Zarxrax
Veteran
How many of you guys are familiar with "Spaced Repetition"? Since a lot of the members here are students, I thought this would be a helpful topic.
Basically, Spaced Repetition is a means by which you can memorize large amounts of material with the least amount of effort. The theories behind it are backed by many years of memory research, so if you want to learn more about it, there's plenty of reading material out there, but I'm going to avoid getting too deep into it here for now.
But the basic principal behind it is, if you learn something today, if you don't study it again, you will probably forget it in a few days. Even if you study it a LOT today, you will still probably forget it in a few days, if you don't reinforce your memory later. So instead of cramming all at once, only to forget something later, the process of spaced repetition brings the material back to you later so you can study it again. If you remember it, then it spaces that material at an even longer interval. Often, you can get a fact to remain in your memory for a year or more, after only studying it a few times. The key is in spacing the fact at a longer interval each time you correctly remember it.
In order to use the principals of spaced repetition to your advantage, you need to get some spaced repetition software. The best one by far, is the free, multi-platform, open-source application, anki. I've been using it daily for well over a year now (primarily for learning Japanese), with great results.
I'm currently using it for memorizing my OLLs. By using anki's "cram" feature, I can review all of the OLLs I have learned, all at once. And it also serves as a database of which ones I have learned, along with my algorithms.
The sad part is, as incredible as spaced repetition is for learning, its not all that great for school. That's because spaced repetition is designed for you.... well, actually remembering something over a long period of time, and reviewing it whenever the program tells you that you need to review it. School on the other hand, works by telling you that you need to learn material by a certain date, and then you are free to completely forget it.
Basically, Spaced Repetition is a means by which you can memorize large amounts of material with the least amount of effort. The theories behind it are backed by many years of memory research, so if you want to learn more about it, there's plenty of reading material out there, but I'm going to avoid getting too deep into it here for now.
But the basic principal behind it is, if you learn something today, if you don't study it again, you will probably forget it in a few days. Even if you study it a LOT today, you will still probably forget it in a few days, if you don't reinforce your memory later. So instead of cramming all at once, only to forget something later, the process of spaced repetition brings the material back to you later so you can study it again. If you remember it, then it spaces that material at an even longer interval. Often, you can get a fact to remain in your memory for a year or more, after only studying it a few times. The key is in spacing the fact at a longer interval each time you correctly remember it.
In order to use the principals of spaced repetition to your advantage, you need to get some spaced repetition software. The best one by far, is the free, multi-platform, open-source application, anki. I've been using it daily for well over a year now (primarily for learning Japanese), with great results.
I'm currently using it for memorizing my OLLs. By using anki's "cram" feature, I can review all of the OLLs I have learned, all at once. And it also serves as a database of which ones I have learned, along with my algorithms.
The sad part is, as incredible as spaced repetition is for learning, its not all that great for school. That's because spaced repetition is designed for you.... well, actually remembering something over a long period of time, and reviewing it whenever the program tells you that you need to review it. School on the other hand, works by telling you that you need to learn material by a certain date, and then you are free to completely forget it.
