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Tips, tutorials and resources to aid you on your path


towards uency.

8 Ways to Create Better Flashcards

Im an Anki nut. In some sense, I owe three of my

languages to Anki. One of my favorite things about Anki is

its exibility; you can make ashcards in any way you

choose.

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Once youve created and memorized a lot of ashcards (I recently passed 20,000

ashcardsgeesh), youll start to notice that not all cards are created equal. Some

ashcards are easy to remember, theyteach you precisely what you want to learn, and

they generally make you smile when you see them. Others make you want to throw your

smartphone out the window. Good ashcards can make the di erence between sticking
with a language until uency or giving up after a few months, so Im making this guide to

help others learn from some of my terrible, terrible ashcard-related mistakes.

Principle 1: Use Pictures


Theres a neat principlethat came out of cognitive psychology in the 60s and 70scalled

the Pictorial Superiority E ect.The basic idea is that we remember pictures ridiculously

well, and we pretty much suck at remembering words. Unfortunately for us, languages

are full ofwords, not pictures, so at least on the surface, were screwed.

But theres a trick.

If you compare your ability to recall a random picture like thisand a


word like Apple, youre going to have amuch easier time

remembering the picture. But what about a picturewith a word?

Studies show that pictures with words are evenmore memorable

than pictures alone. Why? You wrestle with the meaning of that word

in conjunction with the picture. Why is APPLE there? What does that

sculpture have to do with apples? In the process of wresting with the

combined meaning of a word and a picture, you store both of them

deeply in your memory.

So add pictures. All the time (at least on one side of each ashcard). Youll remember a bit

better if those pictures havesomething to do with what youre learning, but that

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shouldnt be hard, given the 45 billion images currently hanging out on Google Images.

I never used to do this (in my personal French deck, for instance, most of my grammar

cards are just ll in the blank exercises without pictures), but I started adding pictures to

my grammar exercises in Russian, and it made ahugedi erence. Now I dont make any

cards without pictures.

Principle 2: More is Better


Some words are hard to remember, and some languages are full of hard to remember

words. For the rst couple of months, Russian kicked my butt. I dutifully made my cards,

added pictures, and studied daily, and yet couldnt seem to remember anything for longer

than two weeks. Sometimes you need more stimulation than a single ashcard to

remember information thats particularly far removed from your every-day experiences.

For me, Russian words were simply too weird to remember easily, with their strange

sounds and odd-looking letters. Fortunately, you can make multiple, di erent ashcards

for a single word. When I tried this in Russian, I stopped forgetting.

The more cards you make for a single topic, the easier and better youll memorize it. At

least for words, there are two main avors of ashcards worth using: cards that test

comprehension (whats achien?) and cards that test production (whats a furry animal

with a waggy tail that chases cats?)

The former put the word alone on the front side of the card:

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Comprehension Cards

Your job is to think about what the word means. Thesecards do an awesome job of
building associations into a new word pictures, sounds, bits of grammar, etc. That way,

the next time you encounter that word in a new context while reading or listening, those
associations will come right back. In general, these cards have a single word or two on

their front sides without any added context. On the back, theyll have pictures, example
sentences, and any other goodies you decide to put on them.

If you move the word to the back side of the card (and the picture or context to the

front), youre training a di erent ability:

Production Cards

These cards require you to recall a word (chien), its grammatical features (un
masculine), its spelling and its pronunciation. They work as reinforcement for passive

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cards and make the words easier to recall when you want to use them in speaking or

writing.

Ive tried to use exclusively production cards, thinking that I would save myself time, but
it didnt work; I couldnt remember chien if I didnt see the exact same dog picture,

which didnt happen very often in real life. Now, I do both types of cards whenever I can,
and I only skip the productive cards if Im sureI never want to say a word (but will

probably read it). When in doubt, just make both. Anki makes it easy to do this without
adding any extra time, and it will make your overall review process much easier. I keep

grammatical and pronunciation information on the back-side of both cards, because if I


cant pronounce the word or use it in a sentence properly, then its basically useless for

speaking or writing. I want to reinforce a words sound and usage whenever I can.

Principle 3: Keep it Simple

Bad: Multiple answers required

When you see words grouped together on vocabulary lists, you may be tempted to keep
them in their original groups. Why spend time making seven cards for the weekdays when

you could make one or two? In my rst French deck, I grouped together the days of the
week, the months of the year, various types of fruit, and anything else I could jam into a

single ashcard. This was unfortunate. Until I split them up, I wasnt able to remember any
of these words.
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Cards like these are problematic because your ability to recall each of the answers is

di erent. If you start o knowing Monday very well, Tuesday decently and
Wednesday poorly, then youll be repeating all three every time you have a problem

with any of them. Its too much, both from a time standpoint (why waste time repeating
Monday when you know it well already?) and from a learning standpoint (youre

repeating the card too often to push any words into long-term memory). Separate cards
like this into their smallest constituent parts, each with a single answer:

Good: Single Answers

Whenever possible, your goal is to test one conceptper card, because it will save you
time in the long run. A simple card is easy to remember and helps produce a quick

response; you either know it or you dont, and if you dont, then youll repeat it until you
do. Net time wasted on Monday: seconds. Net time spent memorizing Wednesday
very well: seconds. Sweet.

A note: There are shades of grey when it comes to the one-concept idea.
Youre welcome is a single concept, but you certainly could make two
cards out of it if you wanted to: (Thank you! ___ welcome!) (Thank
you! Youre ___!). Over time, youll get a sense for how much information
you can store at once, but to begin, Id suggest that you aim for more,
simpler cards rather than fewer, more complex ones. Nearly every time Ive

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had problems remembering a given word or grammar point, its because


Ive made my cards too complex. For languages like Chinese, you may need
3-4 cards to remind you of the spelling, the pronunciation, and the meaning
separately. This saves you time in the long run, because remembering many
easy cards is much easier than remembering fewer di cult ones.

Principle 4: When youre right, youre right


I just told you never to demand multiple answers, but what happens when you try to
learn a synonym?

Multiple equally correct answers


(Synonyms, Production Card)

Both plate and dish are perfectly ne descriptions of this picture. Do you have to
remember bothof them?

Well, no. As long as one of those words comes to mind, youre doing just ne. Youll learn
each word separately through your comprehension cards anyways, so if someone holds a
gun to your head and demands synonyms, youll be ready for him (or her):

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Multiple Correct Answers


(Synonyms, Comprehension Cards)

Multiple Correct Answers


(Synonyms, Comprehension Cards)

This approach also works for words with multiple de nitions. A bar is usually for drinks,
but bars of gold and chocolate bars certainly exist. Cards like these arent a problem:

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Picture Noun Cards for bar

Picture Noun Cards for bar

But the other direction is trickier.What goes on the back side of this card?

Front side of
bar card

You have two options. You can either put the main de nition on the back side, or you can
put multiple de nitions on the back side (and if you remember any de nition, then mark it
as correct):

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Back side of bar, multiple


de nitions

Back side of bar, main de nition


only

Neither approach is better than the other, and I tend to use them interchangeably. In

both cases, youll tend to remember one de nition best, which then becomes the anchor
point for new de nitions. With that anchor in place, its very easy to connect a new
concept to the rst one (Chocolate bars use the same word as normal bars!), and a
single additional card (like card with the single picture of a chocolate bar, above) will be

enough to create that connection, making you an expert in all things bar-related.

Principle 5: Opposites Attract. Dont let them.


Once upon a time, I found a list of antonyms in French and decided to learn them like this:

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Bad: Opposites Attract

Bad: Opposites Attract

This was, arguably, one of the worst ideas ever. Weeks later, when I tried to remember
any of these words, I would remember both instead:

Whats the weather like today? Its very hot or cold today.

What did you think about the movie? Why, it was excellent/terrible. It was de nitely one
of the worst/best movies Ive ever seen. The lead actress was so beautiful/ugly, and she

played her part really well/badly.

It took me months to x the damage to my poor French, and I dont know if my French
ever forgave me. Pay close attention when making cards for closely related ideas, and

make them as independent as possible. Your language will thank you. This applies to

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thematically related words like stoplight, crosswalk, street and sidewalk and antonyms
like cold/hot:

Good: An independent card for


every concept

Principle 6: Keep it Short

Bad: Question overload

Your brain is quite good at being lazy (and e cient). Over the course of practicing a card,

you will memorize the words closest to the missing word, and youll tend to ignore the
rest of the card. In this case, you will commit to memory the following: in some month

of some year, the spork is the. Unfortunately, this is totally useless. Keep your questions

as simple and direct as possible, and you will be rewarded with robust, useful memories:

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Good: Short and sweet

Principle 7: Learn, then memorize

What?

Understand what youre teaching yourself before you memorize it. While there is a place

for uncertainty in foreign language study, memorizing mostly incomprehensible language

isnt the most e ective use of your time. Use examples you can understand, and youll
learn more from them:

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Good: Straightforward,
comprehensible examples work
best

Principle 8: Be careful with corrections

Bad: Showing yourself mistakes

This card is concise, clear and comprehensible. Heres the problem: When you read an

incorrect sentence, youre more likely to believe that its correct in the future, even if you

know its incorrect originally. I just made you more likely to say you eats hamburgers in
the future. Now Ive done it twice. Sorry. Known as the Truth E ect, it makes familiar

things more credible than less familiar things, no matter how untrustworthy the
source.Every time you read a mistake like this, youre more likely to do the mistake in the

future, so if you wish to put corrections into your ashcards, do it like this:

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Good: Replace mistakes with blanks

If you rearrange mistakes into ll-in-the-blank tests, you eliminate the Truth E ect, and

get an e ective, concise ashcard in the process. You can use this type of card to teach

yourself grammar.

What about when you make a mistake by accident? Youll be making thousands of cards,

which nearly guarantees that youll screw up somewhere:

Unintentional Errors (And thats the


last time with the hamburgers.
Sorry.)

Do whatever you can to avoid this, but if it happens, youll nd that these cards will cause

trouble all the time. Youll have serious trouble remembering erroneous cards for more

than two weeks. This is a good thing. Your brain is very good at picking out
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inconsistencies. If you feed it ashcards with con icting information, it will sound an

alarm by preventing you from remembering those ashcards.

If you notice that youre having major di culties memorizing what appear to be easy

cards, double check to make sure that you dont have an unintentional error lurking
somewhere. Either you will nd an error, or your cards are too hard. Thank your brain, x

your cards, and move on with your day.

Thats it! If you have questions and additional suggestions, leave them in the comments!

FILED UNDE R: BLOG, FLASHCARDS, SITE UPDAT E S TAGGE D WI T H: ANKI,


FLASHCARDS, MEMORY, MEMORY T E CHNI QUES, PICTURE S

Gabriel Wyner
I am an author, opera singer and polyglot based in Chicago, IL. After reaching uency in German
in 14 weeks with the help of the immersive Middlebury Language Schools, I fell in love with the

process of language learning, going on to spend two months in intensive Italian courses in

Perugia, Italy. Searching for ways to bring the immersion experience into the home, I began to
develop a system that rapidly builds uency in short, daily sessions. In 2010, my e orts paid o . I

learned French to uency in 5 months, and Russian in 9 months. After Russian, I started writing
my book, working on a related Kickstarter project, and studying languages at a more relaxed

pace, learning Hungarian and a good chunk of Japanese over the course of a year and a half each.

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