My retention rates for Anki are atrocious. This leads me to wonder: if I do really only do Anki, does it impact my performance this badly, since I don’t have much context if any? Is it the fact that I listen to music? What about output, do I need output or only adequate input? Maybe the words I’m learning are those I don’t need, or can’t recall that well?

So I’ve decided to do a little experiment. Every day, I’ll do a different configuration of said things:

Music or no music (M or M̄)
Context or no context (C or C̄)
Output or no output (O or Ō)
Nature of words (W or W̄)

Here are the definitions:

Music - ability to listen to any type of music I want during learning, no music - learning in silence

Context - words will always come in sentences wherein only the word I’m learning is not known to me, no context - words come in isolation

Output - at the end of my learning, I’ll handwrite a short text (or isolated sentences, if the words don’t fit together at all) using the words I’ve learned, no output - no text written

Nature of words - W stands for words I handpick that I think would be most useful for me to know at the time (common words, words relating to hobbies, etc.), whereas W̄ stands for words I learn with no regard to their “usefulness”, for example, if I come across a word for a vegetable I don’t eat often and maybe don’t even know the name of in English and/or my native language, I’ll still learn it

This gives me 2^4 = 16 experimentation days. We will then have 4 subsets of 8 which deliver direct comparisons of a variable (probably not the right terminology, but I’m not well versed in this field, sorry!)

I’ll start this experiment on the 18th of October and end it on the 2nd of November (exactly 16 days) - the beginning and end date of my autumn break. This is to minimise outside influences of school. Also, I hope to be in a more relaxed and open state during the break.

At the end of this experiment, I’ll post my results and insights!

Here’s my exact plan if you’re curious:

MCOW
M̄COW
MC̄OW
M̄C̄OW
MCŌW
M̄CŌW
MC̄ŌW
M̄C̄ŌW
MCOW̄
M̄COW̄
MC̄OW̄
M̄C̄OW̄
MCŌW̄
M̄CŌW̄
MC̄ŌW̄
M̄C̄ŌW̄

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