Making my custom mnemonic's better

[Kgw]

Hello all,

I’ve been customizing my mnemonic’s based on the WaniKani mnemonic recommends, and I would like some advice on how I can maintain better mnemonics. Sometimes I find it a bit of a hit and miss.

Example 1; 入力 = にゅうりょく = Input
Every time I 入力 my password into WaniKani, I get a にゅうりょく out message. The message flashes a rainbow of colour that turns my room into a rave! The message says, “Welcome to the にゅうりょく rave 入力 message!”.

Example 2; 七日 = なのか = Seventh Day
I’ve been inside for the longest 七日 of my life. Which is great because I’ve been putting off driving my car. Being the 七日, I go outside. While on the phone to Jonno he asks me if I’m fine to drive? I look up in surprise. I say to Jonno, なのか. What he says. With a smile of relief I repeat, なのか! This 七日 was well worth it!

Usually example two ends with me shortcutting the mnemonic to the conversation on the phone and noticing the absents of my car. The mnemonic while being personal is an emotionally real experience too, I really don’t enjoy driving. While example one is a wild idea of my room being bombarded with overstimulating colour and follows WaniKani’s theme of being very over the top and ridiculous.

Sometimes I find I get lost in my mnemonic and can’t remember which word was being used to define it. Which I notice feels like the mnemonic has over complicated the association while being too niche and lack enforcement on the word being learned.

What do people find better when tailoring mnemonics to there own ideas? What are better ways to stimulate the imagination that avoids over complicated mnemonics and defines the word without confusion?

It’s possible I don’t full understand the process of making mnemonics either. I’d like to hear your thoughts and advice.

Thanks!

[Humin]

A good mnemonic is one that works. To be blunt though, I can’t parse yours at all, so I can’t give further advice. Your second example especially feels like trying to read while suffering from carbon monoxide poisoning or severe brain fog.

[Kgw]

A good mnemonic is one that works. To be blunt though, I can’t parse yours at all, so I can’t give further advice. Your second example especially feels like trying to read while suffering from carbon monoxide poisoning or severe brain fog.

Correct. Which is why I’m asking about,

What do people find better when tailoring mnemonics to there own ideas? What are better ways to stimulate the imagination that avoids over complicated mnemonics and defines the word without confusion?

I realise my mnemonic are bad, I want to improve them. I want to avoid writing them like I’m slowing dying from a lack of oxygen while communicating to emergency services. Maybe I should have been more clear about what I’m asking help for, as the example are the issue and not the solution to my problem.

[RebBlue]

It seems like you’ve got a random story with the kanji and reading shoved in at random. How mnemonics are supposed to work is you look at the word, remember the story based on the word, and then remember the answer.

How do you get from the word to your mnemonic in order to remember the meaning or the reading? It seems like you’re trying to brute force the memorisation and add a story on top afterwards.

So, like with 入力, those kanji are enter and power, so you’re mnemonic would start there and end with the meaning of input. The reading should follow from the individual kanji, but if you need a reminder in the mnemonic, continue to story to be specific to that reading.

For 七日, the meaning follows from the kanji very easily, so you only need a mnemonic for the reading. Does it being the seventh day help you remember you are in your car? Does the なのか mean anything specific to you or could it be any sound you are saying?

I don’t come up with my own mnemonics often, but here’s an example of a mnemonic that kinda worked for me with 家賃: oh no! I can’t pay my rent! Better use kaching! (やちん)

So, in starting with rent, getting to a rent related word, which gets me to the reading. Kaching isn’t pronounced the same as やちん but got my brain close enough to remember it.

Remember the goal is to eventually not need the mnemonic, not to force one in unnaturally.

[Kgw]

Yeah really interesting. I’ve never used mnemonics before so this is totally new to me. I also had a lot of developmental issues with my hearing as a child that caused a lot of pronunciation issues with my speech so words I think and pronounce are strange (Hearing still really poor but I’ve had surgery recently to help support the underlining issue). This also makes my spelling really bad.

I guess maybe that’s why my mnemonics are so strange. They’re a way for me to overcompensate my impairment. I think today I’ll need to learn a lot more about mnemonics and see if anyone has similar issues as I do. I just don’t know enough about the problem to communicate my issues so it’s going to take some time building the correct definitions to communicate with.

Thanks, @RebBlue.

[Kgw]

So I did a bit of reading and watched videos. I think what I’ve been doing is a combination of chunking sentences, while using memory palace. I then take those two ideas to form the mnemonic. I read a book a long time ago that talks about exercises that help memory. Chunking and memory palace are great for remember the order of something. Like, a deck of cards or positions of pieces on a chess board. It seem more limited as a tool for learning language. Learning the order of 52 cards using memory palace and chucking is great because that order never changes. Using it for language… well you probably can see the issue.

While these techniques can still be used, as you rightful said, the goal is to not need the mnemonics anymore. I certainly forgot that and as you said, I was brute forcing the concept.

Example 2; 七日 = なのか = Seventh Day
I’ve been inside for the longest 七日 of my life. Which is great because I’ve been putting off driving my car. Being the 七日, I go outside. While on the phone to Jonno he asks me if I’m fine to drive? I look up in surprise. I say to Jonno, なのか. What he says. With a smile of relief I repeat, なのか! This 七日 was well worth it!

This is a pretty personal sentence for me so I found it easier to remember. I see myself in my room, and notice myself on the phone walking out my door towards where my car is parked. I don’t like driving so the emotional sense of relief reminds me that I don’t have to drive.

Building the world lets me leverage memory palace, then chunking each moment into separate stories lets me follow the conclusion. Which comes to why I felt like I was struggling so badly when some of my mnemonics became just words at random. I couldn’t always remember the kanji or vocab for the story, but I always remembered the story itself.

家賃: oh no! I can’t pay my rent! Better use kaching! (やちん)

This is infinitely better than what I would have come up with. As an example I would have said something like;

“家賃: “oh no!” I realise that I can’t pay my 家賃 because I don’t have any money in my bank account. I remember I can use the app, やちん. Now I won’t be kicked out for not having paid 家賃. Thank you, やちん!”

I just look at my version and I already see how much it contrasts and the problem I was causing myself. My formula is unspecific and unnecessarily complicated, and honestly just the wrong approach. If your version is direct, mine get’s lost along the way! Talking about my bank account, reminding myself of the app, and being relieved I wont be evicted, are all irrelevant points. I also do this thing where I use the Vocab or Kanji in place of the actual word. I thought that would help me switch my mind into thinking in Japanese instead of English. I didn’t realise that the combination of English and Japanese in a sentence would cause additional confusion. I tried to support an idea, and in doing so created my own problem.

Thanks again, @RebBlue. You’ve given me a lot of advice on these forms and it’s always be really invaluable.