Elaboration:

"In a cartoon by the Far Side cartoonist Gary Larson, a bug-eyed school kid asks his teacher, 'Mr. Osborne, can I be excused? My brain is full!' If you’re just engaging in mechanical repetition, it’s true, you quickly hit the limit of what you can keep in mind. However, if you practice elaboration, there’s no known limit to how much you can learn. Elaboration is the process of giving new material meaning by expressing it in your own words and connecting it with what you already know."

make it stick - Brown, Roediger, McDaniel