Anki: What to use it for + basic types of flashcard
Hey friends.
So now you have probably understood what is Anki, why is it so effective, I also convinced you enough to install this wonderful app. Now when you have done this, congrats, you can start studying. But do not rush. Even though Anki is an absolute game-changer, it is not any kind of magic. When you start learning with Anki, you don’t automatically become an A student. That’s not how it works. You also have to follow certain rules, that will make your studying truly effective.
Some people might say that Anki doesn’t work. This may be true. But I say no. Anki is usually ineffective because you use it in the wrong way. But to prevent that, I would like to dedicate this post to one of the most important things you should know: What to actually use Anki for. If you want Ankí to work for you, then this is by far the most important aspect of it. Because when you use Anki to learn wrong stuff and then say that it doesn’t work, is like using a kettle to make ice, and then saying that it doesn’t work.
So what should you use Anki for?
Simply, Anki is an absolute blaster when it comes to memorizing facts. I mean single pieces of information. But it is not so good in understanding the whole concept, and also understanding the context and hierarchy of different ideas.
Every learning material is created from two parts: Part, when you have to understand what is going on, and part when you have to memorize what is going on. Now you might think that understanding is important only in subjects like math or physics or chemistry, and in subjects like history or biology, we only need to memorize facts. Not really. Even though understanding of the concept itself is not probably as important in these subjects, it is still better to also know how this information relates to other concepts, especially to these, that you already know. When you understand that hierarchy, then you can start memorizing facts.
There is one method for finding what things should you understand, and what things should you memorize. It is called the 4T method, and it was invented by Mike Wu, who also made a youtube video about it on his channel Mike and Matty (you should check it out). But to explain it simply: For T’s stands for Topics, Titles, Terms, and Tables. E.g. imagine you are learning about cells. That is the topic. Titles might be some subheadings you may find in your textbook, like function, types of cells, anatomy, etc. Then, within each title, you can also find a lot of terms, so let’s say in anatomy you’ve got membrane, cytoplasm, mitochondria, ribosome, and so on. And for each term, you also have some information (for example that mitochondrias are the powerhouse of the cell). You have to understand the topic, titles, and terms, but you need to memorize tables. But there’s one cool about this method: Once you create this sort of tree, then there is a chance that you’ve already understood the way single concepts are structured. So now you just have to care about memorization. So we can move to Anki right now.
Decks of cards
So in Anki, your flashcards are organized into decks. That is pretty obvious.
But don’t worry, your learning efficiency does not depend on the way you organize. You can do it pretty much however you want. I do not personally recommend creating one deck, where you’ll store all the flashcards. But do not create too many decks, for each topic, neither (because then maintaining a certain level of organization would be a lot more difficult. )
I prefer to create decks according to the subjects I have at school. But sometimes I also like to create a deck for some important test, and I’ll delete that later because usually, I put there pieces of extremely detailed information, and I am sure that later during the semester it is not going to be important. In subject decks I put only the most relevant info, which is going to be good to know throughout the whole semester.
The basic type of flashcard
So now let’s move on to the next step, which is creating actual flashcards. And to be more specific, the basic type of flashcards.
The basic type of flashcards is very good for
Classic questions - What, When, Why, Who, Where, and How questions. But you need to formulate them correctly.
Two-way connections - Which means information, where there are two (and more) ways you can ask for this. We’ll talk about this one later on.
For learning spelling - especially useful for language learners.
The classic type of questions
As I mentioned before, in these, you can put What, When, Why, Who, Where, and How questions. But you should follow certain rules, that will make your future revisions much much much easier.
At first, questions and answers should be short. This is not the rule that I always follow, but it is a good general rule. That means that you should be aiming for simplicity in most of your cards, not in all of them, cause sometimes it is just too difficult to formulate a simple question.
Your questions should be pretty straightforward as well. When you look at the question, you should immediately know what are you asking for yourself. So to each question, add as many modifiers as you can, without giving yourself an actual hint, to make the question clearer. When there are questions that have multiple answers, add there how many answers you would like to hear. If there are any questions, where you are explaining something, try to indicate what things should you definitely mention during your explanation.
And of course, always add what are you asking about. For example, my friend created a flashcard with the question When it happened, when he was learning about the battle at Hastings. And on the first day, it seemed natural and clear for him, because he knew he was learning about that he meant that battle. But then he came across the exact same question a couple of months later, and he didn’t know what is he supposed to say. So never forget about your future self.
The last thing, I like to do with my flashcards, is kinda fancy, but it makes the flashcards a lot more esthetic, is to always have the main (the most important) answer written in bold, and underneath that, I will have some additional info, which is going to be in cursive. I like this, because this way, with that background info, the only learning resource I’ll ever need is going to be Anki. No textbooks, no notes. Just Anki flashcards. It is fantastic, isn’t it?
The basic type of flashcards + reversed card
The reversed card basically means that the card is going to show up twice during your revision, each time with a different side. This one is especially helpful when learning vocabulary. Let’s say you want to learn that,perro’ means dog in Spanish. So you put it to Anki, with perro in the front. After a few revisions, you’ll know what perro means in Spanish. But that doesn't mean that you’ll know how to say dog in Spanish. By only revising the translation of the word perro, you have created just a one-way connection in your brain, which means that when somebody asks you the questions about the same thing, but in an opposite, way, you won’t be able to answer as confidently. So when you are learning words, some terms, or facts, where there are multiple ways to ask questions about them, use the reverse card type.
Basic type - type in the answer
I do not have much to tell you about this one. It just means that when you are revising flashcards, you’ll need to type the answer. This is useful only when you are learning some foreign languages (for example French), or at least I haven’t found any other usage of these yet. But they’re still useful because thanks to them you can also practice spelling, which is very important.
So that’s all I have to say about basic flashcards. In the near future, I would like to publish posts about the essentials of good flashcards, so if you want to learn about that, check your email inbox frequently. Until that, bye.