Right now, pre-made flashcards suffer similar problems. There are many flashcards available from many sources, but curation is practically nonexistent. Will there be good sets of flashcards out there? Yes. Are there reliably good sources that consistently publish flashcards that adhere to the "20 commandments of knowledge formulation"? Not as easy to find.
Why is this? While Spaced Repetition Software has advanced greatly, public acceptance has not; traditional and archaic learning methods prevail and show no signs of changing due to the global institutional dysfunction (Among many other things). In other words, people don't really care because they don't understand that SRS is superior to traditional learning. Also, the public as a whole has not been taught how to properly structure a flashcard. Thus, many of the flashcards that do exist are poorly constructed.
So while there might be a few good sets of flashcards out there, I've found making my own much easier than modifying poorly formulated pre-made flashcards and weeding out unnecessary ones (Which you will likely have to do). It is also easier to personalize your flashcards (Add pictures, reference memories, etc.) right from the start, thus making them more memorable.
I once purchased a set of Spanish vocabulary, but someone else's collection wouldn't seem to stick. Ive been thinking It would be interesting to enter an entire textbook and treat the text as incremental reading and the chapter problems as flashcards.
ReplyDeleteI'm currently experimenting with using sm for a rather in depth ear training course. As I learn the material I add the audio to cards for future review. I also set the retention level as high as it would go, thinking that since this is a skill more review would be appropriate.
Thanks for a great blog. ABSOLUTELT LOVE SUPERMEMO and CRAVE everything about it and your blogposts, tips etc. are really helpful. Let´s make more people aware of this fantastic software...
ReplyDeleteHenrik
You are welcome, I agree. Learning is so fun :D
ReplyDeleteI read this post for the first time today, almost 14 years after it has been composed. Interestingly enough, the situation appears to be the same nowadays. SRS didn't stick to the general public; few people yet even know that there is such a thing as Spaced Repetition; there are some good decks of cards here and there, but usually they are not worth the effort to weed what is unimportant or badly composed, so that making our own flashcards is yet more productive, most of the times.
ReplyDeleteWill this picture ever change??
I know, right? When I first stumbled upon (And really understood) spaced repetition in the form of SuperMemo, I felt like I had found a magical cheat code for real life. I didn't understand why it wasn't more popular and recognized for the super useful thing that it was. I think in general the reasons are still the same as they were 10+ years ago, but it seems like adoption is A LITTLE bit higher thanks to Anki and other implementations of SRS. Still, it seems like SRS is a "secret weapon" hidden in plain sight. As far as the flashcard quality goes, it still feels the same: it's hard to differentiate between poorly made flashcards and well made ones. For learning languages it is easier to make good flashcards because languages lend themselves very easily to flashcard creation. But learning subjects that are less binary (Agua = water) and more fuzzy (What causes governments to fall) are WAY harder to make flashcards for. And the flashcards that I make are different and reflect my base of knowledge, and might not work for others. I only know how MY brain works, and what metaphors or explanations work best for ME. I can imagine the utopia scenario of there being a gigantic Reddit-style repository for flashcards, and people can submit their own flashcards and add images and sounds to them (To make them more fun to review and informative), and people could comment, upvote or downvote flashcards. Then you could just "skim the top" each week of whatever cool facts/newsworthy things/ interesting historical information/ etc. got upvoted that week and just click "add to my collection." But to do that would require a lot of people to 1. Understand how SRS works, 2. Understand the "20 rules of knowledge formulation" and 3. Know how to make flashcards BASED on those 20 rules. That by itself is a BIG ask, and it seems like for now, we are still on our own.
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