WHAT EXACTLY ARE FLASHCARDS?

Do Flashcards Work?

A flashcard or flash card is a card with information on one side, such as words or numbers, used in classroom exercises or private study. On one side, there might be a query and a response on the other. Flashcards can include vocabulary, historical dates, equations, and more. Flashcards are commonly used as a learning tool to help remember.

Boosting Your Flashcard Game

Flashcards function best when combined with a solid plan. Therefore, after being entrusted by our bosses with figuring out the best method to make your language learning experience, we gathered a few suggestions to help you make the most of them.

1. Create Your Own
We all appreciate the ease of use of pre-made flashcard sets for your favorite app or even store-bought, laminated decks.  However, much is to be said about the old-fashioned writing process. The act of determining which words to utilize, as well as writing all of these words down on your brand-new piece of cardboard, will aid in the learning process.

2. Include images
Languages have been existing for at least 50,000 years, but writing has only been around for around 10,000. Your animal brain still regards letters as a strange new technology, but nature has predisposed us to comprehend visuals and places better. Therefore, instead of simply writing “tree” (which you know), why not draw a short tree?

3. Begin with the Native Side
For most people seeking to learn a language online, comprehension comes before retrieval. So there is a strong chance you already know what the term arbre implies when you see it. However, have you ever tried to recall arbre from memory during a conversation? When quizzing oneself using flashcards, begin with the side of your native language. Then take a breather and force yourself to recall the term in your target language.

4. Extend after the flip
Keep reading the other side of each flashcard after flipping it. After a while, your brain will disconnect from the task, and you will no longer study. Instead, utter the word before inserting it into a phrase. For bonus points, make that line believable or provide some context. You may always get inspiration from one of the characters in your favorite foreign television program.

5. Take a page from Feynman’s book.
Have you come across the Feynman method? Richard Feynman was a Nobel Prize-winning nuclear scientist, musician, and polyglot. He originates the “explain like I am five” cliche. According to Feynman, the greatest way to learn anything is to simplify and teach it to a kid. Although we are not in the business of teaching nuclear physics, this information may benefit your flashcards. To be comprehensive, we sometimes add comments and annotations to each flashcard – complicated terms, gender, and conjugations. This makes them difficult to read and remember. Instead, put your set to the test by presenting it to the nearest 5-year-old.

6. Make Use of Spaced Repetition
Spaced repetition is popular among students. For the first time, this is an evidence-based method that researchers have tested and validated (but so is learning by watching subtitled TV). The concept behind spaced repetition is to go through the newer or more challenging flashcards more frequently while going over the ones you already know less regularly. A complicated program that maintains close track of every error you make can help you identify which ones are “hard.” Alternatively, you can just put them in boxes.

The Usefulness of Flashcards

Flashcards work because they encourage active recall in the brain, which is how we recover memories. Viewing a term and then consciously striving to retain its meaning aids in transferring that phrase from short-term to long-term memory.

Using flashcards, you also unintentionally participate in metacognition or knowledge of one’s rights. This happens when you determine whether or not you need to review the words again based on how sure you were in your answer. As you repeat more difficult flashcards and set away ones you believe you have learned, you use spaced repetition, a memorizing method. The success of flashcards is heavily dependent on self-awareness.

When researchers compared the exam grades of pupils who used flashcards to study strategies to those who did not, they discovered beneficial outcomes. One research included 470 students enrolled in an Intro to a Psychology college course. Almost 70% of the class utilized flashcards to study, and those who did outperform those who did not. Another incentive to put flashcards to the test for your next exam!

Flashcards are an excellent tool to improve your vocabulary. They receive a poor name for being monotonous and repetitive, mostly because many need to maximize their full potential. The advice we have given you here is an active endeavor that requires your full attention.

Think of something other than Flash Cards as a Silver Bullet.

Keep in mind that flashcards are simply one way to review content. Others may be more helpful, depending on your study topic and how far you have progressed in your learning.

• Instead of flashcards, provide your answer on your terms.
• Make a quiz.
• Take a practice exam written by someone else.
• Work on various practice tasks (your go-to strategy for math).
• Create thought maps and Venn diagrams.

Flash cards are excellent for helping you drill correlations between two pieces of knowledge – but that is all they are useful for. This makes them useful for learning definitions, vocabulary terms, etc. Still, it makes them an especially poor study tool for material that fits into a greater visual or organizational hierarchy.

Consider memorizing all of the atomic numbers of the Periodic Table elements using flash cards. To do so, you must depend totally on mnemonics; there must be a visible link between the numbers and the element names. Magnesium is simple to associate with Mg, but not with 12.

Furthermore, the Periodic Table arrangement is far more beneficial for acquiring those quantities. You may soon get to the stage where filling in the full table from memory becomes effortless by understanding the groups and applying additional mnemonics. You may then select a box and determine its number.

Check Our Our Other Blogs:

• Tried and Tested Ways for Parents of Teens to Manage their Homework
• Completing Homework in a Timely Manner