I had a Hebrew teacher who assigned the following exercise on the first day of class: Memorize the alphabet backwards. Once the pupils knew the alphabet backwards and forwards, we were able to look things up quickly in the dictionary.
I became much more familiar with the Latin alphabet after I performed the following exercise: Type out every two-letter string, in alphabetical order. This was laborious because I didn’t know where the keys were on the keyboard; perhaps that contributed to its effectiveness.
I learned the alphabet very early (~2 years old), and when I was about 4 or 5, I learned how to say it backwards without referring to any outside cues. I can remember saying it backwards and really having to focus on visualizing the alphabet while doing it. It’s perhaps because of this forward-backward learning that I know the alphabet in the same way I know the digits 0-9. There is no process to create the list in my mind, it’s just there, permanently.
So, maybe practicing saying the alphabet backwards is a good memory aid. But also, visualizing the letters should also be helpful if you are able to visualize letters at all (some people aren’t).
Type out every two-letter string, in alphabetical order.
A similar method works for developing one’s ability at scrabble. The “two letter scrabble words” deck in Anki seems altogether too much like an exhaustive enumeration of permutations.
I had a Hebrew teacher who assigned the following exercise on the first day of class: Memorize the alphabet backwards. Once the pupils knew the alphabet backwards and forwards, we were able to look things up quickly in the dictionary.
I became much more familiar with the Latin alphabet after I performed the following exercise: Type out every two-letter string, in alphabetical order. This was laborious because I didn’t know where the keys were on the keyboard; perhaps that contributed to its effectiveness.
I learned the alphabet very early (~2 years old), and when I was about 4 or 5, I learned how to say it backwards without referring to any outside cues. I can remember saying it backwards and really having to focus on visualizing the alphabet while doing it. It’s perhaps because of this forward-backward learning that I know the alphabet in the same way I know the digits 0-9. There is no process to create the list in my mind, it’s just there, permanently.
So, maybe practicing saying the alphabet backwards is a good memory aid. But also, visualizing the letters should also be helpful if you are able to visualize letters at all (some people aren’t).
A similar method works for developing one’s ability at scrabble. The “two letter scrabble words” deck in Anki seems altogether too much like an exhaustive enumeration of permutations.