Mnemonic Devices
By: Kimmy Bruett
What Are Mnemonic Devices?
 According to library.thinkquest.org mnemonic
devices are devices that people use to help
them out in memorization.
 People use these to help them out for
memorizing an array of things, basically
anything.
Examples:
 Visualization
 Rhyming
 Association
 Ect.
Example
PEMDAS: The P in please stands for
parenthesis, the E in excuse stands for
exponents, the M in my stands for
multiplication, the D in dear stands for
division, the A in aunts stands for addition,
and the S in sally stands for subtraction.
People use this to memorize the order of
operations in solving a mathematical
equation.
Mnemonic Devices in memorization
 There are many different ways in which
mnemonic devices come in handy.
 Here are a few of the different methods of
mnemonic devices:
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Acronyms and acrostics
Rhymes
Imagery
Method of Loci
Number-letter system
Peg-word system
Acronyms and Acrostics
 According to LEARN by Regina G. Richards:
Acronym is a word formed from the first letters or groups
of letters in a name or phrase.
 Example: MVEMJSUNP = My Very Earnest Mother Just
Served Us Nine Pickles = The colors of the rainbow, in
order: Red, Orange, Yellow, Green, Blue, Indigo, Violet.
Acrostic is a series of lines from which particular letters
(such as the first letters of all lines) from a word or
phrase.
 Example: HOMES stands for the Great Lakes, which
would be Huron, Ontario, Michigan, Erie, Superior.
Rhyme
 According to LEARN by Regina G. Richards:
A rhyme is a saying that has similar distinctive sounds at
the end of each line.
Studies have shown that rhyming makes things easier to
remember because it can be stored with acoustic
encoding.
 Example:
• In fourteen hundred and ninety-two Columbus sailed the Ocean
Blue.
• 30 Days has September, April, June, and November. All the rest
have 31, except February.
• "i" before "e," except after "c," or in sounding like "ay" as in
"neighbor" or "weigh."
Imagery
According to LEARN by Regina G.
Richards:
Imagery is used to memorize pairs of words. An
image is formed as a result of each word given,
and then two images are joined through mental
visualization.
Example:
Piggy bank=
+
=
Method of Loci
 According to LEARN by Regina G. Richards:
The Method of Loci is a mnemonic device that dates
back to Ancient Greek times. They would use this to
assist them when memorizing a speech.
Example:
 You have to imagine a place that you are very familiar
with. Then you imagine all the possible locations in that
place, or all possible situations. It could help if you put
everything in a specific order.
• Say you were telling someone about a house. You would have
to be very familiar with that house and everything in it. And in
order to make telling someone about this house easier you
would have to think about it in some kind of order. You could
start at the basement, then move up to the main floor, and then
move to the second floor.
Peg-Word System

According to LEARN by Regina G. Richards:
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The Peg-Word System can be used for memorizing an ordered
list of words or the specific numbers associated with the
words.
Example:
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1.bun
2.shoe
3.tree
4.door
5.hive
6.sticks
7.heaven
8.gate
9.line or shine or vine
10.hen
Number-Letter System
 According to LEARN by Regina G. Richards:
 The Number-Letter System is very similar to the Peg- Word System,
because it, too, is a method of association. The only difference is that
this method allows you to remember things by associating them with
similarities of the number it is at.
 Example:
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1.= t (there is one downstroke in the letter t)
2.= n (there are two downstrokes in the letter n)
3.= m (there are three downstrokes in the letter m)
4.= r (the last letter in four is r)
5.= l (the Roman number 50 is L)
6.= sh (the word six has begins with an x)
7.= k (the number seven can be turned around to look like part of the letter
k)
 8.= f (a cursive f looks like an 8)
 9.= p (a p flipped looks like a 9)
 10.= z, s (think of zero)
Bibliography
Book:
Richards, Regina G. LEARN Playful Techniques
to Accelerate Learning. Tucson: Zephyr P, 1993.
1-173
Internet:
"Mnemonic Devices." ThinkQuest.Org. 2005. 29
Oct. 2007
<http://library.thinkquest.org/C0110291/tricks/
mnemonics/index.php>.