Help with memorizing lines.

[MistyMountain]

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[SKL]

My kids have memory work for school - usually not very long, but they did recently memorize the Apostle's Creed.

 

After the kids have read it over a number of times, I point out the structure ("the first paragraph is about __, the second ___,....") and some other patterns I may notice ("I see there are a lot of "j" words in this sentence" or "this is a list of three verbs and consequences - ask, receive; seek, find; knock,..." and stuff like that.  I also emphasize what each sentence / phrase starts with, as often, once they remember the first word, the rest is easily recalled.

 

Other than that we just alternate between them reading the whole thing out loud, reciting it together, and trying to recite it alone.  Eventually they get it.

 

ETA:  one thing I've done in the past is to set it to a tune.  Kids somehow learn songs easier than other stuff.

[mathnerd]

We have a lot of memory work for school. Somehow, we have unconsciously stuck to the Jessie Wise method used in the First Language Lessons (as this was the very first book we memorized from when DS was 4) - read a small paragraph together thrice. Then ask the child to repeat it. Do this for a few days until it is memorized. Review the older lines as you proceed to the next part.

[OneStepAtATime]

Yes, break it into small chunks.  Read it to her, have her read it back, practice in different locations, set it to a tune if necessary, etc.   Try to make it fun, if you can, and help her see that this is just a necessary step to learning the lines, not something to fear or a chore to get through.  Discuss the individual paragraphs and what they are saying.  Talk about the purpose of the writing.  Ask her to analyze vocabulary choices.  Even drawing a pictoral reference next to each paragraph may be beneficial.  Any of those things will usually help with attaching meaning and helping her to hold onto the material instead of it just being a bunch of letters strung together.  

 

DD cannot rote memorize easily at ALL.  For Drama we use some of the techniques mentioned above and read through the entire thing, then take a small chunk of the script and read it over together, then I read it to her so she can hear the flow, then she reads it to me. We may spend 10 minutes reviewing in the afternoon, then another 10 right before bed, then another 5 minutes or so in the morning until the first part is done.  Then we re-read the whole thing again, break off the next smaller chunk to review, practice it for a while, incorporate it into the previous part, etc.  She has also recorded her lines to play back as she does other things, and has had other family members record the words for her to hear...I don't require her to recite to me from memory until she has heard it and practiced it quite a bit because anxiety over not remembering something can lock her up and make it harder to remember the words.  Also, she may mis-remember a word and then keep recalling the wrong word or sequence when she reads it again.

 

Good luck and best wishes....

[fdrinca]

When I had to memorize lots for speech/drama, I found doing so right before bed to be very helpful, if only psychologically.

Go a paragraph at a time. 

 

Hand gestures?

 

Lots and lots and lots of repetition. Together, apart, together again.

[Cosmos]

My ds has memorized a lot. It's fastest when I help him. I'll tell you what our method is, but as you can see from the thread, people find different methods that work best for them. With that said, here's what we do:

 

I hold the script/poem/whatever and he stands someplace where he can move. I read a small chunk (one sentence, or one clause of a long sentence) and he repeats it four times or more. Then I read a second chunk and he repeats it several times. Then I read chunk 1 & 2 together, and he repeats those several times. Then the same for chunk 3 and 4. Then he puts all four chunks together and repeats several times. While he's reciting, he paces around. During this stage, he does not work at all on expression or acting, simply getting the words down.

 

At the beginning of the next session, he recites everything he has learned so far, and then we go on to the next bit, following the same pattern as before. We usually don't do more than 5-10 minutes in a session. If he needs to memorize a lot, we have done several sessions in a day.

[Guest kevinjohn]

I prefer to write each sentence before memorizing. It will really help to understand each sentence and you can easily memorize it. You can follow these steps- Firstly, writing the first sentence, and then add it with second and so on. Or you can try it individually. It was my personal experience. I hope it will help.

 

 

 

 

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[Atilla the Mom]

Given her young age, she  may have some difficulty with auditory memory which simply hasn't been diagnosed yet.  My eldest couldn't memorize the simplest grace or bedtime prayer despite oodles of work until she had Fast Forword and got that corrected at age six.  (Her line in the Kindergarten play  - some  ecofriendly thing - was "Turn off the water when you brush your teeth" and took vast amounts of work.  I found that using a picture for every noun, using rhythm, using big sweeping stagey gestures at various points and visual props were helpful.  Incidentally,  I also found that using felt visual prompts and a felt board helped a lot when I was teaching her to write, or she would forget what she was trying to write under the stress of the writing itself.

[Kevin'sMom]

Go over the last parts, both of the paragraphs and the sentences, way more than the first parts.

When you are in the car or at the supper table etc., say the lines but leave blanks to fill in the words. Leave more and more of it blank.

Be sure you have memorized it yourself.

Say the lines everywhere, all the time.

Unfortunately, you will remember the paragraphs for years, but this works.