STEM PARENTING
Flashcards are all the rage.
And honestly, why shouldn't they? Be it on physical little pieces of paper or in their virtual form like on Quizlet, flashcards are amazing for memorizing everything: from vocabulary to dates and facts to principles and theorems. They're great if you're learning a new language but also if you need to review a biology chapter or prepare for a law school exam.
Although mainly used to help kids learn vocabulary in their first or second language with the help of pictures that represent the meaning of words, they can also be written to include a question on one side and an answer, complex definition, example sentence, formula, or concise argumentation on the other.
But if reviewing your flashcards is all you do with them, let me tell you, you're sleeping on a gold mine! I found at least three other ways to use my flashcards — and to re-use them over time.
Traffic lights
That's my absolute number one go-to strategy when it comes to memorizing. All it takes is three colored A4 sheets of paper: one red, one yellow, one green, like traffic lights.
Then I'll start reviewing my flashcards and divide them based on how well I remember the content: I'll put each small piece of paper on the green sheet if I remember it well, on the yellow one if I have some hesitations, and on the red piece of paper if I didn't remember the content of the flashcard at all.
In the next round, I'll omit to review the "green" ones and only focus on the "yellow" and "red" ones, and I'll keep doing that until all the flashcards are in the green area.
That procedure is useful for a variety of reasons.
First of all, reviewing material is often boring and monotonous. This strategy adds a playful component to the process. It can also be done in pairs: I'll review my flashcards, and my partner will sort each one into the correct category based on my performance, and then we'll exchange roles.
Having a clear goal helps because "remembering everything perfectly" is a pretty non-specific and scarcely realistic objective. Instead, if I know I want to have at least half my cards in the green pile before the end of the afternoon, I'll be motivated to keep going!
Secondly, this strategy reinforces metacognition and makes learning evident for the students. Learners, especially kids and teenagers, are often not good at evaluating what they know and reflecting on their own learning processes. Having to repeatedly judge how well they performed helps them develop a critical sense.
On the other hand, watching the number of flashcards in the red and yellow areas progressively decrease is encouraging and helps them feel confident because there's visual evidence of learning!
Sorting into categories
If flashcards are used over time to study different topics, learners can keep them and then pull them out again to compare concepts and definitions.
This is something I often do with my students who are learning Italian. After building flashcards to memorize how different verb tenses are formed and reviewing all the cards relative to each verb tense separately, I'll suggest them to mix up all the cards (passato prossimo, passato remoto, imperfetto, trapassato prossimo…) and then try to divide them by sorting them into categories again.
This strategy helps learners overcome another common obstacle: not being able to link concepts or topics they've studied at different times. For example, learners might be perfectly good at conjugating a verb form when it's the only tense in the exercise but get confused as soon as multiple tenses are involved.
Flashcards allow you to have a summary of all the topics you dealt with, always within reach. You can bring up old flashcards again to review the first topics or even decide to rewrite them in a more sophisticated way now that your proficiency has increased.
Simulating exams
If you have someone to study with, they can use your flashcards to act as your examiner. They may ask you questions based on what's on the front and then check your answer against what's written on the back. This adds an element of authenticity and helps you reduce exam anxiety because you have the possibility of practicing being tested.
Flashcards allow anyone to act as your examiner even if they are not familiar with the content, as is often the case with college students from different majors studying together and reviewing the material before taking an exam.
Having to verbally formulate your answers out loud is particularly good for memorization, content retention, and retrieval. If you're studying on your own, you may be tempted to skip this part and just review everything in your head. But if you don't talk out loud, you can't be sure that you can correctly formulate complete and coherent answers!
As a math teacher, I often have trouble convincing my students of how important it is to talk when you study — to yourself, to your classmates, or the dog!
If you hear the hesitation in your voice, or if you have to continuously pause to think about what you're going to say next, then you know you're not ready yet — and you can go back to the traffic lights game to refine your review.
Final take
I hope this story helped you get a bit more creative with your flashcards and find new and effective ways to memorize content!
What do you use flashcards for? Do you prefer virtual or physical ones?
Published in STEM Parenting. Follow to learn more about a science-based approach to education.
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