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Spaced repetition and learning in context are not mutually exclusive. [0] Secondly, there are many many advantages to learning vocabulary out of context. I am

Spaced repetition and learning in context are not mutually exclusive. [0] Secondly, there are many many advantages to learning vocabulary out of context. I am very interested in foreign languages, and have self-studied to elementary proficiency in Italian, German, and Russian. Memrise is my go to app for picking up vocabulary out of context, because it is the fastest path to a bigger vocabulary. For a lot of vocabulary, at least for the languages I've come across so far, there is a direct one to one mapping for the essential things.. E.g. you can learn the word for "book", "fire", "box", "sky", etc. out of context. Certainly, learning in context has advantageous for improving grammar and in some situations verb usage - therefore a more balanced approach. An easy example of the advantage of in-context language learning is that in German and Italian, knowing somebody uses different verbs than knowing a thing. If you were to study a verb like "to know" in Memrise, you rely on the flashcard's definition to be thorough enough to clarify their usages. [0]: "A Trainable Spaced Repetition Model for Language Learning", writes about how spaced repetition is used by Duolingo. https://s3.amazonaws.com/duolingo-papers/publications/settles.acl16.pdf https://s3.amazonaws.com/duolingo-papers/publications/settle...

sharp11 10y ago
Thanks for the link to that paper -- I hadn't seen that. I agree that SR and learning in context are not mutually exclusive--but they're challenging to integrate. Duolingo is not a good example -- they teach through random sentences, out of context. Your examples - concrete nouns - are where you miss the least by simply mapping onto English. But I would suggest that this is the very easiest part of learning a second language. I think many learners underestimate how much of language is not derivable by plugging vocabulary into grammar rules. There's so much that is just "that's how we say it". And you need to pick that up in context.

sharp11 10y ago

Thanks for the link to that paper -- I hadn't seen that. I agree that SR and learning in context are not mutually exclusive--but they're challenging to integrate. Duolingo is not a good example -- they teach through random sentences, out of context. Your examples - concrete nouns - are where you miss the least by simply mapping onto English. But I would suggest that this is the very easiest part of learning a second language. I think many learners underestimate how much of language is not derivable by plugging vocabulary into grammar rules. There's so much that is just "that's how we say it". And you need to pick that up in context.