How to Make Your Own Flashcards

Do you know that Flashcards although classic, is one of the most effective ways to revise? That is because they promote learning through active recall, which the brain learns most effectively.

Flashcards can be a fun and effective way for parents to teach any topic. They are a great tool to practise and retain information. Thus, flashcards are amazing for subjects like Science, Mandarin, English Vocabulary, History, Geography and more!

To help Parents in creating their own flashcards, we have Ms Mandy Zhang, Flashcard Expert from Learnintt to share the steps and pointers in making your own fantastic flashcards.

Steps to make your own Flashcards

1. Start with a subject topic, for example, the topic “Plants” in Science
2. Prepare the material needed: plain cards, pens, markers, highlighter and textbook
    
   
    
3. Highlight the important information and key points from the textbook
4. A good flashcard only has 1 key point on each card, so start by writing down a “Question” on one side and “Key Point” on the other. For example, on one side, the question can be “Why does the cactus have needle-like leaves?” and the answer side can be ” So it has a reduced exposed surface area, resulting in reduced loss of water.”
    
   
    
5. To make it even more memorable, add an image by drawing on the card or you can find an image from the internet, print it out, then stick on the cards. It helps as a mnemonic device that helps you build an association between two pieces of information in your mind.
    
   
    
6. To keep the cards organised, you can index each card to include the chapter and card number on the bottom right corner of each card
    
   
    
7. And you are ready for amazing flashcard learning! Flashcards feel more like a game than rote learning. When learning becomes fun in their eyes, children won’t push so hard against it.

More tips on making a good Flashcards

1. Keep the title simple – The objective of using Flashcards is for quick and fast revision so reduce the clutter
2. 1 question 1 key point per card – Do not make the mistake of having more than 1 question/key point per card, this only make it harder for you to memorise
3. Add interesting pictures that is related to the user –The human brain remembers better and longer when they see images that are funny and relatable to them

 How to use the Flashcards more effectively

1. Look at the question side first, and try to answer it out loud, then you can flip over the card to see if you get it right
2. Keep your flashcards into 2 stacks, one stack which you answer correctly and another stack which you answer incorrectly
    
   
    
3. You can revise it every day until you have no more cards in the incorrect stack
4. Repeat the process until you can answer all the questions correctly at one-shot
5. You can play it like a game with another person where each player randomly chooses a card and have the other answer it; the one who answers the most correctly wins the game

Conclusion

Flashcards is a great learning tool if you do it correctly, especially subjects that are hard facts. But remember that they are not a holy grail, they have some drawbacks of  not being able to give the learner the “Big Picture” on the subject and it is also quite time-consuming to create them.

If you do not have time to create your own, we at Learnintt offers a variety of MOE Science and Chinese Flashcards to enhance your child’s learning, in addition to other helpful resources. Check them out here at https://learnintt.com/.