Using mnemonics to learn new foreign words

Hi everyone!
I'd like to ask you about using of mnemonics. Does anyone try this way of learning new words? How do you do that?
Also, I'd be interested if anyone share their experience, also if it is negative.

Thank you!

Using mnemonics to learn new foreign words Now I try to learn English words using mnemonics. I have a humble goal to learn next 1000 words with abstract meanings from this list: http://www.vocabulary.com/lists/52473#view=notes My scheme is: 1) Try to imagine an association of pronounce of English word using word (or words or parts of words) of your native language 2) Try to imagine an association of meaning of this word in your native language 3) Connect both of imaginations from step 1 and step 2 to one 4) Tie image from step 3 to location that you know well 5) Try to remember your sick image after some time has passed...Voila! Wonderfully, but it works! Learning words by this way is a more funny and efficient for me than "mechanical memorizing". And...in addition of my story, I'd like to ask some questions. Does anyone try this way of learning new words? How do you do that? What is your scheme? Also, I'd be interested if anyone tells me about negative experience of using mnemonics. It would be interesting. Thank you.

My toughest job in English I've had some hard and interesting job lately. It took almost all my free time for a week and a half. I'm telling about decoding of audio interview. When my friend offered this job, I thought "Well, sounds interesting. I have no problems with English listening of BBC podcasts so why not?". Then my friend said "It's about 60 minutes interview with a punk band from Portland, are you sure?".And I thought for a second time "Hmm, It sounds as challenge and I can learn something new. Of course I should take this job!". My friend gave me about a week - a week and a half, and I started to do this. Oh, God! I met really serious problems with pronouncing and understanding of words I've never heard. In addition the members of this band from Portland were telling about other cities and states of America, they were using some specific words and phrases and I didn't know neither US geography nor those words well. Thanks to Google and Vocabulary.com they were very helpful to me, and the speed of my decoding increased with them up to 1 minute of interview per half an hour of my time! I know, it is not very quick and some Italki users have their own tricks and know other web-resources and their speed can be more quick, but I did it! Of course, after all my friend did some corrections of my job, and I heard some jokes about ridicules moments in my text, but I gained some experience in English and it makes me feel happy now.

A question about using of articles

Hi everybody! I have a question about using of articles at this VOA text:

http://learningenglish.voanews.com/content/graphene-the-material-of-the-21st-century/2681970.html

 

There are 3 pieces of the text where using "a", "the" and nothing before profession:

"Dan Scheffer is vice-president of the manufacturing company, Vorbeck Materials."
(without any article before "vice-president")

 

"Louise Brooks is the manager of the product development team at Vorbeck Materials."
(with "the" article before "manager of..")

 

"Ray Sauro is a chemical engineer at Vorbeck Materials."
(with "a" article in this case, which I counted is right)

 

Why an author don't use only indefinite article in these 3 cases? Can someone explain the difference? Thanks.

March. It's snowy today Today is the 23rd of March. I woke up at 6.00 am and looked at a window. And what did I see? It's cloudy and snowy today. Every spring after the most part of snow is melted, I hope that I won't see these bunches of snow before next winter. But not. I'm so sad. By the way I heard a joke today "Hey people why are you surprised? It's snow in Russia. It's only 100 times in a year"