The concept of memory anchors is a very interesting one. One can do wonders by employing these anchors. The memory anchors can be used to remember bits of data. These are especially useful, if you want to remember a list of things along with the serial number.

We have discussed in previous posts, that memory works by association. If we want to learn a new piece of information, we have to associate that with some base data. What we need to do is to create this base data. The memory anchors system will help you to create the base data with which we can link new data.

Here, we will give each number from 1 to 10(or 20) a visual, based on a particular concept. The different types of anchors are as follows:

Knowledge anchors

Numbers are assigned visuals based on the general knowledge which we have.

Rhyme anchors

Numbers are assigned visuals based on the rhyming words of the numbers themselves.

Shape anchors

Numbers are converted into visuals based on the shape of the numbers.

Alphabet anchors

Alphabets from A to Z are assigned a visual starting with each letter of the alphabet.

Ultimate anchors

Numbers are assigned visuals based on The Ultimate System.

Now Let us talk about them in detail

KNOWLEDGE ANCHORS

Let us try to assign visuals for numbers from 1 to 20 based on general knowledge.

1 Gold medal The person who secures the first place in a running race is
awarded a gold medal
2 Switch A switch has two positions: ON and OFF
3 Tricycle Has three wheels
4 Table A table has four legs
5 Hand A hand has five fingers
6 Alarm clock You set up the alarm clock to ring at 6.00 am
7 Seven up The drink Seven-Up
8 Octopus An octopus has eight tentacles
9 Planets There are nine planets in our
solar system
10 Bowling Alley Ten Pins

11 Football Stadium A Football team consists of eleven players
12 Eggs A tray of twelve (dozen) eggs
13 Teen Teenage starts from age of 13
14 Flowers February 14 is the Valentines Day and people exchange flowers
15 Fighter Plane

Read the explanations given for each of the 15 anchors. It should not take much time for you to learn the anchors. Once these anchors are fixed in the mind, you will be able to use them to link new data to them.

Let us say you want to remember the following list of 15 items which you need to get from the market:

1 Toothpaste
2 Carrots
3 Cornflakes
4 Tennis Ball
5 Eraser
6 Notebook
7 Pencil
8 Dry-cleaning clothes (pick up)
9 Eggs
10 Bulb
11 Noodles
12 Soap
13 Shoe Polish
14 Matchbox
15 Batteries

There is no need of writing things down for being able to remember the above list. Just use Knowledge.

Anchors. Use VAP and CoMBS (Explained In Previous Posts) to link each item with one anchor.

Given below is a list of associations to give you an idea as to how to learn the list using General Anchors.

1 Gold – medal -Toothpaste You squeeze the gold medal and toothpaste comes out
2 Switch – Carrots – When you press the switch, a carrot jumps out of the socket
3 Tricycle – Cornflakes – An tricycle is filled up with cornflakes
4 Table – Tennis Ball – On the table, you are playing with a tennis ball
5 Hand – Eraser – You use an eraser to erase the fortune lines on your hand (palm)
6 Alarm – clock -Notebook An alarm clock is taking notes on your sleeping habits
7 Seven up – Pencil – You make a hole in a seven-up bottle with a pencil
8 Octopus – Dry-cleaning clothes – When you pick up your clothes from drycleaning, you find an octopus in one of the pockets
9 Planets – Candle – All the planets are being lit by candles

10 Bowling – Alley Bulb – In the bowling alley, you see bulbs instead of the pins
11 Football Stadium – Noodles – Hundreds of noodles packets are falling in a football stadium
12 Eggs – Soap You break open an egg and find a soap inside it
13 Teen – Shoe Polish – A teenager polishing shoes
14 Flowers – Matchbox – On the head of each match stick, there is a flower
15 F-15 – Batteries An F-15 ejects a series of batteries on a battlefield

RHYME ANCHORS

In this section, we will assign visuals to the numbers from 1 to 10 based on the rhyming words of the numbers.

1 Sun
2 Shoe
3 Tree
4 Door
5 Dive
6 Sticks
7 Heaven
8 Gate
9 Wine
10 Den

The word SUN is a rhyming word of ONE. Similarly the word SHOE is a rhyming word of TWO. In the same manner, all the numbers are given rhyming words.

Just the way you used the KNOWLEDGE ANCHORS, you can use the RHYME ANCHORS also to remember any list consisting of 10 items.

SHAPE ANCHORS

Here, we will assign visuals to the numbers from 1 to 10 based on the shape of the numbers.

A candle looks like the figure 1. Similarly a sand timer looks like the figure 8. Look at the visuals provided beneath for explanations for other numbers.

1 Candle
2 Duck
3 Spectacles
4 Boat
5 Hook
6 Hockey stick
7 Street light

8 Sand timer
9 Balloon with a
string
10 Bat & ball

ALPHABET ANCHORS

If you have to remember a list consisting of more than 20 items, then the ALPHABET ANCHORS will be very handy to you. You can use these anchors to remember a list of upto 26 words. The alphabet from A to Z are assigned a word each starting with the same letter.

ULTIMATE ANCHORS

This is the last set of anchors. The Ultimate anchors are based on the sounds associated with each digit. The sounds are same as those of The Ultimate System.

Apart from helping you remember lists containing more than 20 or 30 items, the phonetic anchors will be of extreme help in a variety of other situations.