How do you memorize vocabulary?
Make a flashcard for each word and review them with spaced repetition, so you see a word again right before you'd forget it. On each card, write the word in a real sentence, not just the translation. Link it to a picture or a word you already know. Then test yourself instead of just rereading. This is how language learners make words stick.
Rereading a word list feels like studying, but it does almost nothing. Your brain remembers what it has to pull back from memory. So flip it: look at the word, try to say the meaning, then check. Getting it slightly wrong and correcting yourself is where the learning happens.
Spaced repetition does the timing for you. New or hard words come back often. Words you know come back less and less. That way you spend your time on the stuff you actually keep forgetting, not on words you nailed weeks ago.
Two tricks make any word stick faster. Use it in a sentence so it has context, not just a bare translation. And tie it to something already in your head, a picture, a sound, or a word it rhymes with. The weirder the link, the better you remember it.
- 1Make one flashcard per word. Keep it to a single word and its meaning.
- 2Put the word in a full sentence on the card, not just the translation.
- 3Add a hook: a small image, or a word it sounds like, so it sticks.
- 4Test yourself. See the word, say the meaning out loud, then check.
- 5Use spaced repetition so hard words come back sooner than easy ones.
- 6Mark the words you miss and drill those a bit more than the rest.