Button Learn at the bottom of the screen makes it possible to learn the material stored in SuperMemo.
Learning in SuperMemo is based on a sequence of repetitions. Each repetition includes the following stages:
- Look at the question and try to answer it (mentally or verbally)
- Choose Show answer (at the bottom of the screen) to see the correct answer
- Compare your response (from Step 1) with the answer displayed on the screen
- Choose a grade that will reflect the accuracy of your response (e.g. Good, Fail, etc.)
- Choose Next repetition to continue (and go to Step 1)
The grade point scale is defined as follows (instead of clicking the grade button you can press a key displayed in the parentheses):
Bright (keyboard shortcut: 5), excellent response
Good (4), correct response provided after some hesitation
Pass (3), answer recalled with difficulty; perhaps, slightly incorrect
Fail (2), wrong response that makes you say I knew it!
Bad (1), wrong response; the correct answer seems to be familiar
Null (0), complete blackout; you do not even recall ever knowing the answer
Note, that in SuperMemo you are unlikely to need grades Null or Bad
In SuperMemo you first memorize
the material and then repeat it when the program asks you to do
it.
Note the important difference: you memorize the material at your
own pace on the day of your choice; however, you must repeat the
material on the days SuperMemo demands it! This is not a
limitation of the program. This is a limitation of our memory.
The power of SuperMemo is in providing the best timing of repetitions. It is best if you can open the program at
least once per day to check if there is any material scheduled
for repetition.
Delaying repetitions is the most likely cause of having little success with SuperMemo!
Frequently Asked Questions
(Deron Isaac, USA, May 21, 1997)
Question:
How can I edit texts of items during repetitions without backing out of the test mode?
Answer:
Choose Q to edit the question, A to edit the
answer, or E to edit all text components. You can also edit all properties of all
components by using pop-up menus available
with right button click on a component in question.
(Matt Cassidy, New Zealand, Aug 18,
1997)
Question:
How to review items to be
repeated on a given day?
Answer:
Use Tools : Workload and
double-click the day of interest.
(Grzegorz Malewski, Poland, Dec 10, 1997)
Question:
Do grades at final drill
affect the learning process?
Answer:
No. They are only used to eliminate items from the final
drill queue.
Question:
How can I postpone memorizing an element when I am learning new material?
Answer:
Choose Forget on the element pop-up menu (Ctrl+R). This will put the item at the end of the pending
queue.
(Ryszard Siwczyk, Poland, Nov
4, 1997)
Question:
Does the response time at repetitions influence the next interval?
Answer:
No
Question:
I left for vacation, and my learning process is in mess. What
should I do?
Answer:
Use Tools : Mercy
Question:
My computer was hit by a virus and SuperMemo reports integrity
problems. What shall I do?
Answer:
Try File : Recover
(Mariusz Szepietowski, Poland, Dec 7, 1997)
Question:
How can I remove information about the learning process from a collection? I would like to start learning all over
again from scratch?
Answer:
Use File : Reset : Collection. At
the end of this process choose sorting the pending
queue either by hierarchy (in most systems) or by ordinals (e.g. in Advanced
English 97)
Question:
I keep material of different learning priority in my collection. Can SuperMemo help me pay more attention
to high priority material?
Answer:
Yes. You should reduce the value of the forgetting
index for high-priority
material (forgetting index is a proportion of items not
remembered during repetitions). In the contents window select the item
or node that you
want to have higher priority and choose Node operations :
Forgetting index : Set forgetting index on the pop-up menu. Forgetting index is 10% by default and
can be set to 3-5% for high-priority material or only to 20% for
least important branches of the knowledge
tree