The logistics of ACTIVE RECALL and SPACE REPETITION

Dear Learners

You have just heard about active recall and space repetition, but found out the process is actually harder than you thought.

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Of course it is hard, nothing precious comes with easy. But it does not mean there are ways to make this journey easier, less friction, and faster.

I am a 2nd year medical student and I have tried all methods and here’s my takeaway:

It began with me manually making flashcards but it took 2 hours/deck on top of watching the lecture. If there is 60 lectures per semester that’s a total of 120 hours. And that does not account for the time to review cards.

Because time is of the essence during the semester, I diverted to what most people seem to be doing - pre made decks. Don’t get me wrong, I think most cards made on the pre made decks are high quality, but for me to curate a deck that target a specific topic mentioned in my lecture took me hours again. I spent hours isolating tags, suspending and deleting, which then made the process inefficient. Pre-made decks, then, did not work as efficiently as I have anticipated.

Ok finally, chatGPT is here. Just copy and paste the entire lecture in and ask them to create question and answer pair for me. Here’s the problem, without proper training in prompt engineering: my best prompt is “based on this lecture material, generate # of flashcard questions and answer that is relevant to concepts taught in the lecture.” The speed is fast, but the quality now become mediocre. Not to mention, I still have to copy and paste all the questions and answers back to my anki, which now becomes a boring task.

Finally, the I stumble upon @pdf2anki, and I tried it. You simply upload the lecture pdf and in just minutes, flashcards are then created, with one click import to your anki. The engine allows customisation of questions so they are high quality and the entire process is quick. now I simply just upload the file and have it processed while I go make my coffee/ or toilet break. After that, high quality anki deck made specific to my lecture/ topics of interest is done!

If this is a struggle that you guys share, def go give it a try! 20% Black Friday discount here: “BLACKFRIDAY23” for your first month