Remember having vocabulary lists in elementary school and your parents drilling you every day for the big end-of-the-week quiz? And then middle school – as if English wasn’t bad enough - enter vocabulary in another language altogether.
Thankfully, it’s been a long time since I’ve had to brave those terrors. But soon students will be able to leverage a fantastic new resource: Quizlet. Created by Andrew Sutherland, a high school student and self-proclaimed boy genius, Quizlet takes the tedium out of vocabulary.
Operating under the premise that a) students need to better retain their knowledge and b) there has to be a better way to study for those tests, Quizlet takes on many roles so that students can get those words memorized for good:
- Instead of your mom, Quizlet keeps track of the words you know and only retests you on the ones you don't.
- Quizlet lets students share their word lists and facilitates interactive studying.
- It’s free (and thus perfect for the demographic).
Quizlet’s functionality is pretty simple: you enter or import words and definitions, and then Quizlet tests you through various mediums including flashcards, specialized tests and collaboration with friends until the list is mastered. A screen shot of the application is shown below. Additional features include foreign language capabilities and discussion capabilities so students can vent about the merciless teachers that assign vocabulary.
Photo Attribution: density quiz 11/17 taken by Jack Lyons
