How do you personally use flashcards?

[Teek]

I'm setting up some Anki decks for my oldest. I'm making different decks by content area. We haven't done flashcards much up till now except in math, but as more info is covered, I can see the benefit. Just wondering what has worked best for different homeschoolers. Do you do a general review time every day and rotate through content? Do you do a quick review before/after each lesson (like do your grammar flashcards after before/after each grammar lesson, etc.)? 

 

I just want to get a feel for some different ways of going about it. DD is in 5th/6th right now if that matters.  :)

 

Thanks!

[8filltheheart]

Nm. I misread the question.

Edited February 27, 2018 by 8FillTheHeart

[Kiara.I]

We do a general review time. Rotating through content is handled by Anki, it's not something I need to do.

 

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[Miss Tick]

We use Anki for foreign languages, so I try to schedule separate review times for each language. Preferably at least twice a week per language.

 

If I were comfortable lumping stuff together (like when there were multiplication facts in the mix) I would definitely do a set period on general review. Like, "spend 15 minutes or until you are done".

[wendyroo]

Each child has an Anki deck with subdecks for each subject (and often sub-sub-decks for different resources).  We always study the main deck, so Anki takes care of rotation and repetition.

 

My first grader studies his deck once a week.  His deck is small, and I introduce cards slowly for him, so this only takes ~10 minutes.

 

My third grader studies his deck three times a week.  His deck is larger (>3000 cards), so he spends 15-20 minutes each session. 

His deck covers: geography (locations of states, countries, famous landmarks; state abbreviations; capitals of states and countries), facts about great works of art, kitchen safety, musical notation, personal information (address, phone number, grandparents' full names, etc), poems, quotes, speeches, science (names of bones, classification of living things, eons of geological time), the presidents in order, Spanish vocab, spelling and grammar rules, literary elements, math basics (prime #'s up to 100, fraction and decimal equivalents, divisibility rules, geometry definitions, area and volume formulas, measurement conversions).

 

Next year, for fourth grade, I expect DS will study his Anki deck 4-5 days a week in order to stay on top of it.

 

Wendy

[Teek]

Each child has an Anki deck with subdecks for each subject (and often sub-sub-decks for different resources).  We always study the main deck, so Anki takes care of rotation and repetition.

 

My first grader studies his deck once a week.  His deck is small, and I introduce cards slowly for him, so this only takes ~10 minutes.

 

My third grader studies his deck three times a week.  His deck is larger (>3000 cards), so he spends 15-20 minutes each session. 

His deck covers: geography (locations of states, countries, famous landmarks; state abbreviations; capitals of states and countries), facts about great works of art, kitchen safety, musical notation, personal information (address, phone number, grandparents' full names, etc), poems, quotes, speeches, science (names of bones, classification of living things, eons of geological time), the presidents in order, Spanish vocab, spelling and grammar rules, literary elements, math basics (prime #'s up to 100, fraction and decimal equivalents, divisibility rules, geometry definitions, area and volume formulas, measurement conversions).

 

Next year, for fourth grade, I expect DS will study his Anki deck 4-5 days a week in order to stay on top of it.

 

Wendy

 

:ohmy:   Wow. I think we're seriously underachieving at our house. You're my hero.  :hurray:

[Tranquility7]

We do a ton of Anki. It is central to our homeschool, and keeping up on our Anki makes learning new content in every area easier.

 

I like to think of our review time as not just "review", but really "review and integrate", because making connections happens all the time!

 

I add Anki for each subject and curriculum we do. The subjects are in different decks, and curricula within subjects are in subdecks under that. We have a zillion decks, LOL. (ok, not a zillion, but > 40, which seems like a lot but really isn't so bad, since Anki basically manages it all for me). When we review, we just go from deck to deck until we are finished; Anki time is it's own thing, and is not tied to any particular lessons.

 

I have a DS11, DD8, and DD4. As a group, we do our Anki Bible, History, Geography, Language Arts (grammar, poetry, etc.), Art Appreciation, Music Appreciation, and Science. It usually takes about an hour on Monday (since we haven't done it since Friday), and then about 20 min Wed, Thurs, Fri (we often skip Tues since Mon was big). DS11 has been doing Anki far longer than DD8, so some of these decks have cards DD8 knows nothing about. For some of those, I may tell DS11 to "teach her" - by which I mean, explain the fact to her, whatever it is, in a way that will help her understand more about it. Also we try to connect it to things that DD8 has learned since the last time we saw the card together. But then we still schedule it for DS11's retention, not DD8's.  DD4 also has a smattering of cards that are "hers" - some Bible verses and catechism and such.

 

Eventually, DD8 will have her own deck and her own review time with me and DD4, but for now, doing most of it together works fine. (In fact, she used to have her own deck, but it just seemed inefficient to me, so I stopped that and started the mega group review time and have been very pleased with that.)

 

For DS11, I also have extensive Latin and Chinese decks, and a small math deck. He and I do those together, and we usually spend about 3-4 hours through the week on those.

 

Also, not sure if you were asking about this, but one major lesson I have learned from our experience of using Anki for the last 6 years is to do reviews the decks orally *with* your child as much as possible. It is very tempting to just create the decks and then have kids do them independently, but IMHO, Anki cards are not just flashcards. They are an awesome opportunity to re-discuss and integrate. Over the years, I have tried a couple of times to have DS review on his own, but reviewing that way became more of a rote exercise (not to mention that DS would be tempted to rush through on his own). Reviewing together, OTOH, became an opportunity for wonderfuldiscussion and connecting with new things we had learned since last seeing the card. We don't discuss every card, of course, but reviewing together at least gives us that option. Plus, it ensures that I keep up with DS in everything he is learning (which is becoming all the more important the older he gets).

 

[EKT]

I am typically not the flashcard type of homeschooler (at all!), but we are currently using them to learn states and capitals. (We are using this deck, which is super inexpensive and the cards are high-quality and beautiful.) Anyway, we are using them as part of Morning Time. For 5-10 minutes each morning, my girls sit across the table from me, and I hold up individual cards to first one daughter and then the other. (This is NOT a competitive exercise at all, each girl is learning the info for herself and the other one has to be quiet when it is not her turn, even if she knows the answer. We try to make it fun--sometime we'll race the clock, or I'll let the girls answer in funny voices and such, so long as they are on task and focused, etc.) We have been doing this for several weeks and the girls have pretty much mastered them all! (We are moving on to international capitals next.) So, because we're using the cards in a game-like fashion, it's been a fun and effective way to learn this info. So, thus far, my experience is that flash cards have a place and can work well when used sparingly to learn specific facts. Good luck!