Why do we need a Memorization List?

Ideal learning is learning by doing rather than memorizing. In this case, we are developing a skill instead of simply cramming facts into our brains. This is how I approached my computer classes 40 years ago. I spent most of my time in the computer labs doing my assignments, and as a result, I never had to study for tests because I already knew the material.

However, there are disadvantages to the learn-by-doing approach:

1. It takes a considerable amount of time. If you need to know specific facts quickly, memorization is more efficient. A simple example would be learning a phone number. If you dial it enough times, you will eventually remember it, but you can learn it faster through rote memorization.

2. Not all facts can be learned through experience. For the type of work I did, a great deal of book learning was required. The same thing can be said about chess.

3. You will eventually forget information if you don't use it or make an effort to review it. No matter how well you know something now, you will eventually forget it if you don't reinforce your memory.

Humans are inherently forgetful. This is simply how our brains work. We are flooded with so much information that our brains have to prioritize what they retain. In order to transfer something from short-term memory to long-term memory, we need repetition. Our brains will not consider something important unless we encounter it multiple times.

I had a high school teacher who said, "Repetition is the mother of learning." He also added, "Learning requires a certain amount of pain."

The most effective repetition generally involves active recall and spaced repetition. I developed a technique that has allowed me to remember a large amount of chess material. I keep a well-organized list of things that I have memorized, which I review almost daily.

1. Back in the 1970s, I was studying vocabulary words on flash cards to prepare for the SAT. I discovered that I didn't need to review all the items every day. The items I knew best could be reviewed much less frequently.

2. In the early 1980s, the psychology class I took in college discussed this concept, explaining that spreading out the review of things we have memorized can actually help us remember them better. This is called spaced repetition.

3. In 1987, I became interested in memorizing entire chess games. When I had memorized five games, it seemed like too much of a burden to review all of them every day. I realized that I could review some of the games less frequently, depending on how well I knew them.

   This is when I created my first memorization list, which had different review-period categories. I placed different items into different categories depending on how well I knew them.

4. In 1995 and 1996, I created my first online chess lessons. On this website, I advocated using the memorization list to memorize openings and other material from my website.

5. The Chessable website was created around 2016, but I didn't hear about it or start using it until perhaps three years ago. The website claims to automate spaced repetition, which means that it changes how often you review opening lines based on how well you know them.

It seems to me that I was advocating the same idea a couple of decades earlier.

The site is expensive if you want to take their courses. I have taken a couple of their shorter, free courses, but even these require considerable effort to learn.

Reportedly, the average well-educated person can remember around 40,000 words. I figure that if I can remember 40,000 words, then I can remember a thousand chess positions or more.

I recommend copying and pasting the following text into a Word document. If you don't have Word, you can download LibreOffice for free.

Memorization List

Once every day

(11-08) https://onethousandpositionstochessmastery.blogspot.com/2024/06/ruy-lopzez-very-important-game.html

Once every two days

(11-09) https://onethousandpositionstochessmastery.blogspot.com/2026/08/black-to-play.html

(11-08) https://onethousandpositionstochessmastery.blogspot.com/2024/07/white-to-play.html

(11-07) https://onethousandpositionstochessmastery.blogspot.com/2024/07/albin-counter-gambit.html

Once every three days

(11-10) https://onethousandpositionstochessmastery.blogspot.com/2024/07/delayed-alapin.html

Once every four days

(11-11) https://onethousandpositionstochessmastery.blogspot.com/2024/07/white-to-play_74.html

Once every five days

Once every seven days / one week

Once every 10 days

Once every 14 days

Once every 21 days

Once a month

Once every six weeks / 42 days

Once every two months

Once every three months

Once every four months

Once every six months

Once every eight months

Once every 10 months

Once a year

When I use this list, I am constantly promoting and demoting items between categories depending on how well I do each item. The numbers in parentheses represent the dates on which specific items should be reviewed. You have to change these dates manually.

You can move items around in the list using cut and paste. Although this can be done with the mouse, the keyboard commands for highlighting, cutting, and pasting are faster.

Although you have to maintain this list by hand, I am developing an app to automate the process.

I have heard that Grandmasters create lists of things they have learned and review the items on those lists.

I put some of my chess lessons into the list. The goal of each lesson is not to memorize the entire game, but to correctly predict the moves wherever the lesson says either "White to move" or "Black to move."

To avoid spending too much time reviewing memorized material, I recommend adding no more than a few items per week.

If you add no new information to the list, the amount of time it takes to review will decrease because you will promote items to categories where they are reviewed less frequently. For this reason, the memorization list has made it much easier for me to memorize a large amount of material.

How should you approach memorizing chess opening lines? 

I should point out that too much opening memorization can be time-consuming and overwhelming, especially since you are not likely to encounter most opening lines in a real game. Going overboard can be counterproductive.

I have created blogs devoted to opening analysis. You could copy and paste links from my blogs into the memorization list.

However, you might have opening lines of your own that you want to commit to memory. One way to do this is to use Fritz, or a free chess program such as Tarrasch, to create a new chess database devoted to your opening lines. You can then review the items in this database.

If you follow this approach, you could add items to your Memorization List like this:

(11-09) Review Opening Line #2.