@cmw It's a flashcard app rather than vocabulary quiz-based, but I'm exploring Anki Pro as an alternative to Memrise. Without upgrading for now. It has community-made content so there's plenty to choose from for languages like Latin and Attic Greek.

Interestingly, it's also open source.

@Adam I downloaded Anki Droid before, but I never got around to setting it up. People swear by it for med school, but I wonder if that means it's churning out doctors who prefer memorizing facts instead of understanding the material more deeply. (At least, that's an argument that I see bandied about regarding its reliance.)

@Adam It's extremely popular there: ama-assn.org/medical-students/usmle-step-1-2/what-anki

@cmw I guess you can't do much better than an AMA endorsement.

It would be pretty easy to tell if someone didn't understand the underlying knowledge in exams, but I suppose there must be some truth to the claims people have made.

@Adam To be fair, it seems it was a guest post and just had some doctor double check it. It doesn't look to be an official endorsement, and plenty of academic organizations have content like this to drive traffic. That said, it does indicate how widespread it must be in med schools.

@Adam I'm sure it helps to supplement what you've learned, but undoubtedly some students only learn how to memorize facts. It's why I stopped giving multiple choice tests when I was teaching and went straight to short-answer/essay. Yes, it took longer to grade, but I was more confident in my students' learning. And believe it or not, their grades improved!

@cmw Not surprising!

I view something like this as just one tool for learning to supplement the others. I do like that I can easily make my own deck.

If I pick Akkadian back up, I could do that as I go through each chapter.

For languages in particular, Clozemaster might also be up your alley.

The other big criticism I've seen with Anki is that for people who have a better than average memory, it's very inefficient. I think more algorithmic approaches will be popular in the future.

@cmw Seems like this is more gamified and quiz-like rather than just simple flashcards?

@Adam It's "fill in the blank" quizzes. Not for Akkadian or Thai, unfortunately.

@cmw Ahh, and no way to add it.

The app says it uses a method, but I've yet to find an alternative that allows for adding it.