Route back to rote learning [Repeat]

Small talk on 'knowledge economy' loves to talk big about the rottenness of rote learning. Pitched as the bane of True Learning©, mugging up has, at least on the lip-service front, been given the short shrift in respectable circles. But earlier this month, a boost for the much-derided process came from an unlikely source: 57-yr-old New Zealander Nigel Richards, considered the greatest Scrabble player of all time. If that's impressive, the real reason for him leaving an indelible impression on us is that he has won the Spanish World Scrabble Championships - without knowing Spanish. How? By memorising the whole Spanish Scrabble Dictionary.

Richards has an eidetic memory, and, in 2015, the multiple English language Scrabble champion used it deftly to win the francophone tournament without knowing a word of French. He had 'simply' mugged up le dictionnaire. Not all of us have a photographic memory. But rote learning can certainly be a good braintool that goes beyond remembering your own phone numbers, with its own rewards, as Richards shows us. Cramming - whether like priests learning Sanskrit mantras that many of them may not understand, or like our countless young folk going to coaching centres to become 'worthy' - has its own 'invisible' quality. With AI doing much of our critical thinking soon, rote will be back. Mark our Scrabble words.