Chapter Introduction

Figure 1.1Median Annual Earnings of Full-Time, Year-Round Workers

Ages 25–32, by Educational Attainment: 2017

Source: U.S. Department of Commerce, Census Bureau, Current Population

Survey (CPS), “Annual Social and Economic Supplement,” 2018. See Digest of
Education Statistics 2018, table 502.30.
An investment in knowledge always pays the best interest.
— Benjamin Franklin
1. What is the important information provided in this bar graph?
2. How do the median annual earnings of someone with a high school
degree compare to that of someone with a master’s degree or higher?
3. As a college student, what is your reaction to the bar graph and how
might this information influence you?
4. What does the Benjamin Franklin quotation mean here? Do you think it
is only about college and interest?
Prepare to Learn
Congratulations! In your hands (or on your screen!) you are beginning
Chapter 1 of a book that will help guarantee your success as a student. You
will continually develop strategies, habits and techniques for learning and
becoming a part of a college community—on campus or digitally. Becoming
an effective, thoughtful reader and strengthening your ability to focus, study
effectively, think critically, and formulate your own opinions are skills to
succeed: in college, and even more importantly, in the workplace of the
twenty-first century.
In this chapter, you will read about becoming a successful student and learn
to:
 Understand the PRO reading process for your college reading needs
 Apply the skills of Preparing to read, Reading actively and thinking
critically, and Organizing and using what you have read
 Utilize special features of textbooks and e-books
 Analyze information in bar graphs
 Interpret information in line graphs
In the process of acquiring these skills, you will learn how to become a
successful learner: to take responsibility for your success, to utilize effective
memory techniques and strategies, and to think critically.
1.1The Reading Process: PRO
The PRO reading system is a strategy for applying effective reading habits.
Reading is a process; that means reading is a series of small steps. We’ve
divided the process into three basic steps. All good readers follow these
steps, even though they may do so automatically. Depending on your
purpose for reading and the type of material you are reading, you will vary
your strategies for the three basic steps. You may find that you use some
steps more than once in completing a reading task. Eventually, the reading
process and the basic steps involved will become automatic: you won’t even
have to think about them most of the time. Until you form these good habits,
however, you will need to be conscious of your reading strategies and apply
them deliberately as you read and study.
The PRO reading system makes it easy for you to understand and remember
the steps of the reading process so that you can approach your reading
assignments more confidently and complete them more successfully. Each
letter stands for an activity in the system.
 P = Preparing to read
 R = Reading actively and thinking critically
 O = Organizing and using what you have read
When you’ve mastered this system, you will be a reading pro!
Preparing to Read
The first step is preparing to read. Master readers prepare to read. They
don’t take a lot of time to prepare, but they are in the habit of completing
certain activities as they begin the process of reading. Taking the time to get
yourself ready to read is essential to understanding what you read. By
preparing yourself to read, you can figure out what information will be coming
and get ready to receive it. You can also develop curiosity about a subject, so
that you will already be thinking as you begin to read. Have you ever read
something and then not known what you had just read? One possible reason
for this lack of focus is failure to prepare.
The first step in the PRO reading system, P, actually includes four Ps, all of
which are easy to understand and do. You may already include some of these
in your reading approach. Preparing to read includes:
 Determining a purpose for your reading
 Previewing what you are about to read and posing questions
 Recognizing previous knowledge (what you already know about this
topic)
 Predicting what you will learn from the reading
Determining Your Purpose Your purpose influences how carefully you will
read, how carefully you will read, how much time you will need, and what
reading strategies you will use. For example, you read the sports section of
your daily newspaper very differently from the way you read a portion of your
anatomy textbook, especially if you are preparing to take the state nursing
exam. Your purpose in reading the sports page may be to find out the score in
a particular game. You can scan the page quickly to find this information. If
you are reading about anatomy, you have to read more slowly and
methodically to understand, and you want to use strategies to help you
remember the material.
As a college student, you have an obvious purpose. For instance, your
purpose may be to learn as much as you possibly can about Native American
poetry, about computer programming, or about the mechanics of laser
graphics. At the same time, your purpose may be to master enough to do
well on your exams. For example, in a reading class, you may need to
demonstrate how well you master new vocabulary. Whatever your immediate
purpose, remember that the pleasure of learning may also influence how you
read.
Previewing Briefly looking over the reading material to find its key point. In
other words, look at what you’re going to read before you read it. Get an
overview of the material, and notice how interesting, as well as how much
time it will take for you to comprehend the assignment. Once you have done
this, you can predict what topics the reading will cover and choose the most
effective reading strategies for that particular piece, as well as determine the
purpose of your reading. It is also a good idea to pose questions that will
likely be answered in the reading.
Skimming through the introduction, read titles and headings, first sentences
under the headings or the first sentence of each paragraph, italicized and
boldfaced words, and the conclusion. Be sure to briefly study pictures, picture
captions, charts, graphs, and any other unusual visual aids meant to “catch
your eye.” Keep in mind how this section fits with the information before and
after it. As you preview, ask yourself questions that may be answered by the
reading.
Using Previous Knowledge Consider what you already know about the
topic from prior reading and experience. As you preview a section, you will
probably recognize information about which you have some previous
knowledge. This knowledge may come from your studies or your life
experiences. If you already know a great deal about the subject of a reading,
prepare to add any new information you find in this reading to your
storehouse. Your brain has an extraordinary filing system that is more
sophisticated than those of the most advanced computers. Sometimes you
know as much as, or even more than, some authors about a given subject. In
that case, prepare to compare your information and interpretation with theirs;
you may even want to argue some points with them. At other times, you may
know little about a topic. In that case, you can still relate the information to
similar facts you already know. For example, when you read an article about
health problems among preschool children in Rwanda, you may know nothing
specific about Rwanda and its problems, but you probably do know—from
your own experience, reading, and watching various media—something about
young children and about health problems. Because you actually have some
background knowledge, you can relate the new information to what you
already know.
Make thinking about your previously acquired knowledge part of preparing to
read. You’ll soon find you do it almost automatically, and your confidence in
approaching new material will certainly increase. Also, it’s easier to
remember the new knowledge when you recognize its relationship to what
you already know.
Predicting What You Will Learn Predicting what you think you will learn
in the reading is the last step in preparing to read. Based on your preview of
the reading and previous knowledge of the subject, you will have a good idea
of what new information you will acquire.
The preview gave you the framework or outline of the content. Now consider
what you expect to learn from the reading. Raise some questions that you
think will be answered in the selection you are preparing to read. Asking
questions based on your preview will prepare you to read actively, to be
engaged with the material as you go through it. Actively seeking the answers
to your questions will keep you alert and attentive, and will help you
understand what you are reading.
One simple way to create questions is to use the topics and concepts you
noticed in your preview. For example, a section from a physical science
textbook might have the following title and headings:
 Atomic Structure
 The Electron
 The Atomic Nucleus
 Protons and Neutrons
The title and headings give you clues to the content, and each subheading is
about the makeup of an atom. In predicting what you will learn, you might
come up with these preview questions first: What is an electron? What is
an atomic nucleus? What is a proton? What is a neutron?
The text includes a diagram of an atom. So your second question might
combine the headings and the diagram: What role does each part have in
the functioning of the atom?
Besides these questions, different questions might arise from your previous
knowledge and reading. You might ask a question like the following: What
does the structure of an atom have to do with the creation of the
atomic bomb?
Thoughtful questions like this may not be answered in the text, but they can
prepare you for the class lecture and discussion. Looking beyond the literal
content to its implications can prepare you for critical thinking. In general,
ask questions specifically related to the information in the textbook or other
reading. To help you ask questions, look at features in your text such as:
 Objectives
 Headings
 First sentences of each paragraph
 First and last paragraphs (if you are reading something long)
 Illustrations, charts and graphs
 Chapter reviews in the back of the chapter
Other good ways to predict what you are expected to learn from reading are:
 Questions your professors raise or points they emphasize in class
 Study guides your professors may give you
Reading Actively and
Thinking Critically
Successful readers are actively involved in the process of
reading. They interact with the text and think about what
they are reading. These activities are part of the next step
in the PRO system.

Reading Actively The second major step in

the PRO reading system is R, which stands for reading.
Probably the most important advice we can give you
about reading is that you must be an active reader. To
remind you of this, we’ll usually refer to reading in this
text as active reading. Active reading is involved reading.
What are you involved in doing? You are searching for the
meaning of the author’s words.
Reading is an act of communication. It allows you to
share the thoughts and feelings of people you’ve never
met, even people who lived hundreds or thousands of
years ago or in a country you’ve never visited. Reading
the printed word—in a book or magazine or on the
computer—is a remarkably efficient way to communicate
ideas across time and distance. Remember that there is a
real human being on the other end—the writer—who is
trying to share facts, ideas, and feelings with you. You are
trying to decode his or her words and discover their
meaning. When you understand the writer’s message, the
communication is complete.

So what do you need to do to be an active reader? First,

you must become involved in what you are reading.
Preparing to read, as you have learned in this chapter,
will make that easier. In fact, careful preparation for
reading may make active reading almost automatic. Once
you have a purpose, previewing provides a framework for
what you are about to read. Thinking about your previous
knowledge of the subject helps you make connections
between new and old information. Predicting helps you
anticipate what you will learn as you read.
Second, you must be interested in what you are reading. It
is not always easy to be interested in a topic, particularly
if you know nothing about it. Allow yourself to be curious,
to be open-minded about all kinds of information and all
viewpoints. Also, keep your reading purpose in mind.
Pleasure may sometimes have to take second place to
necessity. What initially appears to be an uninspiring
book may be required reading for the career you are
pursuing.

Third, you must be alert and attentive while reading.

Choose a time and a place that allow you to concentrate.
Most people try to establish a special setting where the
habit of focusing becomes natural and is not a constant
struggle. Your brain must have a chance to work
uninterrupted for you to interpret the meaning of what
you are reading. If you’re too tired or distracted, it is
difficult to concentrate on reading. You may have to
motivate yourself to stay attentive. Set yourself a goal of
reading attentively for increasing periods of time, and
then take a break to reflect on what you have read. Then,
after 50 minutes, reward yourself by doing something
different for 10 or 15 minutes (for example, shooting
hoops, calling a friend, or exercising). With a positive
outlook, you can stay interested enough to profit from
even the dullest books.

Lastly, monitor comprehension, or check your level of

involvement with the text periodically. Does your
attention wander? How soon or how often does your
attention wander? Can you determine why your attention
wanders? Ask yourself, “Am I understanding what I’m
reading?” Test yourself at intervals by asking, “What have
I just read?” and “What seems to be important?” Or stop
and try to answer the predicting questions you asked
while you were preparing to read. Some people mark
their texts—by underlining, highlighting, numbering, or
check marking—to help their understanding. It’s usually
best to mark a section of a text during a second reading,
when you are organizing to learn. Otherwise, you may
mark too much. You’ll practice techniques for marking
texts in Chapter 4.

Thinking Critically As a critical thinker, pay

attention to the concepts, ideas, interpretations, and
emotions you’ve read about, making connections to what
you have read or experienced, and asking questions based
on those reflections. At times, we may become so involved
in a reading that we stop to think about what we’ve just
discovered. Reading is a discovery process. Certainly, one
of the greatest pleasures in reading comes from these
discoveries. We are constantly learning new information
about our world and gaining insight and understanding
about ourselves and other people through our reading.
It’s not surprising that these insights make us stop and
think. Every author hopes that will happen when we read
his or her work. If a reading provides a lot of discovery
stops for you, remember to allow yourself enough time to
complete the work—and then enjoy your reading!
Thinking critically about what you read happens
naturally, but it’s often necessary to consciously plan to
reflect on what you’ve been reading. You need to think
not only about what you’re learning now but also about
how these ideas connect or relate to what you already
know. People understand and learn new information best
by connecting it with what they already know. Placing
new knowledge in the context of what you already know
requires time and thoughtful analysis.

There are a number of ways to actively organize your

reflections. You might first ask yourself, “How does this
information fit with what I’ve already learned and
experienced?” If the information is new, you might simply
insert it in the appropriate category in your “idea files.”
For example, if you recently learned the location of
Dubuque, Iowa, you can place that information in your
category of current information on U.S. geography. When
you reflect on the new information, you will also have to
decide how it connects with your previous knowledge.
Reflecting on the relationships between old and new
knowledge helps you to develop greater depth as a
 thinker. As you move forward in your college and work
careers, reflection is an invaluable tool for dealing with
increasingly complex ideas, concepts, and problems.

Critical thinking requires you to do more than collect

large masses of data on a topic. It challenges you to
combine what you learn in meaningful ways, to weigh
facts against opinions, and to evaluate the significance
and usefulness of ideas and solutions to problems.
Ultimately, it is the ability to make an informed opinion
about what you read. The following chapters provide
plenty of opportunities to develop and practice your
critical reading and thinking skills.
Organizing and Using What You Have Read
Once you have successfully completed the P and R steps of the PRO system,
you will be ready for O, organizing and using what you have read. You
will have already prepared to read, read actively, and thought critically about
what you read. Actually, you will probably have done some organizing of your
new knowledge already. By selecting, using, reciting, and examining yourself
on what you have learned from your reading, you will retain it for tests and
assignments in the future. All the steps in the reading process are
interrelated and sometimes overlap, so it is a pleasant surprise when you
arrive at the next step to find that you may have already done some of the
work.
The purpose of organizing what you’ve read is to be sure that you can use
your new information for exams and future assignments. The following steps,
which spell the word SURE, will provide many ways to organize your material.
Once you’ve practiced the different methods, you can decide which ones
work best for you.
S: Selecting the Facts and Concepts You Need to Know You must first
understand what you’ve read in order to select the important points to study.
You must also be flexible as you select facts and concepts to match the
learning objectives of different fields of study—such as biology, math, and
sociology—and to the different teaching approaches of individual instructors.
This text provides you with reading experience in many subject areas. The
following skills will help you select the facts and concepts you need to know.
Each of these skills is explained in greater detail in later chapters, and you
will practice each of them, some of them many times.
 Identifying the topic, main ideas, and important supporting points
 Identifying patterns of organization and relationships among ideas
 Recognizing the author’s purpose
  Understanding inferences
 Evaluating fact versus opinion
U: Using the Material You’ve Selected To understand the new ideas
you’re learning, you must use the material in some way. Good readers know
that it’s easy to be overconfident. It’s tempting to stop after you’ve read
something and feel you understand it, but really mastering new information
requires that you do something with it. You might use any of the following
activities. You’ll have plenty of chances in this book to practice these
methods with readings from different content areas.
 Underlining and annotating texts
 Answering questions (your preview questions, questions you write in
the margins as you actively read, instructor questions, questions at the
end of each chapter, and others)
 Completing charts, graphs, and timelines
 Concept mapping
 Outlining
 Summarizing
 Discussing (in your classroom, in a study group, with a tutor, or with a
friend)
R: Reciting the Information Once you have selected what you need to
know and you’ve organized the information in a manageable format, you
need to recite. Reciting is self-testing. To help you, each chapter in this text
ends with a Put It Together chart. When you complete the chapter and then
review the chart, ask yourself the following questions:
 Do I really know the material? Have I memorized the essential
concepts, definitions, and facts?
 Do I understand the important relationships and interpretations?
 Could I explain the information to someone else?
 Could I apply what I’ve learned in similar situations?
 Can I analyze, synthesize, and evaluate what I’ve learned?
 Can I use this knowledge to propose solutions to problems?
E: Examining Your Learning Periodically This is where the real work of
being a student happens. You must recite, or self-test, periodically to
remember what you need to know for exams and/or your future career. You
need to examine yourself at regular intervals to reinforce what you have
learned. A nursing student, for example, needs to know the names of muscles
and bones in the body to pass exams—and to practice nursing in the years to
come. Examining yourself helps you memorize the material and usually helps
you keep it in your long-term memory and not just pass exams. To help you
examine how well you’ve learned the skills and concepts in this textbook,
there are multiple mastery tests. One mastery test is at the end of each
chapter and a second mastery test for each chapter is located in Chapter 9.
Cumulative Mastery Tests are in Chapter 10. There are additional readings
in Chapter 11 as well for extra practice.
Educational psychologists know that regular reviews are the key to long-term
retention of what we have learned. Most forgetting occurs immediately. That
is, what you read today and what you learn in class lectures today will be
almost totally forgotten within 24 hours, unless you review it. When you learn
new information, try reviewing it on a schedule like this:
 Immediately
 Within 24 hours
 In two or three days
 In a week
 In two or three weeks

After the first review, you can spread your reviews further and further apart
and still remember what you need to know. Keep in mind that probably the
most enjoyable and effective way to review is in study groups. Study groups
can be your key to success as a student.

Preview and Use Your Text

Most textbooks are now written to make your job as a student easier. When
studying for your classes, it’s very important that you take advantage of all
the learning assistance that your textbook can give you. After all, you want to
be the person who realizes that there’s an answer key in the back of your
math book, or the person who knows how to find the meaning of an
unfamiliar word that appears in your print book or e-text!
Know Your Book Look at your textbook to find out what special features it
has to make learning the material easier for you. In a printed textbook, the
features have assigned locations explained in this list. However, for your e-
book you will need to check out the links on your home page to find out what
guidance is provided for you. Some of the most important possible features to
look for are:
  Table of contents—a list of the book’s major topics and subtopics in the
order they’ll be presented; organized in chapters, sections, or units,
with page numbers
 Index—a list, usually alphabetical, of all important topics, people, and
terms found in the text, with page numbers for each; located at the
end of a book
 Answer keys—sometimes included in a special section at the end of a
book or in an appendix to assist students
 Glossary—a list of important terms and their definitions; usually
located in a special section at the end of a book or in a menu bar in an
e-book
 Appendix—additional useful information, such as maps, lists, charts,
and tables; located at the end of a book
 Bibliography or references—a list of additional information on a topic,
including books, journals, audiovisual materials, and websites; located
at the end of each chapter or in a special section at the end of a book
Special features that you may find in an e-book:
 A search icon to help you find a topic, word, or name quickly
 An online dictionary
 A research tool to find additional articles or information
 Study tools to take notes, make flashcards, or do extra practice
Use Your Textbook and E-book Aids! Before you read, preview each
chapter to check out the aids that it might have. While you are reading,
be sure to pay attention to these aids and to use them.
 Look at the lists of chapter goals and check out questions or the
chapter review at the end of each chapter. These will help your brain
get ready to focus on the material.
 Look at the pictures, maps, charts, and graphs. Think about how they
further explain the content of the chapter.
 Figure out the charts. They often help you understand and remember
material that is difficult to grasp.
 Check out the information in the margins or in special boxes.
Sometimes there will be definitions of important words that you need
to know. Other times there will be brief explanations of the material
that may be all you need to remember. In an e-book, definitions may
appear when you click on or hover over a bold or highlighted word.
  Pay special attention to underlined, italicized, and boldfaced words.
The authors wrote them this way to emphasize that they are important
words that you probably will want to remember.
 Notice if there is a glossary in the back of the book or at the end of the
chapter. Figure out how to quickly find definitions in your e-book.
Frequently they will have a glossary or a search icon in addition to you
being able to hover over key words and terms.
 Find out if your textbook has an answer key. That way, you can check
your own work to find out immediately if you’re on the right track. With
an e-book, you will often get immediate feedback about your
responses.
Reading Visual Aids
Visual aids are images that assist the reader in understanding text, whether
that text is on a book page or a computer screen. They can be a picture, map,
cartoon, graph, table, pie chart, flow chart, infographic, or diagram, as well as
a figure, time line, or illustration in a story article, or text selection.
When you read a chapter in a textbook, an article in a newspaper, or a
website, always look at the visual aids as you prepare to read. Occasionally,
they only provide a pretty background or layout, but more often they provide
you with important information that will help you understand what you are
reading. Look at visual aids as you prepare to read. Study them again while
you are reading. And remember, you will need to “read” each visual aid
actively.
 Decide what you think is the purpose of the visual aid. Why is this
visual aid included? What does it mean in relation to the reading?
 Compare items in different parts of the visual aid. What is being
compared? What is the relationship between the parts? What is the
result of the comparison?
 Think Critically about what conclusions you can reach or what trends
you can analyze or predict based on the information the visual aid
provides. In some cases, you can consider this step as finding the main
idea of the visual aid.
When you examine a visual aid, especially one in a textbook, be sure to read
the title, the caption, and the credit line. The caption, a brief explanation that
appears immediately above or below the image, will help you determine the
purpose of the visual aid and reach some conclusions about the information it
provides. The credit line identifies the source of the information and who
created or supplied the image. Together, they will help you understand and
evaluate the image.
Reading Visual Aids
Visual aids are images that assist the reader in understanding text, whether
that text is on a book page or a computer screen. They can be a picture, map,
cartoon, graph, table, pie chart, flow chart, infographic, or diagram, as well as
a figure, time line, or illustration in a story article, or text selection.
When you read a chapter in a textbook, an article in a newspaper, or a
website, always look at the visual aids as you prepare to read. Occasionally,
they only provide a pretty background or layout, but more often they provide
you with important information that will help you understand what you are
reading. Look at visual aids as you prepare to read. Study them again while
you are reading. And remember, you will need to “read” each visual aid
actively.
 Decide what you think is the purpose of the visual aid. Why is this
visual aid included? What does it mean in relation to the reading?
 Compare items in different parts of the visual aid. What is being
compared? What is the relationship between the parts? What is the
result of the comparison?
 Think Critically about what conclusions you can reach or what trends
you can analyze or predict based on the information the visual aid
provides. In some cases, you can consider this step as finding the main
idea of the visual aid.
When you examine a visual aid, especially one in a textbook, be sure to read
the title, the caption, and the credit line. The caption, a brief explanation that
appears immediately above or below the image, will help you determine the
purpose of the visual aid and reach some conclusions about the information it
provides. The credit line identifies the source of the information and who
created or supplied the image. Together, they will help you understand and
evaluate the image.
Bar Graphs
Bar graphs show comparisons among different categories. Read the graph
and the labeling of each bar. The length of the bar shows the quantity, value,
or cost of each category. For example, Figure 1.1 at the beginning of Chapter
1 compares the earnings of people between the ages of 25 and 34 based on
their education level. It is referring to the “annual median income“ per year.
Basically, you will notice that income level goes up dramatically with the
more education you have.
Now, study the following bar graph to gain more information about the
impact of education on employment and earnings. Median means the middle
point; half would be above and half would be below the median.
Figure 1.3Unemployment Rates and Earnings by Educational
Attainment, 2018
Source: https://www.bls.gov/emp/documentation/education-training-
system.htm.
Line Graphs
Line graphs frequently show how statistics have changed over time. For
example, Figure 1.4 is a line graph that shows unemployment rates in the
United States based on educational attainment between 1992-2019. It
provides a visual representation for understanding how unemployment
among these different groups of people has changed over a period of almost
30 years. The horizontal line indicates the year while the vertical lines
indicate percentage of unemployment. The color of each line tells you which
group it tracks. Be sure to read all the information provided about any graph.
For example, when you look at Figure 1.4, you will see bands of light blue
columns and when you read the note on the bottom, you will see that it
explains that the shaded areas represent periods of recession.
Figure 1.4Unemployment Rates for Persons 25 Years and Older by
Educational Attainment
Skills and Concepts Explanation

Skills and Concepts Explanation

PRO Reading System A process to follow for developing effective reading habits

P = Prepare to Read Get ready to read.

1. Purpose (know what your goal is for reading)
2. Preview (quickly look at the material before you start to re
3. Previous knowledge (recognize what you already know abo
subject)
4. Predict (ask questions about what you think you will learn)

R = Read Actively and Stay focused as you read.

Think Critically
1. Become involved
2. Be interested
3. Be alert and attentive
4. Monitor your involvement and comprehension
5. Reflect as you read
6. Discover new ideas
7. Connect new knowledge to previous knowledge
8. Use critical thinking skills to connect and evaluate your ne
knowledge

O = Organize: SURE Do something with what you have read.

Skills and Concepts Explanation

Skills and Concepts Explanation

S = Select the facts and concepts you need to know

U = Use the material you’ve selected
R = Recite the information (self-test)
E = Examine your learning periodically (review)

Use a Textbook Remember to check out and use the special features that textboo
have, such as the following:
 Chapter introductions, which sometimes list goals
 Information in the margins
 Italicized and boldfaced words
 Charts and graphs, and illustrations
 Review questions
 Glossaries
 Appendices

eading 2Your Memory and Your Brain: 5 Key Principles —Dave Ellis

The following reading from one of the most popular student success
textbooks, Becoming a Master Student by Dave Ellis, offers advice about the
memory process. As you read, consider ways in which you can use the
information and techniques presented for sharpening your memory to help
you succeed in college and life.
Sharpening your memory starts with understanding how memory depends on
a squishy organ that’s inside your head—your brain.
— Dave Ellis
1 Following are five key things to remember about how you remember and
learn. They will introduce you to ideas and suggestions that you will find
useful to include in your study process.
Principle 1: See Memory as Something You Do—Not Something You
Have.
2 Once upon a time, people talked about human memory as if it were a
closet. You stored individual memories there as you would old shirts and stray
socks. Remembering something was a matter of rummaging through all that
stuff. If you were lucky, you found what you wanted. This view of memory
creates some problems. For one thing, closets can get crowded. Things too
easily disappear. Even with the biggest closet, you eventually run out of
space. If you want to pack some new memories in there—well, too bad.
There’s no room.
3 Brain researchers shattered this image to bits. Memory is not a closet. It’s
not a place or a thing. Instead, memory is a process that is based in the
brain. On a conscious level, memories appear as distinct and unconnected
mental events: words, sensations, images. They can include details from the
distant past—the smell of cookies baking in your grandmother’s kitchen, or
the feel of sunlight warming your face through the window of your first-grade
classroom. On a biological level, each of those memories involves millions of
brain cells, or neurons, firing chemical messages to one another. If you could
observe these exchanges in real time, you’d see regions of cells all over the
brain glowing with electrical charges at speeds that would put a computer to
shame.
4 When a series of brain cells connects several times in a similar pattern, the
result is a memory. Psychologist Donald Hebb explains it this way: “Neurons
which fire together, wire together.” It means that memories are not really
stored. Instead, remembering is a process in which you encode information
as links between active neurons that fire together. You also decode, or
reactivate, neurons that wired together in the past which allows you to
retrieve information, i.e., “remember.” Memory is the probability that certain
patterns of brain activity will occur again in the future. In effect, you recreate
a memory each time you recall it.
5 Scientists tell us that the human brain is “plastic.” Whenever you efficiently
encode and decode, your brain changes physically. You grow more
connections between neurons. The more you learn, the greater the number of
connections. For all practical purposes, there’s no limit to how many
memories your brain can process. Knowing this allows you to step out of your
crowded mental closet into a world of infinite possibilities.
Principle 2: Remember that the Memory Process Works in Stages.
6 The memory process consists of a series of events. To make the most of
your memory, apply an appropriate memory strategy when one of these
events take place:
 Pay attention to sense experiences. Memories start as events that
we see, hear, feel, touch, or taste. Memory strategies at this stage are
about choosing where to focus your attention.
 “Move” sense experiences to short-term memory. Sensory
memories last for only a few seconds. If you don’t want them to
disappear, then immediately apply a strategy for moving them into
 short-term memory, such as reciting the information to yourself several
times. Short-term memory is a place where you can “hold” those
fleeting sensory memories for up to several minutes.
 Encode for long-term memory. If you want to recall information for
more than a few minutes, then wire the new neural connections in a
more stable way. This calls for a more sophisticated memory strategy—
one that allows you to refire the connections for days, weeks, months,
or even years into the future.
 Decode important information on a regular basis. The more often
you recall information, the more stable the memory becomes. To
remember it, retrieve it.
Principle 3: Sink Deeply into Sense Experience.
7 Your brain’s contact with the world comes through your five senses. So
anchor your learning in as many senses as possible. For example:
 Create images. Draw mind map summaries of your readings and
lecture notes. Include visual images. Put main ideas in larger letters
and brighter colors.
 Immerse yourself in concrete experiences. Say that you’re in a
music appreciation class and learning about jazz. Go to a local jazz club
or concert to see and hear a live performance.
Principle 4: Choose Strategies for Encoding.
8 Signs of encoding mastery are making choices about what to remember
and how to remember it. This in turn makes it easier for you to decode, or
recall, the material at a crucial point in the future—such as during a test.
9 Say that you’re enjoying a lecture in introduction to psychology. It really
makes sense. In fact, it’s so interesting that you choose to just sit and listen—
without taking notes. Two days later, you’re studying for a test and wish
you’d made a different choice. You remember that the lecture was
interesting, but you don’t recall much else. In technical terms, your decision
to skip note taking was an encoding error.
10 So you decide to change your behavior and take extensive notes during
the next psychology lecture. Your goal is to capture everything the instructor
says. This too has mixed results—a case of writer’s cramp and 10 pages of
dense, confusing scribbles. Oops!—another encoding error.
11 Effective encoding is finding a middle ground between these two
extremes. Make moment-to-moment choices about what you want to
remember. As you read or listen to a lecture, distinguish between key points,
transitions, and minor details. Predict what material is likely to appear on a
test. You also should stay alert for ideas you can actively apply. These are
things you capture in your notes. Another strategy for effective encoding is to
find and create patterns. Your brain is a pattern-making machine. It excels at
taking random bits of information and translating them into meaningful
wholes.
Principle 5: Choose Strategies for Decoding.
12 You’ve probably experienced the “tip of your tongue” phenomenon. You
know that the fact or idea that you want to remember is just within reach—so
close that you can almost feel it. Even so, the neural connections stop just
short of total recall. This is an example of a decoding glitch. No need to panic.
You have many options at this point. These are known as decoding strategies.
For example:
 Relax. Your mood affects your memory. The information that you want
to recall is less likely to appear if you’re feeling overly stressed. Taking
a long, deep breath and relaxing muscles can work wonders for your
body and your brain.
 Let it go for the moment. when information is at the tip of your
tongue, one natural response is to try hard to remember it. However,
this can just create more stress that in turn interferes with decoding.
Another option is to stop trying to decode and to do something else for
the moment. Don’t be surprised if the memory you were seeking
suddenly pops into your awareness while you’re in the midst of an
unrelated activity.
 Recall something else. Many encoding strategies are based on
association—finding relationships between something you already
know and something new that you want to remember. This means that
you can often recall information by taking advantage of those
associations. Say that you’re taking a multiple-choice test and can’t
remember the answer to a question. Instead of worrying about this,
just move on. You might come across a later question on the same
topic that triggers the answer to the earlier question. This happens
when a key association is activated.
 Recreate the original context. Encoding occurs at specific times
and places. If a fact or idea eludes you at the moment, then see
whether you can recall where you were when you first learned it. Think
about what time of day that learning took place and what kind of mood
you were in. Sometimes you can decode the information merely by
remembering where you wrote the information in your class notes or
where on the page you saw it in a book.