Building factual knowledge about the U.S. presidents via pictorial mnemonic strategies

Abstract

In individually administered treatment sessions, tenth-grade students first learned the number (chronological order) of several randomly selected U.S. presidents by employing either mnemonic (memory-enhancing) illustrations or their own preferred method of study. Subsequently, mnemonic-illustration, mnemonicimagery, or no-strategy control materials were provided for the task of additionally learning some biographical information about each of the same presidents. All types of second-phase mnemonic instruction greatly facilitated students' recall of the biographical information, and neither positive nor negative transfer effects associated with the initial number-learning task were detected. Considered in the discussion is the educational utility of mnemonic techniques for enabling students to acquire large amounts of factual material efficiently.