{"id":7042,"date":"2018-03-27T11:47:56","date_gmt":"2018-03-27T11:47:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.mytutor.co.uk\/blog\/?p=7042"},"modified":"2022-05-30T14:43:30","modified_gmt":"2022-05-30T14:43:30","slug":"meet-max-a-memory-champion","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.mytutor.co.uk\/blog\/students\/meet-max-a-memory-champion\/","title":{"rendered":"Memorising your revision notes? Meet Max, a memory champion"},"content":{"rendered":"

Easter holidays are here – and for many, it\u2019s a tricky kind of non-holiday as they try to balance relaxation and having fun with revision for summer exams. Learn how to improve your memory with a memory champion.<\/p>\n

Students across the country will be exploring hacks to help them remember their course content. Techniques range from poring over past papers, getting crafty with flash cards, teaching topics back to peers and squeezing in extra one-to-one lessons<\/a> to help commit the year\u2019s learning to memory.<\/p>\n

Even if at times it doesn\u2019t feel like it, the brain can hold a lot of information. It\u2019s a muscle and with practise it improves. Don\u2019t believe us? Meet Max: the top Pi recital champion of this century. (Yes, that\u2019s a thing: reciting the decimal places of the mathematical number Pi).<\/p>\n

Max Ungless, a 14 year old programmer studying for his GCSEs<\/a>, recited Pi to 3,464 decimal places from memory on 14th March this year. We got on the phone with him to see how he did it.<\/p>\n

Hi Max, congratulations on your recent achievement! An amazing feat of memory. Is maths your favourite subject at school?<\/h3>\n

Hi, thank you! I\u2019m ok at maths<\/a> \u2013 but my favourite subject is actually probably Latin.<\/p>\n

When did you first realise that you were good at memorising numbers?<\/h3>\n

I didn\u2019t really realise it at any one given point. I\u2019d say I\u2019m not naturally born with it. I just put it down to practise.<\/p>\n

I remember hearing in year 6 that people could memorise Pi, and I gave it a go then \u2013 I didn\u2019t really put in proper effort at that point but just kind of tried it out. Then, in year 7 when I realised that my secondary school had a Pi competition I thought I\u2019d try again. It sounded fun and the last top score had been from a student who\u2019d managed 86 digits of Pi. I thought I could beat that so gave it a go.<\/p>\n

Tell us a bit about the Pi competition you took part in.<\/h3>\n

It\u2019s not an official national competition. There\u2019s an international leaderboard where you can submit officiated recitals of Pi. Our school just runs a competition every year – I encouraged them to submit my attempts to the international leaderboard.<\/p>\n

How many decimal places have you managed each year that you\u2019ve taken part in the competition?<\/h3>\n

2015 – 331
\n2016 – 928
\n2017 – 2,224
\n2018 – 3,464<\/p>\n

Do you have any techniques to help you remember large sequences of numbers?<\/h3>\n

I prefer thinking of Pi as not individual numbers but a series of short sequences. It\u2019s easier to remember a long number as shorter strings of numbers rather than as individual numbers. Think of phone numbers – they\u2019re easier to remember in chunks.<\/p>\n

What also helps is to think of how we pronounce numbers. Nine sounds different to seven \u2013 so remembering what the sequences sound like can be a helpful safety check against what you\u2019ve committed to memory. I can stop myself several hundred digits in by realising a section didn\u2019t sound right.<\/p>\n

Other people use different strategies. The \u2018memory palace\u2019 is a popular one. This relies on the vision of things. People envision a journey through a house or \u2018palace\u2019 and as they wander through and look around them, they associate what they\u2019re seeing with sequences of numbers. These strategies work because our brains remember things better through sounds and vision.<\/p>\n

For this year\u2019s competition I just practised everyday, when I woke up and before going to sleep. Maybe 45 minutes a day. And I\u2019ve been doing that since November (although I took a month off to focus on studying for my GCSE mocks in January!) so I probably did about 3 and a half months prep.<\/p>\n

Where are you currently in the international rankings?<\/h3>\n

In Great Britain, I\u2019m currently 7th; once the leaderboard is updated I\u2019ll be 6th. I\u2019m still number #1 Pi recital champion of this century.<\/p>\n

Wow, congratulations! Do you plan on going to university? And if so, what subject do you think you\u2019ll study?<\/h3>\n

I don\u2019t really know right now but possibly Classics. Like I said, I like Latin. I also really enjoy programming so might explore that as a possibility too.<\/p>\n

\n

If you\u2019re inspired to approach memorisation afresh, check out our other articles with tips on how to retain information as you revise:<\/p>\n

https:\/\/www.mytutor.co.uk\/blog\/improve-your-memory\/<\/a><\/p>\n

https:\/\/www.mytutor.co.uk\/blog\/active-learning-worth\/<\/a><\/p>\n

https:\/\/www.mytutor.co.uk\/blog\/how-to-prepare-for-exams\/<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Easter holidays are here – and for many, it\u2019s a tricky kind of non-holiday as they try to balance relaxation and having fun with revision for summer exams. Learn how to improve your memory with a memory champion.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":7043,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"content-type":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[789],"tags":[],"yoast_head":"\nMemorising your revision notes? Meet Max, a memory champion<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Easter holidays are a time to balance relaxation with revision for summer exams. 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