Anki Flashcard Scheduling: Reduced interval growth & frequent reviews

This document describes how to reduce the growth of Anki's due dates, and review cards more frequently than once a day (outside Anki's default schedule). If you're only interested in the customizations, skip to Section 3. 1. Problem...................................................................................................................................................1 1.1. Background ....................................................................................................................................1 2. Anki's Solution.........................................................................................................................................2 2.1. Review new material more frequently.............................................................................................2 2.2. Reduce interval growth....................................................................................................................2 3. Reviewing Outside the Schedule............................................................................................................3 3.1. Custom study..................................................................................................................................3 3.2. Reschedule.....................................................................................................................................3 4. Concluding Warnings..............................................................................................................................3

1. Problem
Anki's scheduling is daily and it grows in day-sized increments. This leads to the common perception voiced by new users that 1) not enough time is spent reviewing new material (to acquire reliable, short-term memories). And, 2) review intervals grow too fast sending due dates too far into the future too soon causing too many failures. The symptom of this problem is spending 10 minutes reviewing for the day, having nothing more to do except to add more new cards which compounds the problem (stress of mastering too much material with too little time practicing). You want to test what you've already begun mastering now, not wait till tomorrow. And, you don't want to add more un-mastered material just to have something to do. In theory, you should follow Anki's scheduling which is designed to make the most efficient use of your time, challenging your memory only at the moment you're most likely to forget. In reality, there may be legitimate reasons to review more frequently. The following background will help you understand this conflict.

1.1. Background
Anki is a Spaced Repetition system1 which schedules (spaces) reviews for maximum efficiency of your time. Scheduling is based upon the proven rate at which the mind forgets information, called the "Forgetting Curve."2 Anki schedules cards when there is 90% probability of remembering. According to this theory, there is no reason to review sooner. Doing so is a waste of your time. Just wait until you are statistically prone to forget, then test (reinforce) the memory and wait for the curve to elapse again. However, individuals and material differ. People also have real-world requirements such as exam due dates, or job requirements which require stronger, more reliable (proven) shorter-term memories through more-frequent reviews (at the expense of efficiency). Or, they may simply have more time available which, if not spent studying, would go to waste. Efficiency may not be each individual's primary goal. Those wishing to review more frequently may be told Anki wasn't designed for this -- that it perverts spaced repetition. On the other hand, others find a real, tangible benefit to applying the principles of spaced
1 Spaced Repetition: 2 Forgetting Curve: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spaced_repetition http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forgetting_curve

repetition (priority and spacing between cards based upon difficulty) within imperfect conditions (inflexible due dates).

2. Anki's Solution
Anki version 2 has a few options to review more frequently and reduce interval growth.

2.1. Review new material more frequently

New material is processed in learning mode. Instead of calculating intervals based upon the forgetting curve described above, cards progress through intervals called steps which you can define. For example, if you want to spend a lot of time on new cards, essentially cramming new material, you could do the following:
Options->New Cards Steps (in minutes) 1 2 10 40 120 360 1440 Graduating interval 1 days Easy interval 2 days

Those settings will allow you to review cards throughout the day using intervals similar to Pimsleur's graduated recall method. Each time you answer good, the interval will increase to the next step until it reaches the last one (24 hours). When you answer good on that last step, the card will graduate from learning mode and be due in 1 day. From that point on, the card will be in review mode, discussed below. If you you know a card pretty well, you can press easy and the card will enter review mode and be due in 2 days.

2.2. Reduce interval growth

When a card leaves learning mode it is in review mode. The interval is calculated based upon the forgetting curve discussed in a previous section. The interval will grow in day-sized units, and cards will only be due once per day. You can reduce the speed of interval growth in a few ways:
Options->New Cards Starting ease 100 % Options->Reviews Interval modifier 10 %

When a card leaves learning mode due to pressing good at the last step, it will have an ease factor which is used to calculate intervals in review mode. Reducing this value to 100% will cause the initial interval to grow slower. In review mode, interval growth can be retarded using the interval modifier. By default, the modifier is 100%. Therefore, the shown 10% is a substantial reduction in growth. However, intervals will still grow by at least 1 day. At some point they may become larger than you prefer. Intervals can be reduced using this parameter:
Options->Lapses New interval 33 %

When you fail a card in review mode, it is said to have lapsed. It enters a relearning mode where you can advance through steps defined for this mode. Normally, the interval is reset to 0. But, using the parameter above, you can reduce the interval rather than reset it to 0.

Fail shouldn't be used too much this way. But, it could be useful.

3. Reviewing Outside the Schedule

Because review mode's intervals grow at a minimum of 1 day, no matter how much you try to reduce growth, they're still going to move into the future faster than you may like. Anki has a couple of features to review sooner.

3.1. Custom study

Click the Custom Study button at the bottom of the screen. Two options are useful for reviewing outside Anki's schedule: Review forgotten cards and Review ahead. Choose either one and Anki will create a Custom Study Session Important: before studying this deck, you should click the down-arrow to the right of the deck, go into Options and uncheck Reschedule cards based on . If you don't do this, Anki will adjust each card's schedules, causing them to move even further into the future (compounding the problem you're probably trying to work around by reviewing early.). Notes: 1. Anki sort of copies the card from its home deck to this Custom Study Session deck. As long as the card remains in this temporary deck it won't be seen in the home deck. As you review each card it is transferred back to the home deck. You'll also see an option to Empty the deck, which sends all remaining cards to the home deck. If you delete the temporary deck it will also empty the deck before deleting it. 2. You can click Rebuild to recreate the temporary deck.

3.2. Reschedule
In Anki's card browser you can sort cards by a variety of factors, such as due date. You can select a block of cards and then use Edit->Reschedule to reschedule them within a range of days. For example, you might select cards due tomorrow and reschedule them for today. Select cards due in two days and reschedule them for tomorrow. Doing this a few times, you could pull increasingly distant blocks of cards nearer.

4. Concluding Warnings
If you didn't read the background section above, you should. The warning is: your brain forms memories by letting them percolate and fade. If you never let the intervals grow to the point you're uncomfortable, you'll not have solid memory. Reviewing frequently and/or early can be useful. But, learn to let go of things and let yourself be challenged. As a rule of thumb, you're reviewing soon enough if you fail 10% of the cards. If you're getting 100% correct, you're seeing the cards too soon. So, it's a balancing act between the need to acquire a lot of info in a short period, and letting the intervals move into the future, where you'll maintain the memory through infrequent review.