We don’t have an alphabet song where I’m from, but I simply remember the list of letters. I’ll just mentally recite “a, b, c, d, e...” very fast. If I need to do figure out what letter’s next after one somewhere in the middle I don’t need to recite all of it from the beginning, but I also don’t immediately recall the next letter; I just start reciting it a bit before, e.g. if you’ll ask me what’s after “N” I’ll do a very quick “m,n,o,p” in my mind and then say “O”. I’m not exactly sure how I pick the starting point, it’s automatic; it seems there are some “fixed” starting points for some reason (that come up often) and I usually pick the nearest one; for instance if you asked me what’s after “o” I’ll also start at “m”. Very rarely it happens that I start with a letter following the reference one, then I’ll stop after a few letters and try again with an earlier stop-point.
(I recite the alphabet mentally in my native language, and I suspect the rhythm of the syllables generates some break-points unconsciously, and they probably differ with language. Though I just tried it and it works in English too, it just seems like it takes a bit more time to “think of” a starting point; I wouldn’t be surprised if my brain did a two-way conversion before I could notice it.)
ETA: I just tried singing the song, and I noticed that after H or so I actually have to stop and do it “my way” very fast to remember what’s next. Apparently having to think of the notes (as I said, I’m not used to it sung) is enough to disturb the recall.
Also, this seems to be my an automatic method for memorizing lists; I have terrible memory and it’s very hard for me to memorize abstract things like names, numbers and dates, but the few that I do manage—a few phone numbers and the first 25 or so decimals of π—I remember as a quick list of individual digits. When I have to tell someone my phone number, for example, I’ll recite quickly digit-by-digit in my head and then pronounce it in a more common format (i.e. grouped into tens and hundreds). Similarly to the alphabet, if the translation to groups is slow enough (e.g. if I have to say it in French or something), I’ll start forgetting after a group or two and have to recite it mentally again to keep going.
We don’t have an alphabet song where I’m from, but I simply remember the list of letters. I’ll just mentally recite “a, b, c, d, e...” very fast. If I need to do figure out what letter’s next after one somewhere in the middle I don’t need to recite all of it from the beginning, but I also don’t immediately recall the next letter; I just start reciting it a bit before, e.g. if you’ll ask me what’s after “N” I’ll do a very quick “m,n,o,p” in my mind and then say “O”. I’m not exactly sure how I pick the starting point, it’s automatic; it seems there are some “fixed” starting points for some reason (that come up often) and I usually pick the nearest one; for instance if you asked me what’s after “o” I’ll also start at “m”. Very rarely it happens that I start with a letter following the reference one, then I’ll stop after a few letters and try again with an earlier stop-point.
Me too, and I seem to have a checkpoint at M too.
(I recite the alphabet mentally in my native language, and I suspect the rhythm of the syllables generates some break-points unconsciously, and they probably differ with language. Though I just tried it and it works in English too, it just seems like it takes a bit more time to “think of” a starting point; I wouldn’t be surprised if my brain did a two-way conversion before I could notice it.)
Fun fact: it takes me much shorter (not much longer than my usual reaction times) to translate the words for ‘left’ and ‘right’ across any two languages I know than to actually tell which side is which—I have to imagine I’m holding a pen and that’s the right hand, which can take as long as one second.
ETA: I just tried singing the song, and I noticed that after H or so I actually have to stop and do it “my way” very fast to remember what’s next. Apparently having to think of the notes (as I said, I’m not used to it sung) is enough to disturb the recall.
No problem at all with the song, but it’s still slower than the other way, by about a factor of 2. Also, I don’t have checkpoints with the song, I have to start from A. (Well, I have one at W but it’s not very useful.)
Also, this seems to be my an automatic method for memorizing lists; I have terrible memory and it’s very hard for me to memorize abstract things like names, numbers and dates, but the few that I do manage—a few phone numbers and the first 25 or so decimals of π—I remember as a quick list of individual digits.
Some strings of numbers I remember as sequences of digits spoken, others as sequences of digits written, others as a series of finger movements I make to type them—or in certain cases, to play them on a guitar if they were a tablature. (And I remember the digits of pi through the mnemonic “How I need a drink, alcoholic of course, after the heavy lectures involving quantum mechanics”.)
OK, this is actually how I do it now. I shouldn’t have said alphabet song, because it’s really more of a list. However, I normally find that I have to start at the beginning.
I think I also do this for other common things: social security number, phone number, I think even spelling words.
We don’t have an alphabet song where I’m from, but I simply remember the list of letters. I’ll just mentally recite “a, b, c, d, e...” very fast. If I need to do figure out what letter’s next after one somewhere in the middle I don’t need to recite all of it from the beginning, but I also don’t immediately recall the next letter; I just start reciting it a bit before, e.g. if you’ll ask me what’s after “N” I’ll do a very quick “m,n,o,p” in my mind and then say “O”. I’m not exactly sure how I pick the starting point, it’s automatic; it seems there are some “fixed” starting points for some reason (that come up often) and I usually pick the nearest one; for instance if you asked me what’s after “o” I’ll also start at “m”. Very rarely it happens that I start with a letter following the reference one, then I’ll stop after a few letters and try again with an earlier stop-point.
(I recite the alphabet mentally in my native language, and I suspect the rhythm of the syllables generates some break-points unconsciously, and they probably differ with language. Though I just tried it and it works in English too, it just seems like it takes a bit more time to “think of” a starting point; I wouldn’t be surprised if my brain did a two-way conversion before I could notice it.)
ETA: I just tried singing the song, and I noticed that after H or so I actually have to stop and do it “my way” very fast to remember what’s next. Apparently having to think of the notes (as I said, I’m not used to it sung) is enough to disturb the recall.
Also, this seems to be my an automatic method for memorizing lists; I have terrible memory and it’s very hard for me to memorize abstract things like names, numbers and dates, but the few that I do manage—a few phone numbers and the first 25 or so decimals of π—I remember as a quick list of individual digits. When I have to tell someone my phone number, for example, I’ll recite quickly digit-by-digit in my head and then pronounce it in a more common format (i.e. grouped into tens and hundreds). Similarly to the alphabet, if the translation to groups is slow enough (e.g. if I have to say it in French or something), I’ll start forgetting after a group or two and have to recite it mentally again to keep going.
Me too, and I seem to have a checkpoint at M too.
Fun fact: it takes me much shorter (not much longer than my usual reaction times) to translate the words for ‘left’ and ‘right’ across any two languages I know than to actually tell which side is which—I have to imagine I’m holding a pen and that’s the right hand, which can take as long as one second.
No problem at all with the song, but it’s still slower than the other way, by about a factor of 2. Also, I don’t have checkpoints with the song, I have to start from A. (Well, I have one at W but it’s not very useful.)
Some strings of numbers I remember as sequences of digits spoken, others as sequences of digits written, others as a series of finger movements I make to type them—or in certain cases, to play them on a guitar if they were a tablature. (And I remember the digits of pi through the mnemonic “How I need a drink, alcoholic of course, after the heavy lectures involving quantum mechanics”.)
OK, this is actually how I do it now. I shouldn’t have said alphabet song, because it’s really more of a list. However, I normally find that I have to start at the beginning.
I think I also do this for other common things: social security number, phone number, I think even spelling words.