Rote memorization techniques

Write write write write. Write it out. Over and over and over and over again. There's something about pen to paper that gets it in your head.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spaced_repetition

Repetition, as everyone has pointed out, is key. But I think different people have different ways of processing sensory modalities. For me, hearing works better than seeing. And working on two senses at once is even better. You have to experiment to find what works best for you. And by the way, repetition is key.

There's some evidence that study right before going to sleep helps improve rate of retention. Sleep is thought to play a part in "locking in" memories. So try cramming your head full of facts and figures right before hitting the sack.

Nthing writing. I remember flirting with cheating once or twice in a high school math class. I'd write out equations on little pieces of paper to use as cheat sheets during the exam. Somehow, that process alone did the trick, and I never had to actually look at the cheat sheets. "Holy crap!," I remember realizing, "I think I just studied!"

Note that I was also able to write them all out at the start of the final--I doubt I would have been able to recall them otherwise.

I agree with the mnemonics. I have heard people describe a visualization memory system, in which you think of a visual representation (CAlcium might become a CAt; potassium (K) is a Knee; the CAt sits on someone's Knee...). That said, I learn differently. I still know all the capitals and populations of Latin and South America because I set the information to "Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star" and sang it under my breath until I (and my roommate) went insane. And passed the test, of course.

There appears to be a curve in which you can memorize lots of material by spacing out the intervals between self-testing and reviewing. As in, imagine memorizing a set of data and then waiting a day to review it. Then you might wait three days. Then you might wait a week. And so on. The "supermemo" system implements this technique and there's a writeup of how to use it without a computer http://www.supermemo.com/articles/paper.htm.

(sorry to sound like an ad but) Quizlet.com. Make flashcard sets and drill them using various methods. My favorite is the Learn method: it shows you the term and prompts you to type in the definition (or vice versa if you choose), saving all the ones you get wrong so you can immediately go through just those again. And since it's online, you can access your sets from anywhere.