Flashcards are often touted as a great tool for learning vocabulary. In fact, they’re often the first tool recommended for anyone learning a new language.

For some people flashcards can provide that beneficial vocabulary practice. 

Unfortunately for many others it’s a short term success. 

The traditional flash card with English on one side German on the other side provides no context for the vocabulary Word being learned. Even if a picture is provided it still does not provide enough context.

What is context?  

Context is the situation in which you’re going to be using the vocabulary word. So you’re asking for a receipt at a restaurant or asking for the time at the train station. Time and receipt out of context can be learned but it’s much easier when you have the situation to practice in. 

If you’re going to use flashcards, create context in your mind, practice a situation, a phrase to insert the word into to allow your brain to assign value to the word. Context tells your brain this is why you want to learn this word, not just how. 

Flashcards often test your short term memory which doesn’t always transfer to long term memory, and thus permanent knowledge of the word. Oftentimes using flashcards is only useful for students needing to know vocabulary words for a test for school. 

How often do native speakers use flashcards for their own language? And I’m not talking about when you’re taking honors English and you’re learning words like cogitating that aren’t used in most day-to-day conversations. I’m talking about the words that you use daily that you don’t need flashcards. 

Do Flash Cards Work for Foreign Languages?

Flashcards can work for learning vocabulary and phrases in your new language depending on your goal.

If your goal is to get an A on your next Spanish test, then flashcards could be very helpful.

If your goal is to be able to order in a restaurant in Munich Germany, then flashcards can help there too. 

If your goal is to have a spur of the moment conversation with a native speaker, flashcards can’t really prepare you for that.

If your goal is to sound more native and have a large vocabulary, flashcards might be helpful, depending on how you learn and how you set them up.

flashcards can help you learn vocabulary and phrases, but they can’t teach you fluency, grammar or comprehension. 

Flashcards often teach you the whole word recognition rather than learning to read the words. Again, in certain situations, this is exactly what you need, but other situations, it’s more of a hindrance than a help.

Problems With Flashcard Drills

The biggest problem with flashcard drills; it is testing your ability to memorize words, not your knowledge of language. 

The traditional method with flashcards is memorization and drills. 

You have the English word on one side and the German word on the other side. Then you practice the words and you either quiz yourself or have a friend quiz you by showing only the English or the German side and have you ‘guess’ the word.

I’ve also seen students time themselves to push themselves to recognize words faster. 

Another method I’ve seen is students will put all their vocabulary words into a flashcards set, rather than the ones they are struggling with. 

This method pushes their brain to focus on their successes. The positive outcomes, the ones they know, rather than the ones they are struggling with. So they are reinforcing words, rather than learning new ones. They’re not building their vocabulary, or very slowly if they are. 

You Also Need To Listen, Read, and and Talk

Learning a language is more than just learning vocabulary. 

Vocabulary is a valuable part of learning a language, don’t get me wrong!

But knowing how to use the vocabulary is important too!

That means learning grammar rules and cultural context. 

That means practicing using grammar rules and vocabulary to build speaking and listening fluency and comprehension. 

Vocabulary (even through flashcards) is important but only part of learning a language. 

Don’t just rely on flashcards

They don’t provide context, like I said earlier, just the word and translation. 

They don’t tell you how to pronounce the word or phrase, unless you add that information to the card. Adding more information to each card increases the difficulty of memorization). 

Remember, typical flashcards don’t teach you to read, just to memorize words. 

Paper vs digital flashcards

There are a number of digital flashcard apps from the basic Google slides to Drops (my review here) so it is a valid question of is digital or paper better? 

The answer to that depends on your age and learning style. 

Studies have shown that how early you learned to use technology impacts where the skill of reading is located in the brain. Grandparents have reading paper and digital in two separate areas because of the time between learning to read and reading digital. The younger you are the closer those two areas seem to be with kindergarteners now showing it as the same area. 

The other factor, your learning style, is how you prefer to learn. For tactile/kinesthetic learners the act of creating the flashcards is the most valuable part, so I don’t recommend digital for these learners. For auditory learners, hearing the words is best, either they read them out loud or someone else does and some apps do this! Visual learners are most flexible between digital and paper because they can see the words either way. 

So whether paper or digital is better, consider your preferences and age. 

When to use flashcards in language learning

Flashcards are a tool in language learning, but they aren’t the best tool to learn a language. 

Flashcards are useful for practicing pronunciation of phrases or words. 

Flashcards are helpful in test preparation or building quick recognition skills. 

If you’re struggling with certain words or mixing words up (like wer and wo in German) then it can be helpful to practice correct recognition.