Flashcard

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For the form of digital memory occasionally called a "Flash Card", see Flash memory

A flashcard or flash card is a piece of paper that is used as a learning aid. One writes a question on each card and an answer overleaf. Flashcards can bear vocabulary, historical dates, formulas, etc.

[edit] Applications

Apart from plain illustration purposes, flashcards can be used to support memorization by way of spaced repetition.

A method to achieve this was proposed by the German science popularizer Sebastian Leitner in the 1970s. In his method, known as the Leitner system, flashcards are sorted into groups according to how well you know each one. This is how it works: you try to recall the solution written on a flashcard. If you succeed, you send the card to the next group. But if you fail, you send it back to the first group.

An obvious advantage of this method is that you can focus on the most difficult flashcards, which remain in the first groups. The result is, ideally, a reduction in the amount of study time needed.

Similar ideas have been implemented into the Pimsleur language courses and, since the 1980s, into a number of computer-assisted language learning titles. Much of this software makes use of so-called electronic flashcards.