Once a student becomes familiar with an idea, the processing of it becomes effortless. In order for an idea to become automatic, a student must use repetition to become familiar with that idea. Everyday activities such as brushing your teeth and getting dressed and things that you do everyday without even thinking. They have become automatic and very familiar. There are so many activities in the classroom that need to become effortless in order to succeed in school, such as reading, writing, etc. Repeating information over and over, which is also known as maintenance rehearsal is one effective way to make an idea become automatic. Another activity that is also effective in automatic processing is ellaborative rehearsal, which allows you to connect newer ideas to older ideas that you have already learned. One very effective idea that helped me a lot in school was the use of mnemonics. Mnemonics allow you to take your idea and relate it to something to help you remember it.
Activity : In my activity, students will use mnemonics to help them remember different facts in their biology class. One students needs to know how to remember the order of the animal kingdom. For this mnemonic, the student made up a phrase that has the same first letter as the name of the animal kingdom in order. The phrase "kids prefer cheese over fried green spinach" matches perfectly with the animal kingdom order Kingdom, Phylum, Class, Order, Family, Genus, and Species. The student will now have a way to connect both ideas and to remember the order of the animal kingdom.
Mnemonic devices are such great way for students to memorize things. I think that as teachers we really do need to implement these into our classrooms on a regular basis. First off, it makes memorizing and learning school work fun. It also will put a special meaning and remembrance with the material. I thought that you could even take the mnemonic devices idea one step further. After creating their own device, each student could share their ideas with all of the other kids in their class. This would create more ways to learn the same material and that would give the students options to pick a way that works for them. But also, we know that not all students learn the same ways, so as a teacher you could offer more than just that one option for ways to memorize the material. Overall though, I think your idea is very good!
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