UK Memory Champions Descend On LVS Ascot To Inspire Students To Greater Academic Success
07 Dec 2017
LVS Ascot became the focal point of the memory world on Saturday 4th November as four memory champions inspired students to learn special techniques that will help them surpass their expectations in exams and share the new found knowledge with fellow students. They were at the school to take part in the UK Memory League Championships.
As the only teacher ever to win the UK Memory Championships, LVS Ascot Head of Psychology James Paterson welcomed former UK Memory Champions Marlo Knight, Ben Pridmore (also former three-time World Memory Champion) and Katie Kermode (also reigning UK Memory League Champion) to do battle in a series of challenges that also gave a group of Year 11 students the opportunity to pit their wits against some of the best brains in the world and learn their secrets.
The event saw the memory experts go head to head in a series of 60-second memorisation tasks such as learning an eighty-digit sequence of randomly generated numbers, a full pack of playing cards, a list of fifty random words and the order of thirty unique images.
Select group of students Henry Bole, Simeon Jack and Owen Lambert had the rare opportunity to go head-to-head against the experts in competition and were amazed to see first-hand what is capable with a fully trained memory. Experienced competitors are able to memorise eighty digits in less than 30 seconds as well as a full pack of cards in less than 25 seconds. It was a great opportunity for the students to meet the competitors and discuss their use of memorisation techniques to enhance their own skills.
Alongside this event, the three Year 11 students at the independent all-ability school took part in the first ever UK Schools Memory League Championships, competing in a shortened version of the events, with Henry Bole emerging victorious. Henry said: “It was a great opportunity to meet some of the best memorisers in the world and showed us just how far it is possible to take these skills. I have used them in revision and I can already see how useful they will be when it comes to my GCSE exams this summer”.
The boys will now be invited to train much younger students at LVS Ascot with a view to hosting inter-school competitions in the future. LVS Ascot Head of Psychology and former UK Memory Champion James Paterson said: “Ultimately this exciting competition will help students apply new found skills to their studies, something that I have done successfully in the past and something that students always find a great addition to a balanced set of study skills. It fits perfectly with the school’s ethos of inspiring students to flourish and exceed their expectations”.