Doc Meek

Posts Tagged ‘making mental movies’

I previously wrote about the fun “Triple M Strategy” (Making Mental Movies): the easy way to increase reading comprehension and writing skills.

I did not remember to share some other aspects of Making Mental Movies.
I say to young and old alike:

“Some of you already know how to make mental movies and you
are doing it all the time, even if you haven’t thought about it yet.

“People who make mental movies of what they are seeing or
hearing or reading can easily remember what they have seen
or heard or read about, because they don’t have to remember
what they saw or heard or read about.

“These lucky people just re-wind the movie and play it in their
mind (projected out on to a screen in front of them, a small screen
or a big screen). These lucky people can then easily see what it
was they saw or heard or read about. It is easy to answer questions
when you can see your own movie on your own private screen
and see what happened.

“Hey, you don’t have to remember anything! Just look, see, say! 😮

What if you are not one of these lucky people who can make their
own movies and answer questions easily out of what they see on
their own private movie screen?

“Some people don’t know yet how to make movies in their head,
which they project outwards on to a screen in front of them. It
could be a smaller closer screen, or a bigger farther away screen..

“I used to spend a lot of time teaching people how to make their
own mental movies and project them out onto their own screen
in front of them.

“Then I discovered a big secret!

“It doesn’t matter whether you know how to make mental movies
or not. It doesn’t matter if you know how to project mental movies
out on to your own private screen in front of you.

“If you already know how to do this, great! You are lucky!

“If you don’t already know how to do this, it doesn’t matter!
You are just as lucky as the others! Wow. 😮

“If you don’t know how to make mental movies and project them
out on to a screen in front of you, just pretend!

“Just pretend!

“Pretending works just as well as if you already knew how! WOW!

Doc Meek

Sherwood Park, Alberta, CANADA; and South Jordan, Utah, USA

A Mom asked me, “How do you make reading comprehension go up?”

A teacher asked, “What steps can I take to help the students improve their memories of what they have read?”

The Triple M is the short answer:

“Make Mental Movies.”

Here is an excerpt of what I wrote to the teacher (which I also shared with the Mom):

Slow reading is symptomatic of inadequate comprehension in the reading process. When you slow down and read even slower (at first) and take the time to learn how to make pictures (still photos, and especially movies) in your mind’s eye as you slowly read forward now, you will find two astounding things happening:

(1) The brain quickly learns to make movies faster and faster as you persist in this initially slow process.

(2) Even when the initial reading is not fast, the movies dramatically increase comprehension and memory, so the brain quickly figures out, hey, I can go faster now. As the speed of reading and making movies simultaneously goes up, astoundingly and paradoxically, the comprehension and memory zoom up also.

Hey, try it with some simple “Dick and Jane” stuff initially and don’t even read a full sentence at first. Example:

“The black dog chased the red ball down the street,” is not read altogether to completion at first.

First you read only “The black dog…” and make a picture in your head of a black dog.

Then you read only “chased the red ball” and make a movie in your head of the black dog chasing the red ball.
Then you read “down the street” and make a movie with background now, if you haven’t already done that background part, and see the action!

Then, rewind the movie by twirling your hand around in the air in a tight circle, as if you were rewinding a video “manually.”
Smile and laugh, eh?

Then, as I say to my proteges that I am mentoring:

“Now remember, don’t remember everything;
just watch the movie and see what happens.” 😮

After they watch the movie, I ask them questions to see what their comprehension and memory is. I ask “sneak questions” like, “What is the dog running on?” Or, “What is in the background?” Or “What is in the sky above?” Or “What is in front of the dog?” Or “What is the dog running on?” Or
“Does the dog have a short tail or a long one?”

The beauty of this protocol and the questions is that everybody has different answers to the same “content” question, proving that individuality and vastly improved memory and comprehension go hand in hand.

Beautiful, eh?

Here’s the “goofy mantra”:

Go… slowly… even more slowly… at first.
Then as you patiently plod along… smile… at first… laugh… the pace picks up automatically…
slowly over time… and soon…

You are going a hundred miles an hour and memory and comprehension are beautiful, not to mention your movies.

Start slowly… very slowly… lots of time to learn to go fast!!! 😮

Love your initial lack of speed now . . . smile . . . laugh . . .

Have fun being a slow really fast learner. 😮

Doc Meek, Active Learning Specialist

Sherwood Park, Alberta, CANADA; South Jordan, Utah, USA