Human brain has two types of memory: short-term and long-term memory. You perceive this world in this particular fraction of a second in a unique way, not as one or two seconds ago. People tend to think they can feel the same feelings as they did when they remember things. However, they don't. According to Daniel Gilbert, the author of "Stumbling on Happiness" our brain deceives us all the time as it "refracts" the reality to make it "understandable" to us.
How this knowledge can be applied to help us memorize English words? It is very simple - we have to deceive our brain in a way it does to save things in its memory. The main drive that makes our memories so manipulative is our emotions. If there were no feelings about what had happened you wouldn't recollect it afterwards. You can remember things (or it's better to say - you think that you remember them) which caused some psychological processes called emotions - and the more stronger emotions were, the more changing information you get now while try to recollect your memories.
You can't remember things which didn't cause any emotions: every day we stumble upon hundreds of events and they drop out of your box faster when you can realize it.
To memorize words you definitely should "build a bridge" between your short-term or operative memory to long-term one based on emotional reactions. There are different ways to do it depending on what prevailing type of memory you have: visual, audio or kinesthetic but there is the topic for another post. Today I want you to meet the game which helps you to memorize English words, you can play in it effortlessly everywhere without any requirements. All you need to do as a Russian English Learner is to find consonant words and sounds. This is a good way to go for audio-memory type students. For visual-type it's better to make up a situations in your head.
Here are some examples:
suggest - предложить - она сделала тот самый жест, предложив мне пойти с ней в кино.
soul - душа - не сыпь мне соль на рану, душа еще болит.
teacher - учитель - он указкой тычет
brown - коричневый - это коричневый баран
You can also apply eng-eng type of consonant words, for example:
head - голова - what a heck with your head?
This pun or words game has been used by world-famous genius rapper Eminem. He read: this must be a dis-gus-ting or used words Guess Who's Back meaning Jesus Back. You can play in it combining words or even making new ones everywhere - especially it is cool to do it in queues or when you wait for something and you want to improve your vocabulary skills with not much effort.
