Kristen Parrott

Session 6

Kristen Parrott
Psychology 101
Professor Jennifer Stofer
October 7, 2014

Kristen Parrott
Session 6
Organizing, encoding, rehearsing, and retrieving course content are important to the
human body. Using each of the words listed above, one could come up with great tips to help
him or her study and to get through everyday life.
Before one starts to study, it is important to know how to organize the information. Some
tips for organizing include making sure the material that is being studied is correct, organize the
material in ways that is easy for ones individual memory to understand and remember
(Experience Psychology). Another tip is to try to organize the material in different ways. This
way, a person can find out if one way is better for him or her.
Encoding is the memorization of the material. One tip to make encoding best is to pay
attention. Do not attempt to study or try to memorize more than one thing at once. Focusing on
one thing at a time will help the encoding process. Another tip is to not try to process the
information in a way that is difficult to understand (Experience Psychology). A few more tips
include, using imagery, and elaborating points.
Rehearsing and retrieving are two other important processes. Some tips for both of these
include continuously going over the material, talking about what has been learned, doing things
that can help trigger memories, and being comfortable.
Autobiography memory is extremely important to human life. Autobiography memory
helps people learn from their experiences in life and also provides the functions to understand
ourselves. The most important role in autobiography memory is its role in social bonding.
Keeping the memory sharp is important to the memory. The saying use it or lose it is
true. One must continue to do something if he or she wants to be able to remember it. Keeping

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Session 6
the memory constantly working helps in having a strong memory and not running into problems
later on in life.
Baylor University: Academic Support Programs, Maximizing Memory, is an authoritative
website that helps one learn ways to improve their memory. The relevance between this site and
research is the site gives facts on ways memorization can be improved. Since this is a
universitys site, the authority is reliable. At the bottom of the webpage there is information such
as location, telephone number, hours, and an email address. The accuracy and purpose of this
site is clear, there are no spelling or grammatical errors and the purpose of this site is to inform
people about how to maximize ones memorization.
The Baylor University site gives tips on how to improve memory. Some of those tips
include organizing the material, use your body, use your brain, recall it, and memory tricks
(Maximizing Your Memory). It is important to relax, create pictures, and write things down.
Some other tips the Baylor University site suggests are to create connections between things one
already know and things that are being learned and to beware of attitudes (Maximizing Your
Memory). It is sometimes easier to understand a concept if it is connected or associated with
something that is already known. It is also easier to learn something when one thinks positive
about the subject. For example, if someone does not like math and the always dread it, that
person will most likely not be able to remember as much as the person who tried to have a
positive outlook on the subject.
Experiencing Psychology gives a lot of the same tips in organizing and recalling such as
finding similarities in the topic. Both the book and the site explain that organizing information
help, but they give different suggestions. Some differences include the site telling one to use their

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Session 6
body and also gives memory tricks. The book focuses more on how to mentally improve memory
while the site shows physical and mental ways to improve memory.
To help study for an upcoming midterm exam, one could use the ways mentioned above.
One can organize the material in different ways such as by chapter or certain parts theyre have
problems with. Another way one can study for an upcoming exam is to take a practice test
multiple times to help memorize the material. One could also have someone else quiz them over
the subject. Creating rhymes, songs, sentences, and creating mind maps. (Maximizing Your
Memory).

Kristen Parrott
Session 6
Reference Page
Baylor University Academic Support Programs Memorization (n.d). Baylor University Academic
Support Programs Memorization. Retrieved October 10, 2014 from
http://www.baylor.edu/support_programs/index.php?id=42437
King, L. (2013). Memory. Experience Psychology (Second Edition ed., pp. 235-238). New York:
McGraw-Hill