I enjoyed this tremendously. I too am surprised that your fancy, labour-intensive flashcards did not result in significantly better results. Perhaps it does boil down to frequent exposure, even in a very simplified form — dripping water hollows out a stone.
Thank you for the wonderful comment, and the great analogy. I was slightly disappointed that the short-term gains were minimal. I’m hoping that the real magic happens long-term. Maybe six months from now the fancy ones will stick more than the typical ones!?
Thanks very much for the suggestions and perspective! The whole mind mapping thing hasn’t worked for me, though I know a lot of people favour it and it’s a solid strategy. I also experimented with diagramming word families, which was moderately helpful (though I did find some brute force memorization helped me get over the hurdles with problem words that don’t stick). Setting things to song has been relatively helpful…though, if the words aren’t encountered in the wild, I doesn’t always recall them if too much time elapses. I think my favourite recall method remains composition, though I do it in Old English probably because the syntax can be easier(?).
Great article. Love your content.
Thank you so much! That’s such a nice comment to read!
I enjoyed this tremendously. I too am surprised that your fancy, labour-intensive flashcards did not result in significantly better results. Perhaps it does boil down to frequent exposure, even in a very simplified form — dripping water hollows out a stone.
Thank you for the wonderful comment, and the great analogy. I was slightly disappointed that the short-term gains were minimal. I’m hoping that the real magic happens long-term. Maybe six months from now the fancy ones will stick more than the typical ones!?
I sent you my answers to your interview questions in which I eschewed flash cards in a way.
Visual aids are useful though
One can make mind maps out of word fields too, like words related to horse tack and riding, for example
Its endless, just the words about the hunt make up more like word galaxies
Its hard to get an overview, which is the idea, with flash cards or similar visual aids or without
Reading aloud and hearing it might be more effective actually though
Or at least do that while using the flash cards?
Thanks very much for the suggestions and perspective! The whole mind mapping thing hasn’t worked for me, though I know a lot of people favour it and it’s a solid strategy. I also experimented with diagramming word families, which was moderately helpful (though I did find some brute force memorization helped me get over the hurdles with problem words that don’t stick). Setting things to song has been relatively helpful…though, if the words aren’t encountered in the wild, I doesn’t always recall them if too much time elapses. I think my favourite recall method remains composition, though I do it in Old English probably because the syntax can be easier(?).