Is a spaced-repetition system actually effective for learning kanji? What is spaced-repetition anyway? In this article, we break down these questions and more, so keep on reading!

Spacing Out Your Reviews - Hacking Your Brain

When you initially encounter a new word, kanji, or really any other piece of information, your brain is likely to forget it in just a few minutes. In fact, there is a way to mathematically show how fast people usually forget things. When plotted on a graph, it's a nice downward-sloping, curved line. We call this: the forgetting curve.

No one is perfect at memorizing things (especially kanji!), so the existence of a forgetting curve makes sense. But how can we stop our own forgetting? Is there a miracle drug or supplement that can prevent this perfectly? Nope. It's just how we're biologically programmed. The brain seems to think that most things are unnecessary and will refuse to commit them to memory – a phenomenon scientists call moving into long-term memory. But did you know that there is actually a way to convince your own brain that something is important enough to remember? The key is repetition.

When you see or hear something over and over again, your brain begins to realize and starts to pick up on patterns – something the brain is designed well for. With enough exposures, your brain begins to believe that the information it's constantly seeing is important enough to commit to long-term memory. This movement of information into one's long-term memory is essentially what memorization is.

To know a language, one must memorize (sometimes said as, learn) lots of vocabulary and, in the case of Japanese and Chinese, kanji. This is the first step with spaced repetition systems: repetition.

The Spacing Part - Two Kinds

But now the question becomes: how much time between repetitions is most effective? Some really smart people began experimenting with various timings (spacings) and discovered that too short a time (like, 5 seconds) and too long a time (like, 5 months) is not very effective when first starting out. There was a sweet spot. Some memory scientists claimed that spacings of 1 day each were best while others thought spacings of just a few hours were best.

Today, we know that evenly spaced-out repetitions are good in general, but there's actually a better way to space out your reps: expanded spacing.

To explain this concept, let's say you are learning the kanji 虎 (tora, "tiger"). You make a flashcard for it, and after you see it for the first time, you choose the view the flashcard again in a few hours. If you remembered it correctly on your second encounter, you decide to bump up the spacing and set your next encounter at exactly one day later. Once you get that right, you set the next encounter at three days later... then one week... then three weeks... then one month... etc.

This is expanded spacing: with every successful rep, the space between reps gradually gets longer and longer. Eventually, the time between reps will become so large that you won't be scheduled to see that flashcard again for several decades! But by that time, the kanji 虎 should already be moved to your long-term memory and you are free to get rid of that flashcard altogether.

Research comparing even spacing and expanded spacing has generally shown that expanded spacing may be better for long-term memorization and recall. Students learning words in a second language were tested on how many words they could remember after spending a few weeks using either an evenly spaced repetition method or an expanded spaced repetition method. The students who used the evenly spaced method seemed to do slightly better than the expanded spacing group. But the students were tested again two weeks later. This time, the expanded spacing group significantly outperformed the evenly spaced group.

Repetition + Spacing = The Best of Both Worlds

Many modern language-learning applications, sites, and programs out there combine repetition with expanded spacing to help users learn vocabulary and characters. Essentially, they employ an SRS approach.

We do the same here at Tanukanji. There is one big difference, however, between us and other kanji-learning services out there: AI. Yup, as far as we can tell, no other kanji-learning platform gives you extra study tools outside of a standard SRS feature. While SRS flashcards are the staple of our service, it is made stronger with the artificial intelligence chatbot, grammar practice, and even a fun Japanese game: shiritori.

So there you have it folks: SRS is most definitely NOT a myth and is something you should be using in your kanji (or language) studies. We made a podcast episode about SRS and how beneficial it is. Check it out on our YouTube channel!

Image Credits

Image 1: The original uploader was Icez at English Wikipedia., CC0, via Wikimedia Commons