The PROBLEM with Active Recall and Spaced Repetition (Truth Behind Studying Smarter)

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Kraut
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The PROBLEM with Active Recall and Spaced Repetition (Truth Behind Studying Smarter)

Postby Kraut » Sun Jan 01, 2023 4:51 pm

Memory Researcher Says Anki Won't Make You Fluent

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cFXaeH5 ... l=KoreKara
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The PROBLEM with Active Recall and Spaced Repetition (Truth Behind Studying Smarter)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=--Hu2w0 ... JustinSung
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Re: The PROBLEM with Active Recall and Spaced Repetition (Truth Behind Studying Smarter)

Postby Le Baron » Sun Jan 01, 2023 5:52 pm

I've watched the top video before recently, but not the bottom one. He says (a lot) "but the research shows..." and talks about only short-term memory benefits. This seems to me to be the exact opposite of what most people report about SRS. That it feels like there is no real short-term memory benefit. The initial discussion about Anki not being used in isolation to 'learn a language' is less relevant to this forum, where practically everyone knows you have to read, listen, talk and understand structure. So I suppose he's addressing the dabble crowd who want to gain as much as possible for little to no effort.

I already do most of the things mentioned. e.g. making small batches of cards from books I'm reading and then recycling these into use contexts.

In short, he's probably a great memory researcher, but his general argument against Anki here is worthless and half the story.
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Re: The PROBLEM with Active Recall and Spaced Repetition (Truth Behind Studying Smarter)

Postby leosmith » Wed Jan 11, 2023 12:22 pm

Kraut wrote:Memory Researcher Says Anki Won't Make You Fluent

Thanks for posting this - I actually wish there were more videos warning about overusing Anki.
Some points I agree with (in my own words):
• If you are going to use Anki, use it in moderation; limit the daily time you spend on it to something manageable. More is not always better. Anki has hurt a lot of people; take this warning seriously.
• Pre-learning lists of words is not as effective as populating your deck with words you encountered in context but did not know.
• Knowing a word in Anki does not guarantee that you will know it when you encounter it in context.
• The vast majority of learning takes place in context.
• There is a lot of obvious stuff mentioned which I will not comment on here (Anki is an aid, not a method; forced output is good; have you ever heard of comprehensible input? etc.)

Some points I disagree with (in my own words):
• If you don’t know a word, you should use interleaving to learn it. While I’m sure this is effective, it’s overkill imo. I wouldn’t use it unless I was really struggling with an important word.
• A sentence in Anki gives you no more context than a word. This was his implication at one point – I think it pretty obviously does.
• 10 words a day is too much. This seems to make sense, because few people acquire 3560 or more new words per year. But by his own recommendation, that’s not how smart Anki users use Anki. It is a prop; a memory hook we cast aside at some point. In my case, I average about 30 Chinese words per day. When my reviews hit 200/day, I delete all cards over 1 month old. It’s totally manageable. Eventually I’ll delete the whole deck, and I’ll still be able to read most of these words. At that point, my reading will provide enough repetition/review to sustain this knowledge. I’ve done this before, as have many others – you don’t forget most of those words as he implies.
• His stats – so many numbers that he came up with off the top of his head that do not jibe with reality. He should do some research ahead of time so that he has some accurate examples. For that matter, How much time was wasted by Eric for not being able to explain the usefulness of using Anki for literary words – if he had just prepared a few examples, they could have cut 10 minutes out of the video.
• (2nd video) Someone who uses Anki is going to learn less effectively than if they don’t use Anki. The second video was long and technical, and not really worth watching unless you are interested in his (pay) courses imo. But he made this conclusion, which I disagree with. I think his science is largely theoretical because there are so many ways to do Anki that he is basically saying reviewing/repetition does not help you in the long run. This is clearly false. He might have a case against a specific kind of user, or more correctly “over-user”, but I find it kind of annoying that he implies no Anki user can be more effective than someone who never reviews/repeats.
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Re: The PROBLEM with Active Recall and Spaced Repetition (Truth Behind Studying Smarter)

Postby sfuqua » Wed Jan 11, 2023 4:28 pm

I agree completely with the comments about the video. :D
It is important to remember that anki is unnecessary to learn a language. It is not a complete language learning solution. :o
Anki can be a powerful tool, however. It can be very convenient. For very unfamiliar writing systems, it seems like a particularly apt tool. 8-)

I enjoy doing anki reps, but I look forward to the day when I can dop anki and just read Japanese.(Will this time ever come???) :(

Of course by that time I will be moving back on to Irish or Chinese, or maybe High Elvish.... And I will need anki to break into those languages.... :lol:
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