What is the best way to memorize many foreign words?

Question

I'm a Turkish high school student and I joined Scrabble tournament in my school so I have to memorize lots of English words which are written in Scrabble dictionary.

So, what is the best way to memorize many words?

Answer 1

Hi, a good easy way is by associating.

You take an English dictionary and start in the first page you try to only read those words that are similar than Turkish in form and meaning. Most occidental languages have a large inventory of words that come from common sources and hence are very similar even after years of evolution.

Turkish being as it is an occidental language, it surely share with English a lot of words coming, from Latin, Greek, Persian, Italian, Arab and also of the Ottoman era. So it is very easy to remember a word which is formally and semantically similar to another word in your own language.

Although there are many types and way of memorizing association is the basic process of memory. Hence with the aid of a dictionary you associate English words to Turkish words.

For example:

in English bank, is banka in Turkish
in English extract, is ekstrakt in Turkish
in English harem is also harem in Turkish

and so on

Hope it helps
Santiago

Answer 2

Santiago has the right idea. when i am trying to learn Turkish words I go for similar sounding ones to English. I also try to visualise for example:
Turkish word for plate is tabak so I imagine eating a plate of tobacco.
another good idea would be to get post-it notes and stick them all over the house with both the Turkish and the English words on them, IE Banyo - bathroom on the bathroom door. you can read it every time you see it. also write how you would say it under the English words as our pronunciations must seem really stupid to you!!!!!!!!

PS, a tip for your scrabble games, QI and XI are good 2 letter words for quick points if you get stuck :-)

Answer 3

Use visualisations. For example:

Think about a route you take often, like your journey to school or to a friends house. As you envision your journey, assign a word to each section of the journey, or to a specific area, such as a shop or a house that you pass. You probably should write it down like this:

My neighbour's house = clock
the grocery shop = toothpaste
the house with a big tree = paper

And so on...

I'd probably learn the words in sets of around 10, and once you have learned a set you could move onto the next, using a different route.

Answer 4

Sugestion: Get a lot of little cards like matchbox size. Write a word on each card.Carry it with you and go over it whenever you have a little time.It works for me.

Answer 5

Did you write your question all by yourself?
Doesn't seem like you need help @ all.
but flash cards help and repeating the word or writing it over and over again.