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My new way of making Anki flashcards (for other Anki nuts)


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I am a huge fan of the spaced repetition software Anki. Over the years, I’ve made various decks for myself and the kids, and we’ve gone through phases of using Anki in different ways (including my kids not using Anki for several years).

Recently, two topics on the WTM forums have motivated me to transform our Anki usage: (1) Thanks to a post about the book “Fluent Forever” going on sale, I bought the book, and it inspired me to convert our translation-dependent foreign language flashcard into multiple mono-lingual flashcards. (2) Thanks to a post about a kid’s math woes, I am making a bunch of math flashcards with example problems for my DD going through pre-algebra.

However, it will take me months to create all of these flashcards, and many of the flashcards are interrelated. I want a system of making and maintaining flashcards that is robust and flexible. I want a way to manage verb conjugations patterns that will grow as we learn more patterns. I want a way to make a separate flashcard for gender of words, but only for those words that had difficult to remember genders. I want a way to create multiple examples of the same math problem and link them together. I want a way to easily and quickly add more examples on the fly if a particular word/concept is difficult.

I stumbled on the solution in a link describing how to create overlapping cloze deletions in a single note. Since this last resource didn’t come from WTM, I’m posting it here so that other Anki nuts can benefit from it. Warning: this is only for Anki nuts who are willing to delve into creating their own note templates.

https://eshapard.github.io/anki/the-power-of-making-new-cards-on-the-fly-in-anki.html

Springboarding from the info in the link, I created a new note type with a dozen generic cloze fields and a seperate field for sorting in the Anki browser. Whenever I add a new note, I use this note type, and I am converting many of our existing notes to this new note type. I’m really excited about the power and flexibility of this new note type. If anyone is crazy enough to want more details, let me know.

———

If you’ve never used Anki or are scared by the learning curve, here is some evidence of what Anki has done for me:

My longest-standing Anki deck holds my DD’s spelling review words. I’ve used it almost every weekday for the past six years. Some of the first spelling words I added were “clock”, “neck”, and “wishes.” Since then, over the years she has reviewed “clock” seven times, spending a less than half a minute on it and never misspelling it. “Clock” won’t come due again for over ten years. On the other hand, over the same time period, she has reviewed “neck”  119 times, spending almost 20 minutes on it and misspelling it 24 times. She thankfully spelled “neck” correctly when she reviewed it earlier this month, but she’ll still see it again next year. She has reviewed “wishes” 186 times, spending over 33 minutes on it and misspelling it 50 times. We’ll see how she does on “wishes” next month. I have no idea why she can spell “clock” but struggles with “neck” and “wishes,” but I’m grateful that I have Anki to keep track of it for me.

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THANK YOU!   

I have totally revamped our Scripture Mastery verses using cloze deletion.... now with multiple cards with varying amounts of info removed.  I love this!   I felt I had done a fair bit with anki, but adding more fields to the cloze cards to make a larger variety of 'help' is cool.

 

I am thinking of adding condition fields, to conditionally make the extra help cards only if they need them..

 

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Scoutingmom, 

Did you change your scripture verses to regular cloze cards, or did you create the conditional cloze cards described in the link? Discovering regular cloze cards was my first major breakthroughs in making flashcards. My second breakthough was learning how to manually code cloze deletions, including making hints. I highly recommend reading the section of the Anki manual explaining how to manually type the code that makes a cloze deletion.

My favorite type of cloze deletion uses hints with the first letter of the elided words. For example, for the verse “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth” I could create the following note:

Genesis 1:1 “{{c1::In the beginning::I_ t__ b________}} {{c2::God created::G__ c______}} the {{c3::heavens::_______}} and the {{c3::earth::_____}}.”

That  one note would produce three cards:

Card 1:

Genesis 1:1 “[I_ t__ b________] God created the heavens and the earth.”

Card 2:

Genesis 1:1 “In the beginning [G__ c______] the heavens and the earth.”

Card 3:

Genesis 1:1 “In the beginning God created the [_______] and the [_____].”

My third major breakthrough was the conditional replacement that I referenced in the link above. If you use conditional replacement, you can create the following additional cards on the fly on the *same* *note*. This makes maintaining the info so much easier.

Card 4:

Genesis 1:1 “[I_ t__ b________ G__ c______] the heavens and the earth.”

Card 5:

Genesis 1:1 “In the beginning [G__ c______ t__ h______ a__ t__ e____].”

Card 6:

Genesis 1:1 “[I_ t__ b________ G__ c______ t__ h______ a__ t__ e____].”

—————————— 

I also use Anki with All About Spelling. Anki is a great way to do all of that review at the beginning of each lesson without having to mess with physical flashcards or deciding when a rule/sound/phonogram/word is mastered.

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Yes, I have used close deletions before, and knew how to make more than 1 card in the field, or have more than one deletion on the same card.  I read the article, and now have a new cloze type with 5 fields,  which I labeled MAIN, Help card 1, Help card 2 etc.  (Ok, maybe not exactly accurate names).   So now I can have cards made with overlapping cloze deletions... lots of them....

 

So, for example....

MAIN:  {{c1::James 1:5}} -  {{c2::If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, that giveth to all men liberally, and upbraideth not; and it shall be given him.}}

HELP CARD 1:   James 1:5 -  {{c3::If any of you lack wisdom,}} {{c4:: let him ask of God,}} {{c5::that giveth to all men liberally, }} and {{c6::upbraideth not;}} {{c7:: and it shall be given him.}}

HELP CARD 2:  James 1:5 -  {{c8::If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God,}} {{c9::that giveth to all men liberally, and upbraideth not;}} and it shall be given him.

etc....

And I modified the card setup, and it is working great!

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  • 3 weeks later...
On 4/27/2018 at 11:30 AM, Kuovonne said:

...

I stumbled on the solution in a link describing how to create overlapping cloze deletions in a single note. Since this last resource didn’t come from WTM, I’m posting it here so that other Anki nuts can benefit from it. Warning: this is only for Anki nuts who are willing to delve into creating their own note templates.

https://eshapard.github.io/anki/the-power-of-making-new-cards-on-the-fly-in-anki.html

Springboarding from the info in the link, I created a new note type with a dozen generic cloze fields and a seperate field for sorting in the Anki browser. Whenever I add a new note, I use this note type, and I am converting many of our existing notes to this new note type. I’m really excited about the power and flexibility of this new note type. If anyone is crazy enough to want more details, let me know.

...

Inspired by your thread, today is a Teacher Planning Day 'round here: minimal school for the boys while I wrap my head around Anki (which we've just begun using).  Is it possible for you to download & attach one of your Anki files (even with just two cards in it) so that I (and anybody else) could grab it and look at how it's built?  Just thought I'd ask!

thanks so much for the work you've already done in sharing what you've learned.  I'm off to grab a cuppa &  some chocolate to perk me up while I play with card types & fields...

ETA: okay, I think I did it.  ?  I'm uploading a tiny Anki file with my sample card in it on the off chance it's helpful; it literally has a dozen "Field" fields in addition to the text.  There is also a "Search Field" and a "Header" field. 

{removed my poor example!}

ETA #2: Kuovonne, can you expand on how you'd use this note for your foreign language work?  We have tons of Latin, and plan to add Greek and some French/Spanish soon, and I'd be very grateful for your ideas.

Cloze Test.apkg

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Serendiipitous,

It looks like you added the “fields” to the note type, but didn’t edit the card template. You also don’t need a “search field.” The Anki browser automatically searches across all fields.

I’ll pull together a demo deck for you to look at.

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Here is a sample deck with the bible verse note I described earlier in this thread. The attached deck uses the note type I initially described with a dozen generic fields.

I have since modified the note type even more to include several additional features, such as varying info on the backs of only selected cards in the same note, progressive hints, and multiple choice options in shuffled order. However, those features require very specific data entry and JavaScript coding. Because I have spent many hours working out the coding, I don't want to give away my more advanced note type for free. I am thinking of selling it for a nominal fee.

DemoMultiCloze.apkg

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  • 3 weeks later...
On 4/28/2018 at 10:26 PM, Kuovonne said:

Scoutingmom, 

Did you change your scripture verses to regular cloze cards, or did you create the conditional cloze cards described in the link? Discovering regular cloze cards was my first major breakthroughs in making flashcards. My second breakthough was learning how to manually code cloze deletions, including making hints. I highly recommend reading the section of the Anki manual explaining how to manually type the code that makes a cloze deletion.

My favorite type of cloze deletion uses hints with the first letter of the elided words. For example, for the verse “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth” I could create the following note:

Genesis 1:1 “{{c1::In the beginning::I_ t__ b________}} {{c2::God created::G__ c______}} the {{c3::heavens::_______}} and the {{c3::earth::_____}}.”

That  one note would produce three cards:

Card 1:

Genesis 1:1 “[I_ t__ b________] God created the heavens and the earth.”

Card 2:

Genesis 1:1 “In the beginning [G__ c______] the heavens and the earth.”

Card 3:

Genesis 1:1 “In the beginning God created the [_______] and the [_____].”

My third major breakthrough was the conditional replacement that I referenced in the link above. If you use conditional replacement, you can create the following additional cards on the fly on the *same* *note*. This makes maintaining the info so much easier.

Card 4:

Genesis 1:1 “[I_ t__ b________ G__ c______] the heavens and the earth.”

Card 5:

Genesis 1:1 “In the beginning [G__ c______ t__ h______ a__ t__ e____].”

Card 6:

Genesis 1:1 “[I_ t__ b________ G__ c______ t__ h______ a__ t__ e____].”

—————————— 

I also use Anki with All About Spelling. Anki is a great way to do all of that review at the beginning of each lesson without having to mess with physical flashcards or deciding when a rule/sound/phonogram/word is mastered.

Kuovonne, I was going to PM you this question but thought I'd ask it here in case it is helpful to anybody else:  Does this method of Scripture memory work well for your little ones?

and, again, thanks for sharing your work.  I'm in the process of getting our memory work into Anki using these methods, and with the help of the sample deck you posted.  I'm just so, so grateful. 

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24 minutes ago, serendipitous journey said:

Kuovonne, I was going to PM you this question but thought I'd ask it here in case it is helpful to anybody else:  Does this method of Scripture memory work well for your little ones?

and, again, thanks for sharing your work.  I'm in the process of getting our memory work into Anki using these methods, and with the help of the sample deck you posted.  I'm just so, so grateful. 

 

We don’t have a focus on memorizing scripture in my family. However, over the years, the cloze method (blanking out words) has worked very well for us for memorizing scripture, poems, prayers, and other passages of text. However, we don’t use them in Anki. I prefer to use Anki for shorter bits of information — spelling words, foreign language vocabulary, math concepts, grammar, vocabulary roots, selected bits of info in content subjects (symbols in Chemistry, identifying countries, etc.). I’ve used Anki in different ways over the years.

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1 hour ago, Kuovonne said:

 

 

We don’t have a focus on memorizing scripture in my family. However, over the years, the cloze method (blanking out words) has worked very well for us for memorizing scripture, poems, prayers, and other passages of text. However, we don’t use them in Anki. I prefer to use Anki for shorter bits of information — spelling words, foreign language vocabulary, math concepts, grammar, vocabulary roots, selected bits of info in content subjects (symbols in Chemistry, identifying countries, etc.). I’ve used Anki in different ways over the years.

Thanks!  May I ask what you like to do for retaining those longer passages? 

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3 hours ago, serendipitous journey said:

Thanks!  May I ask what you like to do for retaining those longer passages? 

 

We haven’t worked on long term retention of passages. My kids didn’t see the point of long term memory of passages, and I decided it wasn’t worth the effort. Most of the passages that they memorized were for classes, and we dropped review of the passages when the classes were over.

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12 hours ago, TABmom said:

So, how exactly do you use flashcards to review spelling? 

 

I read the spelling word on the flashcard and my DD writes the word on paper. If she gets it right with no hesitation, I rate the word “good.” If she gets it right but hesitates, I rate the word “hard.” If she makes a mistake but self corrects, I rate the word “again” but say nothing. If she makes a mistake and doesn’t catch it, I rate the word “again” and explain the correct spelling to her. She also immediately practices the correct spelling several times.

When I press “again” I know that DD will see the word again tomorrow. When I press “good” or “hard,” the word could show up in a couple of days, a few years, or anything in between, depending on how many times she’s gotten it right and how long it has been since she last saw the word. Anki takes care of calculating the exact interval. 

After DD has written 40 words, we stop for the day. (She started out with maybe 5-10 words per day and has worked her way up to 40 words per day over the years.) Most days all 40 words are review words from Anki. If she gets through all her Anki review words before hitting 40 words, I teach new words from All About Spelling.

All of the spelling word are in their own deck so they don’t get mixed up with other flashcards. I also have a custom note type and study options, although neither are necessary. My custom note type is setup so that the work is on both the front and the back of the card, along with a few other things, like the source of the spelling word. I also include pronunciation tips for some words and example sentences or phrases for words with homonyms. My study options are setup to ignore leeches and introduce only four new words per day in random order. I also customized the learning steps.

I use All About Spelling, so most of my words come from those books, although I also add other words that she misspells as well. When DD is ready to start a new level of AAS, I enter all of the spelling words in advance, and promptly suspend all of them. Then, as DD completes a new level, I unsuspend the words for that level.

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