Fluent Forever: How to Learn Any Language Fast and Never Forget It

by Gabriel Wyner

• Learn the sound system of your language • Bind those sounds to images • Bind those images to your past experiences

Extra repetition is known as overlearning, and it doesn’t help long-term memory at all. Can you remember a single fact from the last school test you crammed for? Can you even remember the test itself?

When you study by reading through a list multiple times, you’re practicing reading, not recall. If you want to get better at recalling something, you should practice recalling it.

KEY POINTS • Memory tests are most effective when they’re challenging. The closer you get to forgetting a word, the more ingrained it will become when you finally remember it. • If you can consistently test yourself right before you forget, you’ll double the effectiveness of every test.