How to use this resource

These activities are designed for students to use on their own or with partners. They are quick activities that shouldn’t take more than five minutes. They do not require any other resources, except perhaps a piece of paper to cover over the words.

The first ten activities are simple recall tasks where students have to retain brief pieces of information in the short term. These are fairly simple to begin with, but increase in difficulty as they are required to remember jumbled words or nonsense words, and so on.

The final five tasks introduce strategies that are hugely helpful for increasing memory skills. These are tools for life! Teachers can build on the principles outlined in these activities to create their own tasks based on topics of study, spelling lists, interests of their students … the sky’s the limit!

Explain to your students how the brain remembers best (below). Include these steps in presenting your memory activities and keep reminding your students that every time they use these strategies, they are strengthening the paths of memory and helping their brain to do their best.