Newsletter: Winter 2011 - Memory and Learning

When parents and teachers think about learning difficulties they will often consider such areas as language, or attention, or even motor functions. It is less common for them to consider memory as a factor when students struggle in school – but problems with memory can often be a major reason for difficulties in class, with homework, and on exams.
Memory is a constellation of functions that enable individuals to capture information, store it for immediate or long term recall, and to efficiently bring it to mind when needed. When any of these functions is not working well, school performance can be affected. Understanding the different aspects of memory and how they work is an important first step to developing strategies to help students succeed.
Short Term Memory
Short Term Memory is like the entryway to our mind, enabling us to capture and briefly hold information – sounds, sights, what we read, and what the teacher is saying - while we decide whether that information is to be used, stored, or discarded. However, short-term memory is affected greatly by attention and language. Students who have difficulties understanding language or who struggle with attention may miss the information that comes their way from a class lecture, a book, or otherwise. They may appear to have a “memory” problem when, in fact, the information never gets into their memory. Other students have a limited “chunk size” capacity, which makes it hard for them to capture information that is not presented in small segments. And most people find it hard to remember certain kinds of information for even short periods; the average adult can only recall seven numbers at a time, hence the typical telephone number.
Active Working Memory
Another part of memory is active working memory, which is often compared to a computer’s RAM. Active working memory is our “cognitive counter space” for simultaneously holding and working with several different pieces of information. It includes such tasks as remembering what you read at the top of a page when you get to the end of that page, or what the beginning of a chapter or a book was about by the time you get to the end. You rely on active working memory in math, to remember the second step of a math procedure while you are working on the first one, and when you write, simultaneously holding in your mind how to spell the word that you want to use while not losing track of the word that you will write next. Students with limited active working memory may appear impulsive because they sense that they will forget what they intend to do or say if they don’t attend to it immediately. Students with limited active working memory often have trouble listening and taking notes at the same time.
There are numerous factors that can impede active working memory. Lack of sleep, anxiety, and other emotional upsets can diminish active working memory capacity. Specific learning difficulties can also have an impact. For example, a student with dysgraphia, who struggles with the mechanics of writing, may have to expend so much mental energy in forming her letters, that other aspects of her essay – remembering what she wanted to say, recalling what she wrote in the beginning of the essay, and the instructions the teacher gave about the project – all may fall by the wayside.
Long Term Memory
Our long term memory is the storage space for information we have taken in from our short term memory, and which we may have also processed, linked, or categorized with our active working memory. We can access the information in our long term memory in several ways. Ideally, we can find it by recalling or remembering it, as when a fact comes to mind as we consider a question. Even if we can’t recall information, we can often recognize it when it is presented to us. So, when answering a multiple choice question or reviewing spelling options on a spell-check function, we can recognize the correct answer or proper spelling, even if we could not recall it without prompting. Many students find that they cannot quickly access information that they have stored and are constantly feeling frustrated when another student provides an answer that they “knew but just couldn’t think of”.
Tools to Help with Memory
Understanding the components of memory is only a first step to helping students overcome memory difficulties. First, we examine the broad array of issues that can impact memory at any point, making sure that problems with attention, sleep and alertness, difficulties with language, and emotional issues are all addressed. Then, there are numerous strategies and tools that we recommend to students to help them build their memory and to help them by-pass memory roadblocks. These include using strategies to more actively process incoming information, such as material in a text book. Students can also transform information, link it to something they already know, and explain it to someone else – all ways to help embed the information in memory and make it easier to access. There are many ways to use technology to help memory, from basic tools like spell check on the computer, to applications that help with keeping a calendar, notes and ideas, or to-do list organized, to devices like the smartpen to help with the memory demands of lectures.
Understanding the role of memory in school performance, and adopting appropriate techniques to build memory connections and to bypass memory difficulties, can help students of all ages.
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Memory is a constellation of functions that enable individuals to capture information, store it for immediate or long term recall, and to efficiently bring it to mind when needed. When any of these functions is not working well, school performance can be affected. Understanding the different aspects of memory and how they work is an important first step to developing strategies to help students succeed.
Short Term Memory
Short Term Memory is like the entryway to our mind, enabling us to capture and briefly hold information – sounds, sights, what we read, and what the teacher is saying - while we decide whether that information is to be used, stored, or discarded. However, short-term memory is affected greatly by attention and language. Students who have difficulties understanding language or who struggle with attention may miss the information that comes their way from a class lecture, a book, or otherwise. They may appear to have a “memory” problem when, in fact, the information never gets into their memory. Other students have a limited “chunk size” capacity, which makes it hard for them to capture information that is not presented in small segments. And most people find it hard to remember certain kinds of information for even short periods; the average adult can only recall seven numbers at a time, hence the typical telephone number.
Active Working Memory
Another part of memory is active working memory, which is often compared to a computer’s RAM. Active working memory is our “cognitive counter space” for simultaneously holding and working with several different pieces of information. It includes such tasks as remembering what you read at the top of a page when you get to the end of that page, or what the beginning of a chapter or a book was about by the time you get to the end. You rely on active working memory in math, to remember the second step of a math procedure while you are working on the first one, and when you write, simultaneously holding in your mind how to spell the word that you want to use while not losing track of the word that you will write next. Students with limited active working memory may appear impulsive because they sense that they will forget what they intend to do or say if they don’t attend to it immediately. Students with limited active working memory often have trouble listening and taking notes at the same time.
There are numerous factors that can impede active working memory. Lack of sleep, anxiety, and other emotional upsets can diminish active working memory capacity. Specific learning difficulties can also have an impact. For example, a student with dysgraphia, who struggles with the mechanics of writing, may have to expend so much mental energy in forming her letters, that other aspects of her essay – remembering what she wanted to say, recalling what she wrote in the beginning of the essay, and the instructions the teacher gave about the project – all may fall by the wayside.
Long Term Memory
Our long term memory is the storage space for information we have taken in from our short term memory, and which we may have also processed, linked, or categorized with our active working memory. We can access the information in our long term memory in several ways. Ideally, we can find it by recalling or remembering it, as when a fact comes to mind as we consider a question. Even if we can’t recall information, we can often recognize it when it is presented to us. So, when answering a multiple choice question or reviewing spelling options on a spell-check function, we can recognize the correct answer or proper spelling, even if we could not recall it without prompting. Many students find that they cannot quickly access information that they have stored and are constantly feeling frustrated when another student provides an answer that they “knew but just couldn’t think of”.
Tools to Help with Memory
Understanding the components of memory is only a first step to helping students overcome memory difficulties. First, we examine the broad array of issues that can impact memory at any point, making sure that problems with attention, sleep and alertness, difficulties with language, and emotional issues are all addressed. Then, there are numerous strategies and tools that we recommend to students to help them build their memory and to help them by-pass memory roadblocks. These include using strategies to more actively process incoming information, such as material in a text book. Students can also transform information, link it to something they already know, and explain it to someone else – all ways to help embed the information in memory and make it easier to access. There are many ways to use technology to help memory, from basic tools like spell check on the computer, to applications that help with keeping a calendar, notes and ideas, or to-do list organized, to devices like the smartpen to help with the memory demands of lectures.
Understanding the role of memory in school performance, and adopting appropriate techniques to build memory connections and to bypass memory difficulties, can help students of all ages.
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