiest way to learn English from films and audio recordings is to simply watch or listen, without being distracted by writing out words. This is the easiest approach, but this way you are unlikely to learn anything new, just reinforce the words you already know (which is also important).

If you write out and then repeat new words, you will not only enjoy the film, but also expand your vocabulary. Of course, while watching, it is very inconvenient to be distracted by pressing pause and writing down words, but you can take short notes, and then return to them and analyze the material in more detail. As with reading, you don’t need to write down all the words you don’t understand in a row.

It is much easier to study audio and video using special sites. The most suitable for this are the popular online services LinguaLeo and Puzzle English, which use a special interface for convenient viewing of videos with the ability to quickly (by clicking on a word in the subtitles) translate and save words.

Remembering words while writing and speaking

Reading and listening are passive speech activities, speech perception. Written and spoken language is the active use of language. When you write or speak, vocabulary develops differently: you have to practice using words you already know, moving them from passive (at the level of understanding) to active.

When writing, be it an essay or informal correspondence in a chat, you have to constantly select words and try to express your thoughts more clearly and accurately. Often a situation arises when you want to say something, but do not know the appropriate word or expression. It’s not difficult to find it with the help of a dictionary, but don’t let this valuable find be forgotten right away - write down such small discoveries and repeat free time. Practice in active speech activity is great for identifying such gaps.

During an oral conversation, of course, you won’t be able to look into the dictionary, but conversational practice forces you to practice already familiar words and constructions. You have to strain your memory, remember everything that is stored even in its most distant corners, in order to express a thought. Conversation practice for learning a language is like training for the body: you strengthen and develop your “language form”, transferring words from passive to active.

Conclusion

The first two methods - cards and spaced repetition - are suitable for learning collections of words, for example, “In the city,” “Clothing,” and so on. Methods three to five are designed to memorize words during speech practice.

If you want to ensure that words are not only remembered, but also not forgotten, regularly practice reading and listening. Having encountered a familiar word several times in a living context, you will remember it forever. If you want not only to have a passive vocabulary, but also to express your thoughts freely - . This way you will turn dry knowledge into confident skills. After all, we learn languages not in order to know them, but in order to use them.