WK User Aaydothaytch previously wrote about similar observation in January 2020, but that topic is now closed and I wanted to add a table of data to support our shared observation. Here’s what we both observed:
If you want to get through 100 reviews more quickly, then click the Wrap Up button at the beginning of each new review session. This will automatically create your review session from a pool of just 10 items. After finishing your 10 item Wrap Up session, you will start a new review session and click the Wrap Up button again.
This considerably reduces your time to get through 100 reviews because if don’t click the Wrap Up button, your review session will be based on larger pool of items. It’s like juggling 10 items versus juggling 15 or 20 items at any given time during your review session (I actually don’t know how many individual items are being juggled in a “regular” review session, but it’s definitely more than 10 items).
While not the most scientific set of trials, I tried both approaches four times each and find a 38% reduction in time spent per 10 reviews.
So, I’m not sure if it’s more beneficial from a retention standpoint if doing regular reviews or wrap up reviews are better, but I do know if you have a lot of reviews to do and you want to knock them down as quickly as possible, click the Wrap Up button at the beginning of each review session and you’ll see a significant reduction in time spent (-38% for me in this set of Level 37 reviews).
The question you’re trying to answer is “how long does it take to complete 100 reviews?”, not ten reviews. True, focusing on ten reviews at a time will complete ten reviews faster, but how long does it take overall?
Not really. Not trying to answer the question of “how long does it take to complete 100 reviews?” Just sharing an observation that if you want to get through a large number of reviews in the shortest time possible (“100” is just a number arbitrarily selected to represent a large number of reviews), using the Wrap Up button will get you there.
However, since you asked, if we multiply 10 x each Review Type’s average, we get 45 minutes/28 seconds for 100 “Regular” reviews and we get 28 minutes/10 seconds for 100 “Wrap Up” reviews. There’s your answer. Cheers!
Well, that’s not a fair comparison, because in the 4:33 you spent completing ten reviews in the regular session, you also half-completed another five to ten reviews, putting you ahead for the next ten. Plus, you’ve gotta add in the time it takes to start a new review session in wrap-up mode. Maybe that’d take you a minute forty five seconds.
What I’m trying to say is that if you’re trying to time how long it takes to do a hundred reviews, you need to do a hundred reviews. You can get away with timing a subset if the subsets are discrete (for example, I can time how long it takes to fold a hundred paper cranes by folding ten and multiplying), but in this situation, you’re doing two tests that aren’t equivalent.
There is a user script called “Anki mode” if you really want to speed things up. If your not paying attention though, you can progress things that you actually got wrong or accidently mark something you got right, wrong.
If you do 100 reviews on a 100 review set, there’s no technical reason for it to take different amounts of time. As noted, if you want to get in and quickly finish 10 reviews then using the timer makes sense, since that just prevents other items from getting in to your queue, but I don’t see any reason to think that the full set would change.
While you may finish the reviews quicker and maybe even feel that you are learning more efficiently, the reduced effort from a smaller pool of items can actually decrease the learning effect. You may not want to overdo this. Keyword: interleaved learning.
The fastest way to do reviews is just get them all correct. If you don’t know it, you deserve to see it again. But I’m coming off a week of being unable to cheat using Double-Check or review extra with Self-Study Quiz, so I’m a bit snippy about that.
You’re right and I see your point. I’m going to first compare five sets of ten to one set of fifty and see where I net out. I suspect the delta between the two methodologies will narrow considerably (or possibly even be more or less the same). Stay tuned…
I think this where all this ultimately leaves me. If I have a small batch of reviews and a limited amount of time, I’ll use the Wrap Up button so as not to leave the second part of reviews on the table when you have a hard stop and need to log off.
I use 1x1 mode reading first + lightning mode from rfindley’s scripts. I felt like the mixed reading/meaning didn’t do all that much for my accuracy, actually lead to confusion in a few cases, and generally slowed me down with constant task switching. Now I can just vrooom vroooom my way through reviews and wrapup is purely “10 more and I’m out” button.
That said, maybe I would have had less issues with the mixed approach if it was closer to what you are doing here. It’s an interesting thought, but I can’t say I actually want to test any of this. It just sounds too annoying, and especially for morning sessions I love my current autopilot method.
That’s a good approach. Personally I spent maybe 5 or ten levels in the 30s and 40s figuring out how well I did with different approaches. Definitely paid off in getting a better long term routine going.
That is true. Right now I’ve just finished 135 reviews and it took me, like, 10-15 minutes I think? It really speeds up the process. But to be honest, I almost never use the script because it only works on my computer at home (and I’m almost never at home #cries), and I guess doing it “vanilla” is somewhat useful since I need to (or try to) basically review reading+meaning twice in each session.
I just read a book that discussed this type of learning. Studies show that the more you struggle to recall something you have learned, the more likely you are to remember it again in the future. By breaking your review into these small chunks, you are making it easier to recall, and likely making it more difficult to recall again later. People who use scripts to make this even easier are possibly harming themselves even further.
I don’t think we’ve definitively established that it actually is, and even if it is, I feel the connection to the point you’re trying to make is unclear. Please run us through the whole chain of your logic, instead of just the first step.
Imagine the extreme, with reviews where you are always presented with the reading immediately followed by the meaning (some people use scripts that do exactly this). I feel it is obvious that this would be easier than having the reviews completely randomized from your entire pool of reviews.
Right now I’ve just finished 135 reviews and it took me, like, 10-15 minutes I think? It really speeds up the process. But to be honest, I almost never use the script because it only works on my computer at home (and I’m almost never at home