Just for the immediate review after a lesson, it would help me learn the new content by NOT randomizing the order.
It would make sense to have the reviews (only the reviews immediately following the lessons) be reviewed in this order:
Word 1 - English Meaning, then kanji
Word 2 - English meaning, then kanji
Word 3 - English meaning, then kanji
etc.
Or… you could switch up the English meaning and the kanji.
But for EDUCATIONAL purposes, it does not make pedagogical sense to trick our brains immediately when we are first learning by doing something like this… Word 2 English, Word 3 kanji, Word 1 kanji, word 2 kanji, word 3 English, word 1 English, etc.
The randomness of it seems to be crucial to the spirit of SRS. If you are able to identify correctly the kanji reading or meanings tossed randomly at you, you really know it. “Learning” in the SRS style is by quantity not quality: Fluency in Japanese Comes from Quantity, Not Quality
I agree with the regular Reviews (when one is reviewing what they have learned a few hours+ prior).
Just not with the Lesson reviews (when one is just checking what they have learned to see if they really learned it).
What inspired this post was a case where I almost became immediately - and unnecessarily - confused by the Lesson Review session, which interrupted my memory process (which is ALSO key and important to SRS).
It doesn’t have to be 1, 2, 3. It just would be better not to be 3123213. … for the Lesson Review (again, NOT the regular Reviews).
I think even for the first review you should be able to recall them out of order. And it’s not like there’s a penalty for getting it wrong anyways, since there’s nothing lower than apprentice 1.
I normally find for readings I’ll have to remember the meaning first anyways. Or at least the meanings of the individual kanji.