Page 289 - Use Your Memory

YOUR MEMORY'S RHYTHMS
in which you are learning in such a way as to enable understanding
to remain high without giving the memory a chance to sag too
deeply in the middle. This is easily accomplished by learning to
divide your learning periods into the most beneficial time units.
These units, on the average, turn out to be between ten and sixty
minutes, for example, thirty minutes, as shown in the graph below.
If your time is organised in this way, several advantages immediate-
ly become apparent:
1 Each of the inevitable dips in your memory during learning
will not be as deep as if you had carried on without the break.
2 Instead of only two high points of recall at the beginning and
end of the learning period, you will have as many as eight 'begin-
ning and ending' high points of recall.
3 Because you are taking breaks, you will be far more rested
during your next learning period than you would have been had
you continued to work without breaks. The additional advantage
of this is that when you are rested, both recall and understanding
will function more easily.

A graph showing which time units give maximum recall
4 Because when you are taking breaks you are both more rested
and recalling more of each learning session, your comprehension
of the next new section in which you find yourself after the break
will be greater because you will have laid a firmer foundation in
which to nourish and associate the new information. The person
who has not taken such breaks, in addition to a growing fatigue,
will be recalling less of what he has learned before, and therefore
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