(upbeat music) - Welcome friends to this episode of the "Everyday Educator" podcast. I'm your host, Lisa Bailey, and I'm excited to spend some time with you today as we encourage one another, learn together, and ponder the delights and challenges that make homeschooling the adventure of a lifetime. Whether you're just considering this homeschooling possibility or deep into the daily delight of family learning, I believe you'll enjoy thinking along with us.

But don't forget, although this online community is awesome, you'll find even closer support in a local CC community. So go to classicalconversations.com and find a community near you today. Well, listeners, I'm super glad to welcome you to today's episode. Last time we were together, or a couple of times ago, we enjoyed hearing from Kelly Wilt and Alyse DeYoung about their experiences working with Memory Master and National Memory Master.

And we had so much fun, and there was so much to share that we really didn't get finished. And they had more to share, and there's more for you to learn. And I also asked them to come back so that we could just share tips and tricks for memorizing for all of us.

For all of us, no matter how old we are or how old our students are, tips and tricks for families all about memorizing. So you just sit back or keep running or whatever you do when you're listening to a podcast, and we're gonna talk to you about memorizing tips and tricks for all kinds of families.

So Kelly, Alyse, I'm so excited that you were able to join me again today. - Absolutely, Lisa, hooray. We get to talk more about some of the things that we love memorizing and just how memory is such a gift from God and how we see that gift reflected in the lives of our foundation students and even most recently, our National Memory Master finalists.

So I have heard reports of thousands of memory masters all around the world this cycle, and it just thrills me to my fingertips and the tips of my toes to hear families delighting in the act of memory. And most recently, Alyse and I both were at the National Memory Master Competition, and I know Alyse has got some highlights from this year's competition to share.

- I am so glad, Alyse, thank you. Are you super excited to be coming on to the team for National Memory Master? - Super excited is an understatement at this point, especially after having seen the competition and seen these memory masters in action. It just blew me away at every turn, whether we threw curve balls at them with the timeline or the memory bee or the map drawing, they really rose to the challenge and had worked so hard to get to that point, and I just loved every second of it.

- Oh, I'm so glad. I will say that it is kind of an electric atmosphere. I think by the time the students get to that point, by the time that you have the finalists that are there at the National Memory Master Competition, they are having a ball. They have, in essence, done the quote-unquote hard work, and they are there to enjoy it.

And it is so much fun to me to see the interactions between the students and some between the families as well and the camaraderie that develops all around their common experience of memorizing. And honestly, and I think we'll probably stumble upon some of those gems during our time together this afternoon, I think that the act of memorizing and the shared memory of common information builds community wherever you practice it, even in your family.

And that's what I want all our CC families and beyond to get, that there is beauty in memorizing with your family that somehow will knit your hearts together in an even deeper way. So we're gonna talk about it. We're gonna talk about it. - Absolutely. Well, and Lisa, I would say this.

Just in my interactions with the families at National Memory Master, I would say I have never once heard a parent say, "Oh, my child did this all by themselves." Yes, never once. And so to hear these moms and dads and siblings saying, "Oh, yeah, we sit down and we do this every day," or "Our favorite thing that we memorize together is this," or "Here's this fun thing that we did," to learn the timeline events frontwards and backwards, it's such a joy to see these families celebrating together.

And that is one of the key words of the National Memory Master competition. We celebrate. We celebrate these acts of memory. We celebrate the finalists, but we also celebrate the sacrifice that these families have made to come together and to participate in these acts of memory, building libraries of the mind, common libraries of the mind together.

It really is a beautiful thing. - Oh, I love that. And that comes through in the leadership that you two provide to our family. So we've just been talking about it, and we have just been through the season of Memory Master testing with all our foundations families all over the world.

And as y'all have been discussing, the inspiring National Memory Master competition and celebration. So, and I know that y'all have been deeply involved in these. So I wanna give you a chance to brag on this year. So tell me, Elise, tell me some of the highlights of this year's National Memory Master competition.

- There are so many that I could share with you all, but I definitely do have one that stands out in my mind. So during the competition, I got to sit in the back row and kind of oversee the competition, which means I just got to see all the parents and siblings and the competitors all at once.

And one of my favorite things was to see how the crowd reacted to these amazing students. There were applause and celebration when they succeeded. And when they did not succeed, there was always a standing ovation for these kids every single time. And they were just, they were welcomed into the arms of their parents if they were upset or anything.

And I will be honest, I'm not a big crier, but I was sitting in the back row getting very emotional watching this competition, because you just, you know that there's so much invested time that these families have put towards this competition and their hearts are in it and they love it.

And so it was so exciting to see how this competition wasn't how you might imagine, like, oh, you've been eliminated, go sit down and then just like silence as you watch them descend from the stage. It was a team effort. Everyone was proud of these students, whether they had known them prior to the competition or not.

And I got to see that all at once from the back seat and it was encouraging and exciting to witness. - That is so awesome to hear and see that it really is a family. It's a family endeavor. So yes, your little nuclear family has helped you learn to memorize and recite and make up a story and draw a map and do fast math, all of that.

But then the larger CC family is a community of support. I love that so much. I love that. Kelly, what are some of your highlights from this year? - Oh my goodness, I think if it were up to me, I would want all of them to win. And so it is a blessing that I am not the head judge.

And I just, from the moment that the families arrive at the venue for the competition, you can sense the togetherness, the togetherness of each family, which then becomes extended as families are introduced to one another and we become a family of families right there in real time at the competition.

And I've got to say two of my favorite highlights from this year. One was during some of our more difficult timeline heats. Elise and I both noted that the students who were not currently answering the question were seated in their chairs and you could see them counting on their fingers and in their minds, these were timeline events.

And before the head judge could give a thumbs up, you know, that was the correct answer or a thumbs down for an incorrect answer, you could see the sheer joy spread across these finalists' faces when they realized that their friend had answered correctly. And that was such a delight to see.

It just thrilled my heart to see them cheering on their friends, doing these difficult things. And I think my second highlight was, you know, at the end of round two, which this year we had five finalists move forward into round two. - Right, that's unusual, right? - Yes, typically it's only four finalists.

And this year the students were just so outstanding that eventually the judges said, "All right, we're just going to move on." (all laughing) "We're going to end this portion of the competition "so you're all going ahead." - Yes, when the winner's name was announced, one of the other finalists just reached over and he just engulfed him in this huge hug.

And they were celebrating and jumping up and down and cheering for their friend. And it was just so wonderful to see the highlights of the competition centered around these relationships that these students had built with one another, that the families had built with one another. National Memory Master Competition is always a time of sheer joy as we celebrate together.

- That, and see that kind of, I will admit, that brought me to tears and it's just you telling about something that happened weeks ago. But I love, I love the fact that we are celebrating one another. We're not celebrating how smart somebody is. We're not celebrating the eliteness of the accomplishment.

We are celebrating our friend. We're celebrating our family. We're celebrating your accomplishment, but we are sharing your joy. That is just awesome to me. And I want people to hear that, that yes, it's a competition because you are winnowing people down 'til you get a winner, but it's not as much about the competition as it is about celebration of the efforts.

So that's great, that's great. It really is. I know that I can tell that you guys love spending time with those families that have chosen to participate. And it really does sound like a family affair. What I want to know is, are there common characteristics that you've noticed in these families?

I think that there are three words that immediately come to mind that really describe all 16 families, and that would be dedicated, enthusiastic, and united. All of these families have poured so much time and effort into this memory work, into the preparation, into traveling all the way to be there for the competition.

And in their dedication, they are so excited about it. You can see it on their faces. I remember meeting everyone in person for the first time at check-in, and just those kids, they were wide-eyed looking around, like you're seeing your friends in person for the first time who you've met over Zoom or messaging.

And they were just so excited to be there. And then finally, as a family unit, they were all united around this one goal and this one celebration. And it was definitely so exciting to see because I loved what you said at the beginning about there's a common thread because of the memory work.

It really does bind everyone together. And I think that's really important, and it definitely played itself out this year. - Yeah, yeah. What about you, Kelly? How would you characterize them? - I love the words that Alyse chose, and I think they are so accurate. There is a spirit of unity between the members of the family with their students from the moment they arrive.

You can tell that this is something that they have done together, and they are enthusiastic. There are no sad faces. No one looks as if, mom told me that I can never play outside again if I- - Right, right. (all laughing) - There's nothing like that. They are just supremely enthusiastic about what they have accomplished, and not in a prideful way, but in a, hey, we did something difficult, but we did it together, and we're excited.

I think that those characteristics really are helpful for our families to achieve that success in memory together, and one of the things that we prayed this year at the competition was that these acts of memory would be a love offering to the Lord, because it's one thing to do something difficult for your own honor and glory, which is very temporal, not long-lasting, but to do something and offer it as a love offering to the Lord is an entirely different thing, and I think having that perspective regarding memorizing foundations of memory work, drawing maps of the world, or whatever we do, as Christians, that puts every single task that we complete in a different perspective and in a different light, and I think that these families have done that.

They have prioritized rightly. They have done this together, and they're so excited to share the fruits of what God has done in their families through memorizing the foundation's memory work. It's always such a beautiful thing to see families getting together and praying before the competition and just encouraging their students.

You can tell that they are supremely invested not only in the fact that their student has memorized these facts, but that in the memorizing that this has changed their child for eternity, and I think that perspective is key for not only the National Memory Master Competition, but for foundations families as well, whether your child memory masters every single cycle and has done it since they were four years old, or whether or not your child just loves the timeline song and they just want to sing the timeline song in memory every year.

If that's the one thing that they delight in, that it is a love offering to the Lord. And what a wonderful thing that is. - I think that's great. And you both have made such a point of the fact that this is a family affair and that parents are very invested or very much a part of the National Memory Master journey.

So I want to know, can you give me some specifics? How involved do most parents get in their child's preparation? I mean, how much time does it take? What have you heard about other family members helping out? - Well, I think one thing when you consider the achievement of these families that are coming to National Memory Master, the best metaphor I can think of is watering, slow watering a garden over a long period of time.

Because I am from the South and I grew up with a grandfather who always had a summer garden. And so every day he would just lightly, slowly water his garden. He didn't want to wash the seeds away. And this deep irrigation would sink into the roots of those baby roots of those plants and anchor them in the soil.

And National Memory Master and even Memory Master in community is definitely not something that you wake up and go, I think I'm going to do National Memory Master. - Yes, yes. I mean, maybe some people do, but that's probably not the recipe for success. - Exactly, exactly. Elias, I'm trying to remember.

I think we had at least one finalist this year who had Memory Mastered eight times. Is that right? - Out of all my stars, I think I read that. - Eight times. And you talk about slow watering of this garden, this mental garden over time. He had mastered and mastered and mastered again and again and again.

And I think that duration, doing it over time and repeating it over and over are just so key to that information being retained in the brain. Elias, what about you? Do you feel like, I mean, did you hear anything from families this year? People who perhaps said, we've done this for this many years, or it seemed this year, we had a lot of families who had been participating in Memory Mastered for quite some time.

- So they had a system, I bet. A thing that they did to prepare. - Yeah, so I definitely heard from lots of the families that they had that slow watering for sure. They had been doing that for a long time. And in your original question, Lisa, I think you asked how involved parents are and other things.

- Yes. - They definitely are involved. And that's one of the things that points back to that unity that they had when they showed up for competition day. I think for most families that I talked to, their experience was that parents were heavily involved at the beginning. They were setting that pace, that standard.

This is what we do as a family. This is worth it. It's exciting. And then after that, they saw that their student loved it. They truly, truly loved it. And it was the student that propelled the family forward. It was like, "I wanna do this. "Let's keep doing this." And those are the students who are really the ones who excel at National Memory Master because they're the ones who take it into their own hands and develop new ways to make it exciting.

I heard from a lot of kids. They were like, "The biggest thing for me "is I had to make it fun. "Let's make games, let's go outside at the grocery store. "Let's do memory work with my siblings "and my friends and all that." It's definitely not a, "I'm gonna go study "and shut myself in my room," type thing.

- Yes. - You do in your real life with the people around you. And I think that that's what makes it really special. - I like that. And you know what? There's a lot of wisdom in that. And I do see the value in parents getting involved at the beginning, like you said, to help their children set up a system and a pace for eating the elephant.

How are we gonna do this? I think that's really good. Parents probably have better time management skills than most of our older foundation students. And so that seems like a good way for parents to be involved. But then I absolutely love and support what you said, Elise. Then those families then let it be the student's job to propel themselves forward.

The student needs to drive the bus after the road is constructed. And that's how you get the students, like you said, taking ownership. And that's how you know the parents are not pushing the students to do something. The family is helping the student to achieve their goal. And that's beautiful too.

And I love the whole idea that the kids who succeed are the ones who made it fun, who played while they practiced, 'cause that's sustainable. That's really great. So Kelly, what are some of the other tips and tricks that you've heard from families through the years? - Well, I think that Mary Poppins had it right with saying in every job that must be done, there's an element of fun.

You find the fun and snap the job's a game. And I think that the first tip or trick that I would offer is something that Elise has already alluded to. Find the fun, make it fun. Take sidewalk chalk and go out into your driveway and decorate it with memory work.

Take dry erase markers or washable paint and paint the glass in your house while you sing history songs. There are so many different things that you can do to make things fun. I know a lot of families will even take the board game Candyland and they'll use our memory work flashcards for each cycle and they'll use them to play the game Candyland, which I think is fabulous.

So so many fun things that you can do. And of course, every year out of our finalists, I will hear some unique tip or trick. Two years ago, our winner's family told us that he mastered the timeline backwards because they taped the entire set of timeline cards up the stairs.

- Oh my gosh. - This next level of their home. And so he would walk up the stairs and recite the timeline. And then he would recite it backwards, going down the stairs to the first level of the home. And I just thought how brilliant and fun for him.

And his siblings would chant along with him while he went up and down the stairs. So he got physical exercise and mental exercise. (laughing) And this year, just recently, I had a conversation with our winner, Ewan Fisher, from this year's competition. And I found out a new way to memorize the timeline.

His sisters are very involved in dance and every year at Christmas time, they participate in the Nutcracker. - Yes. - And Ewan told me that he memorized the timeline backwards by setting it to the second act of the Nutcracker, the music. - Oh my gosh. - And so he said he'll never listen to the Nutcracker in the same way ever again, because he'll only be hearing the lyrics to the timeline song.

So I think it really is, the biggest tip is finding the fun and then doing things over and over again until they are committed to memory and then sharing them with others. You know, I mean, I can't tell you many times my children would be in the grocery store and they would be singing the president's song and people would turn around and they would look at us like, who are these children and how do they know this?

- Right, right. - Sharing that is part of the joy, right? You know, sharing that memory work that's been mastered with other people in your life and then telling them, you know what? I memorized this timeline song so that when I get older, I'll know when these things happened in history or I memorized the president's so that I can tell you, you know, which president was leading our country at a certain point in history.

So there's always a purpose, but if you find the fun, it makes it easier to accomplish what needs to be done. I did not mean for that to rhyme, but there you go. - That is too funny, that is too funny. You heard it here first, folks. (laughing) We are Dr.

Seuss here on The Everyday Educator. That's really good. I like that. The exhortation to share your memory work, share what you're doing. Other people might be drawn into the game or the song and they can join you on your quest. I like that a lot. So would you encourage people who maybe have heard some of these podcasts or went to national conference and saw some of the memory masters in action, how early should people start pursuing memory master for next year?

- Today, would be my answer. (laughing) I actually just had a conversation with a lady over the phone today about this very thing. One of her families, her community was wondering, when should we start? When should my daughter start? - Yeah. - And today is the answer for that.

- Oh, that's so fun. The sheer amount of information alone kind of alludes to that fact, like, okay, it's gonna take a while to get three cycles of memory work down. But then also the level of mastery that is required for national memory master, it is a very high bar to meet.

And it does require time, that slow watering Kelly talked about. And also why would you wanna put off the fun is another way of looking at it. - That's great. - Yeah, I remember that memory work was a ton of fun when I was doing it. And you can definitely have a blast with it, especially over the summer.

If you're traveling, going to the beach, parks or things like that, you don't have to be cooped up in your home in the dead of winter, reciting math facts. You can skip count while you run or all of that stuff. - Yes. - There's a thousand ways to do it and just incorporate it in your daily life.

You don't have to sit down and be like, I'm gonna dedicate two hours every day from now till next year's national memory master. And that's how I'm gonna be a memory master. I would say that you'll probably get burnout that way. Just start incorporating it now and make it exciting and enjoyable.

And I'm sure that you'll have great success. - You know what, Elise, you are so wise to be so young. That is really true. If you incorporate it into your daily life, it just become practicing memory where it becomes what you do. And it doesn't become a job and it's not drudgery and you don't get burned out.

It's just a game you play on your way to something else. And that can be delightful. I love it. Okay, so I know families, we've been discussing national memory master, but lots of families might not ever decide to go all the way to national memory master. But these same families fully believe that memorizing is a key component for classical education.

So I want us to talk for the last part of our podcast today about memorizing for all of us. So if I'm not going to go for national memory master next spring, what's the big deal about memorizing? How is it for all of us? So y'all set the stage.

What is so important about memorizing? - Lisa, I think this is a really valid question because of the world that we live in today, right? Nearly every adult has some form of handheld device, and access more knowledge, encyclopedic knowledge that has ever been able to be accessed in the history of the world.

And so what is the big deal about memorizing? Why take the time to commit things to memory when you can within a minute have them in the palm of your hand? And I know Elise and I both have thoughts about this and why memorizing is important. For me, I know I've already said this, it is building a library of the mind.

You know, we, in our minds, we have millions, probably, conservatively, mental souvenirs from our sensory experiences in this world. And so, you know, for our foundation students, part of those experiences are pieces of memory work. And, you know, if you think about them being like a library at the risk of sounding too antiquated, they are setting up a Dewey Decimal System of information.

And for anyone who may be listening and says, "What is the Dewey Decimal System?" (all laughing) Which, a few years ago, I wouldn't think I would need to explain, but I'm going to do it anyway. You know, that is a numeric system by which you can find different types of literature within a library.

And, you know, by memorizing, we are providing structure to our thoughts, we're providing structure to those sensory experiences that we have in the world. You know, I think about our foundation students, how they may memorize the timeline song, and already they have a structure for every other historical event that they will encounter throughout their challenge years, throughout the remainder of their adult life, in sequential order.

So memorizing alone, just at face value, gives us structure for the other information that we're going to take in in this world. Elise, what about you? Why do you think memorizing is important? - I absolutely love what you just said about building that structure, and I also love your metaphor about the library.

I have a similar one that I like to use, and I think of memorizing as the act of furnishing the mind. That's kind of how I've always viewed it, and so that structure idea really helps to paint that picture. First, you have to put up, oh boy, I'm not into construction, the beams, the walls, the roof, all that, and then you really get to fill it in with the furniture, and the paintings, and the music, and the colors, and all that, and it is so exciting.

I think that we've lost a lot of the excitement around memory, which has been experienced throughout all of history, and I think a lot of it, you could make the argument, comes from that cell phone in your back pocket, but that's a discussion for another day, I'm sure. Overall, I can think of two main reasons why memory is so important, just based off of that idea of furnishing your mind.

First is academically, it is undeniably useful and helpful. There's actually a quote from Daniel Borstein, who wrote the book, "The Discoverers," which we study and challenge for classical conversations, and I love this quote, so I'm just gonna read it aloud if that's all right. - Yes, that'd be great.

- He says, "By memory and in memory, the fruits of education are garnered, preserved, and stored." And so just that alone, the way he breaks it down, it's beautiful words, which makes it exciting to read, but then also it's so true, and that skill, we cannot just get rid of it.

You need to remember what you're learning, or else you have to ask yourself, what is the purpose of education? Why are you even going to school if you're not gonna retain any of it? So academically, it's absolutely essential that you practice the skills of memory, but then also there's the spiritual aspect of it, of what do you...

You're building your character and your desires when you memorize good and true and beautiful things, and I think that it's so important to keep that in mind as we're training the next generation through classical conversations to love memory, and in doing so, reminding adults who may have forgotten that, that this is a beautiful skill, it's a necessary skill, and it will really serve you well if you choose to memorize the good, true, and beautiful.

- Those are such inspiring answers from both of you. You have given all of us a good reason to memorize. I love the fact that when we commit things to memory, we have sealed a personal connection with information. It becomes part of our story because it's part of our memory, and it becomes part of the context that we use to explain the rest of the world to us.

And when we have memorized things, they become part of the story that we understand about the world that God is showing to us. And so I love all of those goals. And I love that you brought in the fact that even parents need to recognize these goals of memorizing.

The need to memorize and the beauty of memorizing doesn't end with our school years. We can really benefit from memorizing. We're not done. How can memorizing be a family affair? Kelly, when do we start? Okay, so a bunch of questions that go along with this. How can it be a family affair?

And when do we start with our littlest learners? And then, you know, we all know they are like sponges, so they love, like I could tell hours worth of stories about my grandson, Gideon, and the way he is constantly amazing me. He marches around reciting the litany of all the words he knows and all the things that he knows.

And it's just a delight to him. So we know that little children do that, and Gideon's not quite too, but how do we encourage our older students to keep practicing their memorizing skills and not leave it in foundations? Such good questions. So I think, first of all, thinking about how memory work can be a family affair, one of the blessings as a parent that we have from the Lord is that we are given the role of, if we follow the metaphor of the library, the role of being our children's first mental librarians.

You know, we are curating the content that is being placed on the shelves of their minds, even at an early age. So when you read the book, "Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See?" you are helping them to establish the ideas, name the ideas of what colors are, what these animals are.

They're already putting that information on the mental shelves of their minds. And, you know, thinking about, you know, when do we start? Oh my goodness, right away. It's like Elisa's answer for memory master, right away. I can remember when all three of my children were teeny tiny babies. I think I read them their first book in the hospital.

- Yeah, yeah. - And of course, you know, some people might say, "Oh, you know, they're basically an intellectual potato at that point. What can they retain?" But I'm gonna tell you this. I think that I believe that God has designed our minds in such an incredible way that even those earliest experiences have impact on our children.

Whether they see us holding a book and they hear us reciting words, eventually they're going to master those words. I personally have memorized so many children's books from reading them over and over. "Goodnight Moon," you know, is one of my children's favorites. And if I start in with the text of "Goodnight Moon," all three of my children can recite it along with me because from their earliest days, we have made memorizing together just a gift, a family gift that we give one another.

It is family culture to be memorizers. And you know, with our littlest learners, they take so much joy in that. I mean, at the National Memory Master Competition, we were watching these students who were in their final year of foundation. So that means next year, they'll be beginning the journey into Challenge A.

We saw them joyfully reciting their memory work. There was no drudgery. It was effortless and simple to them and delightful to share what they had memorized. Now, I will say this, when our children move from the grammar, you know, stage where everything, it's so much fun to repeat and to play, and they begin contemplating and reasoning and fitting those puzzle pieces of ideas together, the joy of memorizing can be lost if we don't take care to cultivate it.

- Yes, absolutely. - You know, as our children get older, we also need to consider the types of things that we're asking them to memorize. Now, I will say this, I still delighted in having my children memorize nonsensical, fun things. - Yes, yes. - Even when they were older, it's because we love the sounds of the words.

And I think that is also a skill that needs to be acquired. You know, just listening to, as Elise said, the beauty of words is so key for our students in helping them to become good writers because they've heard good writing and they know what it sounds like. So I think, you know, continuing to cultivate, not letting ourselves get to a place where we think memorizing is obsolete.

One of the things Elise said earlier is how we're contributing to our character. You know, forming our character is a never ending process because we are human. We are made in the image of God, but we are not gods ourselves. And so that character will continually be cultivated and memorization, committing those pieces of information to memory is a part of that process.

So, you know, I would say as our children are getting older, encouraging them to continue memorizing may look a little different than when you're skip counting or you're making muscle man arms as you, you know, skip or recite memorization facts. It might simply be walking around the block together and reciting a passage of scripture together.

Or, you know, our challenge program has so many wonderful built-in opportunities for memorization. It simply could be getting in the car with your student and letting them recite while you're driving to the grocery store. But always I think, and we've already alluded to this too, the element of togetherness strengthens that act of memory because you're able to recite together.

And I think for our students that emphasizes to them that, hey, we think memorizing is important too as parents and we should be continuing to do that ourselves. - Yeah, I love that. I really love that. I think that listeners can tell that we are all three really big on family strengthening their memory muscles.

And so I wanna give, so there may be listeners out there who say, okay, you have convinced me. I can see that this is a good thing to start with my little guys and I wanna keep doing it. Or maybe I wanna start doing it with my older children as well.

But I don't know what to memorize. How do we start? You guys, let's brainstorm for just the last couple of minutes. What are some things that families could memorize together? And you guys feel free to tell me some things that your family have done together well, or things that you discovered, they sounded good, but it didn't work out.

So be really practical, okay? - There are so many things I could think of and lots of them come from my experience in the Challenge program. Like Kelly said, I think that lots of older students can lose that excitement of memory. And that definitely happened to me until we came to the study of Shakespeare.

And in Challenge, you have to memorize, I believe it's about 30 lines of Shakespeare and give it in a dramatic interpretation. I did this with one of my good friends and we had so much fun with it. But man, there's a reason why Shakespeare is so famous. His beautiful words and exciting stories really helped to awaken that desire to memorize his work in me.

For example, my favorite Shakespeare speech in all the Shakespeare plays I've read is Mark Antony's speech in Julius Caesar after they kill Caesar. It is riveting to me. I absolutely love it. And so I have it in my sites to memorize coming up here, but that is an amazing one or anything from Macbeth or Much Ado About Nothing.

They're all so exciting. I highly suggest Shakespeare. But also just, well, of course there's scripture, which we're commanded to memorize. So that's a good extensive that right there. But poetry, I was actually just at a conference this past week and was talking to Mr. Andrew Pudowa about memorization and looking through his book.

And he has all these fun poems in there that are meant for smaller children. And I have a small baby cousin who when he grows up, I want to be able to share those fun, delightful poems with him. And so just reminding older students that they can delight younger students with what they commit to memory.

It's not always just about what they think that they'll directly benefit from. So think outside the box and what really excites you. And some people aren't as in love with Shakespeare as I am. So you don't have to go there, but those are just some things I've been thinking about where just pick things that excite you, that you can use in your day-to-day life and that will delight those who hear it.

- That's great. That's a great suggestion. Kelly, I know that you love music and you love poetry. Tell me some things that you have memorized with your family. - Oh my goodness. So many things set to music. My children laugh. Anytime that we can't memorize something, they're like, "Mom, put it to a song." So they have memorized the first 18 elements of the periodic table set to music, which was incredibly helpful when they've passed through chemistry to have that information tucked away.

And I would echo so many of the ideas that Elise has already given to you. For our family, poetry, it was so helpful to them in strengthening those memorizing muscles because you can memorize short poems, haiku or a cinquain, or you can memorize epic poems, not necessarily all at once, but bit by bit until you've mastered the entire thing.

So there really are so many wonderful things in the world to commit to the shelves of the library of your mind. The fun part is choosing what you want to spend time and energy memorizing. I can remember as a young child, I was asked to memorize "Twas the Night Before Christmas" for a Christmas program at my elementary school.

And every single day I would walk home from school to my grandmother's house. She only lived a few blocks away from the school. And I would recite "Twas the Night Before Christmas" to the cadence of my squeaky little shoes, hitting the concrete one after the other. "Twas the night before Christmas," and all through the house.

And even now as an adult, I still remember it because I took time to commit it to memory. And it definitely was not something that I woke up the day before Christmas and said, "I think I'm going to memorize this poem." It became a part of who I am.

And so I would just strongly encourage our families to, like Elise said, look for those things that bring you joy. I would say passages of scripture, which describe the qualities of God, are a wonderful place to start. The Ten Commandments is part of our memory work. That's also a great way to start.

And for our littlest ones, they can memorize the Ten Commandments by holding up 10 fingers and reciting one for each finger using another tool of memory. So there are so many wonderful things in the world that we can memorize. It's just up to you to choose what you want in your mental library.

- Those are great suggestions. What I want to say to families is, look, delight in words with your family. Delight in the sounds, delight in the rhythm, delight in rhyme. Kelly and Elise have given you some really great suggestions. But if they all sound too serious for the summer, hey, listen, memorize song lyrics.

Memorize "Silly Songs with Larry" from Veggie Tales. Memorize a hymn that you sang at church. Ask your teenagers. Get them to share some of the song lyrics from the music that they are listening to. It's a great way for you to see what they're listening to. But then offer to memorize a song lyric that is meaningful to them with them.

You can memorize counting rhymes that you can practice while you're skipping rope or bouncing balls. Listen, you guys, you can stretch your memory muscle by memorizing dialogue from movies, from film dialogue. And some of the first things that we memorize, well, maybe not the first things, but when the girls were really little, we had a tradition on the 4th of July.

Now, we are a big musical theater kind of family. And so we, on the 4th of July, we always watched "The Music Man." And one of the earliest things I can remember is one of the songs from there. He's a what? He's a what? He's a music man. And he plays clarinet with the kids in the town.

Big brass bass, big brass bass. And the piccolo, the piccolo with uniforms too. And my girls memorized this. They were teeny. And I had no idea that the rhythm and the cadence and the movement of that rhyme had taken root in their minds. So listen, families, find silly things to memorize.

What tickles your child's ear first, especially for your little ones? 'Cause if it tickles their ear, it will worm its way in and they'll be able to memorize it. And it will make them giggle. And that makes, anything that makes them laugh makes them wanna do it again. But find out what makes your teenager's ears tingle.

What touches their heart? And offer to memorize that with them. It will build, like we've said this whole time, what you're doing is building a library of the mind, but you are also building a community of heart in your family. So yeah, we wanted to talk about National Memory Master, but we really, really wanted all of our families to see that memorizing is a family affair and it is worth pursuing all by itself.

Kelly, Elise, thank you so much for sharing your wisdom and your inspiration again. I really appreciate it. - Absolutely. Thank you, Lisa. - This has been really fun. This has been really fun. And so families, I know your academic year might be ending and you're looking for fun things to do and memorizing can be fun, but going somewhere, taking a trip can be fun too.

I wanna remind you CC families that Great Wolf Lodge has an exclusive discount for Classical Conversation members. Did you know that or did you remember that? If you decide that you're gonna take your family on a celebration outing for the end of the year, Great Wolf Lodge is a great place to go.

I mean, it's an indoor water park and resort chain and there are dining and shopping and family events and kids activities going on in the resort all the time. There are 20 Great Wolf Lodge locations across the United States and Canada. So there are some great opportunities for your family to have a blast together.

And that exclusive up to 30% discount for CC family members will really help you. If you want more information about Great Wolf Lodge and that exclusive CC discount code, you can find it in the CC Connected Learning Center. So go to CC Connected Learning Center, click on Member Benefits and Additional Resources.

There's a document in there that will give you the low down on a lot of fun for your family this summer. Families, I hope that you will enjoy the week together and that you are all practicing being everyday educators at home. See you next time. Bye-bye. (gentle music) you you