The first way to learn lists, is to… LEARN LISTS.
Think back to when you were at school, how did you learn to count in French, how did you learn a poem or song, how did you remember battles, chemical elements, etc.. ?
Probably by rote.
By writing down the list, time after time, after time. Very monotonous, but does get rewards.
Some lists though are quite big. So break the lists down into manageable sizes.
For example the 2 letter words could be broken into :
a) 26 mini lists each beginning with a different letter (DA, DE, DI, DO)
b) 26 mini lists each ENDING with a different letter (AR, ER, OR, UR)
c) Ignore words a child of 10 would know (and then look at the rest) e.g Ignore AM, BY, IT etc
d) Words containing JQXZ
e) Words containing 2 vowels (or 2 consonants) e.g AA, AE, AI, EA etc or CH, FY, KY etc
f) Musical notes (DO, RE, MI, FA etc)
g) Parts of speech (AH, ER, UM etc)
Every long list, whether it is :
- all the 2 letter words
- or the 7 letter words containing the letters of RETAIN
- or the 4 letter words containing 3 vowels (e.g AREA, EPEE, IDEA)
can all be broken in several sub-list. How you create the sub-lists is down to you.
Using the last example as a question …
Can you think of 3 different ways the 96 4 letter words containing 3 vowels can be split into sub-lists ? (Answers at the end, but do think about it before you read them)
These days many top players record the lists and play it back on the car, or the bath. You can too… every mobile phone has a recorder function these days!
Next time we will look at mnemonics.
(For those struggling with the sub-lists for the 4 letter words containing 3 vowels here are 3 sub-list ideas :
- Words starting with the same letter e.g OBIA, OOZE, OUMA etc.
- Words split by the sole consonant in the word e.g AREA, ARIA, EURO etc
- Words split by vowel make up AEE yields AGEE, AJEE, EASE etc..
There are others of course, the choice is yours)
