Sarah Lynn
“If you’re just engaging in mechanical repetition,
it’s true, you quickly hit the limit of what you can retain.
However, if you practice elaboration,
there’s no known limit to how much you can learn.”
~ Brown, Roediger, McDaniel (2014)
Elaboration is essential for you to commit new learning to memory. Elaboration is when you explain new information in your own words. Once you begin to add examples and details, or make connections to other experiences and knowledge, you are enriching the new learning and making it more memorable and more transferrable to new contexts.
Elaboration involves the thinking strategies of paraphrasing, summarizing, creating analogies, answering questions, and describing connections. Elaboration activates the frontal lobe of your brain and brings your new learning to a higher level of awareness and articulation. Continue reading
