Memory Games

Last Monday I was standing at the sink washing dishes, and William was standing beside me on his indispensable stool playing in the water. For some reason I had the thought to see how many nursery rhymes and songs William knew, so I started saying the first couple of words and letting him finish. If he ever stopped, then I would say the next word, and he would fill in for a while etc. It was a fun game and he really enjoyed it. I was amazed at how many he knows by heart. He knew every one that I could think of, even ones that we have only read a couple of times, and most of them he didn't need any help on. It was so much fun to recite all of them, and sing songs with him, and I was so amazed at his memory, that I thought if he could memorize all those why shouldn't he be able to memorize scriptures? So I decided to start right then.

It was on the spot, and I was just trying to think of a short scripture that I could start with, and the first one that came to mind was Moses 1:39, "For this is my work and my glory, to bring to pass the immortality and eternal life of man." I would just say a phrase at a time and have him repeat it, and we probably only said it 3 or 4 times total. A little while later he was doing something else and I heard him say "For this is my work." I thought it was interesting that it was rattling around in his brain already. I figured we would just say it a couple of times a day, and I would see how long it took him to learn. We said it 2-4 times on Tuesday and Wednesday and on Thursday he had the whole thing memorized, only needing one or two words. It's really cute to hear him say words like "immortality." Now he can say the whole thing completely by himself, including the reference.



Since this was such a success, I decided that we would do one scripture every week, or however long he needs for longer scriptures. We are starting with the first Article of Faith this week and I think we will work on memorizing the Articles of Faith first. It is really a lot of fun and he really enjoys learning new words and the rhythm of language. Memorization is such a good mind stretching activity and I'm so excited to use it with scriptures.

One funny thing about William knowing nursery rhymes is that often in moments of stress or concentration he will start spouting lines from them. For instance, his nose has been very runny lately and often when we wipe it he will say "BAHH" and then continue with "ba ba black sheep have you any wool?" Or when he is concentrating on something I will often hear, "Jack and Jill went up the hill," or "Little Miss Muffet" etc. It really makes me laugh because he will say it in such an intense little voice.

Another nice thing is that since he likes saying songs and rhymes so much it gives us a really great activity to do while driving in the car, and other times when I need to get things done, but he wants my attention.