Q. What can I use this site for?
A. For learning and revising a variety of material, including programming languages, spoken languages and various academic subjects.
Q. How does it work?
A. A course of study is presented through a series of questions and answers, which are introduced gradually and repeated regularly until the material is mastered.
Q. How is this different to any other method of learning?
A. It is more efficient. If you are revising for an exam or are trying to commit information to long-term memory, studying here is likely to be a better use of your time than any other form of study.
Q. What are the key principles involved?
A. Spaced repetition and active recall.
Q. What is spaced repetition?
A. It is a learning technique where material is reviewed at increasing intervals of time. It was first suggested in 1932 by Cecil Mace in his book Psychology of Study, adopted by Pimsleur (and called “graduated interval recall”) for his language learning courses and by Sebastian Leitner for his flashcard-based system. It has also been recommended by Tony Buzan. The idea draws on Hermann Ebbinghous’ study in 1885 of the exponential nature of forgetting. See Wikipedia.
Q. How is spaced repetition used on this site?
A. Exercises in any one course of study are introduced one at a time and then reintroduced at increasing intervals of time. New exercises are introduced alongside previously-answered material. Incorrectly-answered exercises will continue to be presented until responses are consistently correct. The intervals of time between each subsequent presentation of an exercise can be adjusted to suit the needs of the student.
Q. What is active recall?
A. It is where information has to be actively recalled—for example by typing a response to a question—rather than just recited or re-read. Pimsleur referred to this as “anticipation”. See Wikipedia.
Q. How is active recall used on this site?
A. All exercises are presented as a phrase or question that requires a response. Then each response is checked for its accuracy.
Q. How do I start?
A. Just select a new course from the several that are available.
Q. How do I return to a course that I have already started?
A. When you select a course for the first time, a new account is created automatically for you. If you want to continue to use this account, you should save your details after you finish studying for the first time.
Q. Once I have started a course, how often should I learn?
A. you can study as often and for as long as you like, but you are likely to get most benefit from studying regularly. If you are not in a hurry, or if you are studying several courses simultaneously, you may want to study each course for just a few minutes each day. You can also study more intensively, although some of the benefits of combining the gradual introduction of new material with the spaced revision of old material will be lost if you attempt to cover too much material in too short a period of time.
Q. Can I create my own course materials?
A. Yes. Just follow the Create link after you have logged in. Subjects can be built up gradually over time and entire topics can be imported from a spreadsheet or text file. Online help is available.
Q. Can I use this in my school or organization?
A. Yes. A range of tools for teachers and administrators is available. Please contact us for details.
Q. What support do you offer for foreign language learning?
A. We use the text-to-speech facilities that are installed on most new computers to combine written and spoken translations in a variety of languages. Text-to-speech can also be used to aid learning by visually impaired users.
Q. What support do you offer for mathematics?
A. We provide a variety of techniques to make it easy to present a variety of mathematical material and to for users to construct mathematical formulae and graphs using a standard keyboard.
Q. What support do you offer for computer programming languages?
A. We are still working on this.
Q. What is the status of this site?
A. As of July 2009, it is not yet officially launched, although it is open to the public. Over the next few weeks, the emphasis will be on removing a long list of bugs and on beginning to build up and test a variety of different sorts of learning materials.
Q. Who maintains this site.
A. It is owned and managed by Danny Sofer.