Remembering What’s on Your Flashcards Mark Mitchell & Janina Jolley, 2014 Clarion University of Pennsylvania Click here to get started (if asked, please choose “enable macros”) Click here to get started (if asked, please choose “enable macros”)

Welcome, tom! Before you start memorizing what’s on your flashcards, we need to make a couple of points. First, your flashcards must be accurate. Otherwise, you will be memorizing incorrect information. (Our previous tutorials showed you how to make flashcards that contained accurate definitions and examples.) Second, your flashcards must make sense to you. Otherwise, you will have trouble memorizing them and, even if you do memorize them, memorizing confusing stuff won’t help you answer most test questions. Let me show you what we mean.

Why You Need to Understand the Definition 1.If a definition does not make sense to you, it will seem like nonsense to you—and memorizing nonsense is more difficult than memorizing stuff that makes sense. – For example, compare trying to memorize the following two “sentences”: Jek veh xib yap biv mup va gew hix weg cih qez fik. The boy and his dog met an old man who had one eye. 1 Unfortunately, we do not remember where we Got this demonstration. If you know, please us.

Why You Need to Understand the Definition 2. If you memorize information without understanding it, you won’t be able to use that information: You can’t use what you don’t understand. For example, you will miss questions that ask you – to apply your knowledge. – to show that you know what the definition means, such as the following question: Memorizing without understanding is like storing garbage.

_____ reinforcement occurs when a response leads to the _____ of something bad. (Appleby, 2013) a.Positive, removal b.Negative, removal c.Positive, presentation d.Negative, presentation To get this right, you need to recognize correct definitions of a term that are worded differently from the definition you learned. Someone who merely memorized a definition might get this question wrong. To get this right, you need to recognize correct definitions of a term that are worded differently from the definition you learned. Someone who merely memorized a definition might get this question wrong. √ √ A Typical Multiple-Choice Question on Negative Reinforcement

Reflection Question Have you ever memorized a definition, but A.Did not really understand what the definition meant? B.Had trouble applying it to new examples? C.Had trouble explaining to other people what the term actually meant? D.Not been able to use the word in a sentence? E.All of the above. Click on the best answer

Reflecting on the Reflection Question As your answer to the previous question indicates, people have trouble understanding definitions. However, if you created your flashcards using the techniques described in our previous tutorial, you should have learned and understood the concepts. Now, it is time to use your flashcards to cement those concepts permanently in your memory.

Remembering What You Have Learned To remember that knowledge, you will use both your definition and example cards. Start with your definition cards. Be sure the front (term) side is up. Negative reinforcement (2) Definition {positive punishment} Front

Remembering What You Have Learned With the term side of your definition card up, try to produce the definition (word for word) from memory.  The number in parentheses will remind you how many key elements you have to remember.  Give yourself credit only if you recall all of those key elements.  In addition, if you have frequently confused your term with another term (that term will be in red in brackets on your card), explain how your concept differs from that other term. Front Negative reinforcement (2) Definition {positive punishment}

Remembering What You Have Learned Now, test yourself over your examples cards. Negative reinforcement Examples Front Look at the term side and then try to recall the examples (you do not have to recall them word for word, but be sure your example incorporates all the key features of the concept). “The baby gets his mother (1) to hold him more (2) by stopping his crying when his mother picks him up. ” “The baby gets his mother (1) to hold him more (2) by stopping his crying when his mother picks him up. ”

Can You Stop Now That You Have Gone Through Your Cards Once? No! To forget is human– unless you review. Reviewing maintains the paths to your concepts.

How Should You Review Your Cards? In hard ways: Don’t re-read your cards—Test yourself on the cards. Make your testing hard by testing  On different days. Give yourself a chance to see what you are forgetting — and to reverse that forgetting. For example, studying 15 minutes a day, 4 times a week is much more effective than studying 1 hour straight.  In different ways. Shuffle your flashcards so you do not go through them in the same order each time. Mixing up the cards is so helpful that it may even help to mix cards from different subjects together. Sometimes, answer aloud; sometimes, answer in writing.  In different places.  On the hard cards more than on the easy ones 

To Be Sure You Are Testing Yourself More Over The Hard Cards 1.Sort your cards into at least 2 piles: (cards you always get right and cards you don’t). Test yourself much more frequently on the cards you get wrong. 2. If you make a mistake on a card from the “easy” pile, move it to your “hard” pile. Similarly, if you have correctly responded to a question from your hard pile 5 times in a row, move it to the easy pile.

Practice on Your Electronic Devices If you are tired of your flashcards, you can use free, online flashcard systems such as – StudyBlue – Quizlet

Practice With Friends If you are tired of practicing alone, get a partner. In addition to making quizzing more fun, partners  Can help check that your definitions and examples are correct.  Make you say your answers aloud—and saying it aloud improves memory.  Let you know when your answer is vague or wrong.  Give you experience with more examples of the concepts.

Refine your cards To help you remember concepts, refine your cards by 1.Adding pictures to make the information more visual and memorable; 2.Adding diagrams, simple arrows, or tables to make connections between ideas clearer (Young, 2010); 3.Adding examples to your cards. 1.Adding examples gives you practice applying the concepts— and applying the concepts is what most professors want you to be able to do. 2.In addition, grounding your concepts in real life examples is like adding stakes to a tent: It makes things more stable. Without examples With examples

Sort to Remember  Order your cards from most important concept to least important. Research clearly shows that students who distinguish important concepts from the less important do better than students who don’t (Brown, Roediger, & McDaniel, 2014).  Sort your concepts into pairs of opposites.

Sort to Remember One way to remember a concept is to link it to other concepts. That way, you are not just dumping a concept into your brain—you are wiring it in so the concept is online. One easy way for you to link concepts together is to sort the cards into piles according to which of several broader categories they belonged (see the example on the next slide).

Sort to Remember For example, you could match concepts to broader concepts, like this: Psychoanalytic concepts Behavioristic concepts Negative reinforcement

Sort to Remember In addition, you could develop better memory and understanding by matching concepts to important categories, like this: Negative reinforcement Supported by research Not supported by research

Conclusions About Using Your Cards 1.After you understand the concept, test yourself by looking at the term side and then providing the appropriate example or definition. 2.Be tough on yourself:  Only give yourself credit if you say or write the definition perfectly.  Test yourself more on the cards you get wrong than on the ones you get right.  If you consistently get a card right one day, wait a couple of days, and test yourself over that card again. 3.When testing yourself, study often, study in short bursts, and mix it up: Study  in a variety of settings,  at various days and times, and  frequently shuffle your deck. 4.Add examples, arrows, and pictures to your cards. 5.Sort your cards.

Quiz Time! Now that you have gone through this tutorial, please take the quiz on the next few slides so that you can show off what you have learned.

References Appleby, D. C. (2013). A flashcard strategy to help students prepare for three types of multiple choice questions commonly found on introductory psychology tests. Retrieved from Documents/otrp/resources/appleby13flashcard.pdf Brown, P. C., Roediger, H. L., III, McDaniel, M. A. (2014). Make it stick: The science of successful learning. Cambridge, MA: Belknap. Hubbard, D. W. (2010). How to measure anything (2 nd ed.). Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons. Oakley, B. (2014). A mind for numbers. New York, NY: Tarcher-Penguin. Young, S. (2010). Learn more, study less! Publisher: Author.

Acknowledgments We would like to thank Dr. Jeanne Slattery, Dr. Jamie Phillips, and Dr. Scott Kuehn for their insightful comments on earlier versions of this presentation.

Quiz Question Reading over your cards is almost as good as testing yourself over your cards. True False

Quiz Question You should keep your cards in order. True False

Quiz Question You should study your cards in the same place every day. True False

Quiz Question If you can’t immediately generate the full definition or example, you should look at the other side of the card to get the answer. True False

Quiz Question It is important to quiz yourself in a way that makes it so you always find your quizzes easy and you almost always get all the questions right. True False

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