How To Remember Everything You Learn with ChatGPT

So have you ever had that feeling where you read or watch or listen to something and you think you've learned something new but then a few days later you try and remember it and you find that you've forgotten everything that you thought you learned?

Book Active Recall Quiz

Okay so the first prompt that will help us to remember everything that we learn is one that I use whenever I get to the end of a book, video or anything I'm learning from.

This prompt uses active recall which has been shown to be significantly more effective than simply reading when it comes to effectively learning content.

We can use ChatGPT to generate some fun active recall questions that actively test our knowledge of what we've just read, helping us to retain the information for longer.

We can use a prompt like:

Book: The Power of Now
You are a memory expert. I am trying to remember key concepts and quotes from the above book to make the key points stick.
Please provide me with 5 quiz questions to test my knowledge. Ask one question at a time and wait for my response. Do not ask them all at once.

Now with ChatGPT's training running up until 2021 only a cool hack here is to use Bing or a paid app like Shiken that allows you to enter a YouTube video link or more recent book or article and then generate questions.

Learning Through Actions

Now one of the best ways to remember what we learn is to turn any theory into actions and then learn by actually doing something.

I recently read a new book on sales. Instead of just reading this from beginning to end I read to a point where a practical example of a sales tactic that I could try out was explained and then I stopped reading and integrated the tactic into my next sales call to try it out. Because I had to actually think about how to use the sales tactic for my specific need I developed a better understanding and was able to more effectively remember what I'd learned.

ChatGPT can save us lots of time here when it comes to translating what we're learning into actionable steps. For example we can ask ChatGPT to summarize content and turn it into actionable steps using the prompt

Book: eat that frog by Brian Tracy
Summarize the key points from the above book.
Output the key points referencing chapters.
Then output actionable steps to help me better understand and remember these key points.

Critique My Understanding

When it comes to effective learning encoding as just as important as using active recall. To help our brains to encode what we're learning we want to make the information easy to remember and one of the best ways to do this is to relate it to things that we already know.

We also want to test our existing knowledge and identify any knowledge gaps to make sure we actually understand the concepts that we're learning.

ChatGPT is great here as you can get it to critique your understanding of an existing topic before you dive into more detail. This uses the evidence-based learning concept of priming your knowledge which is the same as reading over notes before a learning event as a quick refresher and to prime your brain for relating any new information to what you already know.

We can use the prompt:

Topic: Quadratic equations
You are a learning expert. Please critique my understanding of the above concept. Expand where necessary and simplify. Identify any knowledge gaps and suggest concepts that will help me to understand the topic more thoroughly.

My understanding:

The "solutions" to the Quadratic Equation are where it is equal to zero.
They are also called "roots", or sometimes "zeros"

Boost Encoding - Story

One of the best ways to learn anything effectively is to become curious and move from learning being a chore to being genuinely interested in the topic we're learning.

When I studied medicine there were topics that I had to learn for exams that just didn't interest me and I often ended up finding these difficult to remember.

So to learn effectively we need to make even boring topics interesting. One way to do this is to link to information to something we are already interested in. For me when I was learning topics in neurology like myasthenia gravis which weren't that inherently interesting to me I'd try and find an interesting clinical case or piece of medical history that piqued my interest and helped me to better encode the topic to something I already knew.

This could be time-consuming but luckily ChatGPT can instantly turn even the most boring topics into something more memorable.

We can use the prompt:

Topic: Myasthenia Gravis
You are a learning expert. For the above topic find an interesting news article, famous story or interesting example that helps me to better understand and relate to the above topic.

Boost Encoding - speak with a famous figure

Making learning both fun and relevant is really important if we want to remember things for longer.

I'll often remember conversations I've had with people in work or at home pretty vividly especially if that information is told through a story. A good story gets us curious and holds our attention so that we're focused on what is happening and so we're more likely to remember stories than a list of items we're forcing ourselves to memorize.

Now I love this ChatGPT prompt as it's super creative and it finds a famous figure related to the topic we're learning and then allows us to roleplay with that person creating a memorable learning experience.

We can use the prompt:

Topic: Algebra
You are a learning expert. Find an interesting example of a famous person from history who has been impacted by the above topic. Create a role play so that I can ask that person questions about the topic.

We might want to talk to a character from a book or a historical figure like Napoleon to help us to more effectively remember a historic time period.

Just in Time Learning

Now curiosity is one of the most powerful tools we have when it comes to effective learning. If I'm curious about something I'll actively want to understand more about a topic. For example I recently went to watch Oppenheimer at the cinema and it immediately got me interested in how accurate it's depiction of historical characters was and also in the physics behind nuclear technology.

This is something called just in time learning where you're learning in the moment as opposed to a scheduled study session where you set out to learn a specific topic.

If I watch a movie or tv show it might generate curiosity and I might then head into ChatGPT either on my Mac or on my iPhone if I'm out and ask for an explanation using the Feynman technique.

For example:

Topic: Nuclear Weapons

Explain to me in simple terms like I'm 5-years old how nuclear weapons work.

Share What You Learn

If I don't put something I've learned into practise I'll tend to forget it. In fact that's one of the reasons I started my blog and this YouTube channel. By sharing what we've learned with others it helps us to collect information together and explain it in simple terms which aids our own understanding.

I often find that sharing things like these prompts forces me to dive deeper into a topic and as I'm practically doing something I'll remember it more effectively.

The downside here is that not knowing where to start when it comes to writing a blog can stop you in your tracks. Luckily ChatGPT can help you out here by offering some structure so you can focus on sharing your key learning points.

We can use a prompt like

For example:

I am going to write a blog post about my experience of learning Marketing to help me to better remember key concepts and share information online with others.
Provide a blog outline for a blog about my experience learning email marketing

Provide A Wider Context Map

When we come across a completely new topic it can seem difficult to learn. I remember reading about particles in physics for the first time at school and thinking that the topic seemed pretty conceptual and not really that practically relevant.

It was only when I understood the topics importance and relevance that I then found it much easier to learn as I then knew how it related to other concepts like matter and mass and motion that had real-world applications.

And we can use ChatGPT to help us to gain a wider context map for any new topic before we learn it. This aids encoding and makes topics we might perceive as difficult a little bit easier by relating to things we already know.

We can use the prompt:

Topic: Electrons
You are a learning expert. I am studying the above topic. Provide me with its wider context within the subject and the world so that I gain a full understanding of its relationships to other concepts and importance and how it may relate to things I already know.

Utilize Memory Palace technique for information recall

For the final prompt I'm actually going to give you two prompts that will help you to become a memory master and remember absolutely anything.

While it's best to understand a topic in detail rather than to just memorize what you read in a book. Sometimes we do want to memorize lists of items. This might be a list of vocab for language learning or just a shopping list so we don't forget our groceries.

ChatGPT can be really helpful here and I'm going to give you two prompts that take techniques used by memory masters that breakdown long lists of items and make them memorable.

The first prompt uses ChatGPT to build a memory palace in just a few section.

List of items:
Tomato sauce
Mustard
Barbecue sauce
Red-wine vinegar
Salsa
Extra virgin olive oil, canola oil, nonfat cooking spray
Jarred capers and olives
Hot pepper sauce
Brown rice
Cereal
Milk

You are a memory expert. Use The Method of Loci to build a mind palace to help me remember items in the list above.

The second prompt uses the PEG mnemonic system and turns your list into a linked series of items and image that are easier to remember.

List of items:
Tomato sauce
Mustard
Barbecue sauce
Red-wine vinegar
Salsa
Extra virgin olive oil, canola oil, nonfat cooking spray
Jarred capers and olives
Hot pepper sauce
Brown rice
Cereal
Milk

You are a memory expert. Use the PEG system to help me remember the above list of items.