{"id":7179,"date":"2026-09-29T17:58:13","date_gmt":"2026-09-29T17:58:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.jolliffe.de\/?p=7179"},"modified":"2026-09-29T17:58:15","modified_gmt":"2026-09-29T17:58:15","slug":"donkey-bridges-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.jolliffe.de\/en\/uncategorized\/donkey-bridges-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Donkey Bridges"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<div class=\"wp-block-media-text is-stacked-on-mobile is-vertically-aligned-top\" style=\"grid-template-columns:32% auto\"><figure class=\"wp-block-media-text__media\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"615\" src=\"https:\/\/www.jolliffe.de\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/Donkey-Bridge-1024x615.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-7180 size-full\"\/><\/figure><div class=\"wp-block-media-text__content\">\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">It\u2019s always good to have a donkey bridge if you can\u2019t remember a word.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">I can never remember the German word <em>Dozent<\/em>, for example. So ,I imagine a lecturer who is a little bit dozy. And there it is: <em>Dozent<\/em>. Admittedly, this may not be the most respectful way of remembering your university lecturer, but it works for me!<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">A donkey bridge \u2013 <em>Eselsbr\u00fccke<\/em> in German \u2013 is, of course, not an real English expression. In English, we would normally call it a mnemonic or a memory aid. But I rather like donkey bridge. It sounds much more entertaining than mnemonic, which sounds like something you might be prescribed by a doctor.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">We all have our own donkey bridges, and they don\u2019t have to make sense to anybody else. They just have to get you safely across the river of forgetfulness.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Here are a few that you might recognise.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Since or for?<\/strong><br>Since has an I with a dot over it \u2013 think of a particular point in time. For has an O, which can remind you of a period of time: for two years, for three weeks. A tiny visual trick, but surprisingly useful.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>A, I or E?<\/strong><br>If you having trouble, think of <em>i for iPhone<\/em> and <em>e for email<\/em>. Or, if you prefer something more memorable: I Ate Eels! Why eels? I have absolutely no idea. But perhaps that\u2019s why it works.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">A friend with a sweet tooth told me about this one: <em>dessert<\/em> or <em>desert<\/em>? Dessert is the one you eat \u2013 and you always want two helpings. So, dessert has two s\u2019s. The desert only has one.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The beauty of donkey bridges is that they can be completely ridiculous. In fact, the more ridiculous they are, the more likely they are to stick in your head.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">So, what are your donkey bridges? Do you have a clever way of remembering an English word, spelling, pronunciation or grammar rule? Please let me know! I\u2019d love to collect them and perhaps compile a whole collection of donkey bridges for a future blog.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>It\u2019s always good to have a donkey bridge if you can\u2019t remember a word. I can never remember the German word Dozent, for example. So ,I imagine a lecturer who is a little bit&#46;&#46;&#46;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":7180,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7179","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"translation":{"provider":"WPGlobus","version":"3.0.5","language":"en","enabled_languages":["de","en"],"languages":{"de":{"title":true,"content":true,"excerpt":false},"en":{"title":false,"content":false,"excerpt":false}}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jolliffe.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7179","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jolliffe.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jolliffe.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jolliffe.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jolliffe.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7179"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.jolliffe.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7179\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7184,"href":"https:\/\/www.jolliffe.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7179\/revisions\/7184"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jolliffe.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7180"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jolliffe.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7179"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jolliffe.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7179"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jolliffe.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7179"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}