Flashcards

A structure for pairs with a pile of cards carrying the question on the front and the answer on the back, in six steps, the first two of which happen only once. First the class forms pairs; A is whoever comes first alphabetically. Then, if the class writes the set itself: everyone thinks up questions, question on the front, answer on the back. Then the game starts: A reads the top question out loud and B answers. Right? B gets the card and A gives a compliment. Wrong? The card goes to the bottom of the pile and comes round again by itself. After every card the two swap roles, until the pile is gone. The game is one continuous round: the clock above it is your ceiling, the pile decides when it is finished.

Because the compliment keeps the structure cooperative. Without it a won card is a point, and then the quicker one of the pair wins and the other stops trying: a contest, in which the material no longer matters. With the compliment A is pleased when B knows it: A reads the question, sees the answer, is therefore practising along, and says "well done" when it is right. Because the roles swap after every card, everyone takes a turn at testing and at being the one who just did not know, and that is what makes the compliment sincere. Model it once in the first round; after that the class does it itself.

With the default settings the whole structure takes ± 15 minutes, briefing and look-back included.

The game itself gets one time in the preparation, ten minutes by default, and that is a ceiling: the pile decides when a pair is finished. A set of twenty to thirty cards fits well inside it. Add a minute and a half to form pairs and agree the letter A, and a minute to hand out: twelve minutes or so in total. If you let the class write the cards, count on five extra minutes for that step. With conversation cards it is different: there a round lasts seven minutes (five asking, one swapping, one finding a new partner) and you pick the number of rounds. Three is the default, so a little over twenty minutes.

Three ways. One: the class writes them itself: set the first step in the preparation to five minutes, hand out blank cards from the basic kit, and everyone writes two or three questions about the material with the answer (looked up in the book) on the back. Two: the card generator: type your questions or, with a free account, let the AI write them, eight per A4, print and cut; for answers on the back, fill in the Answer field as well and print double-sided. Three: an existing set from the textbook or from a colleague. Whichever it becomes: one set per pair, and an answer on every back. If the questions will not come, start from the terms in bold in the chapter: one card per term, the question on the front and the explanation from the book on the back. Prefer Microsoft Copilot? Ask: ‘Write 8 short questions about [topic] for students aged [age], each with a short answer. One question per line, with the answer after it.’ Put the questions in the Large text box of the card generator and the answers in the Answer box.

The second deck of the same structure: cards with a question and no right answer ("what do you most like doing on a Sunday?", "what are you proud of?"), chosen in the preparation. The steps change with it: A takes a card and asks, B tells and A follows up (five minutes); then they swap (one minute); then everyone stands up and finds a new partner (one minute). Because there is nothing to win and no card leaves the pile, the end is decided not by the pile but by a number of rounds; three is the default. Pick this deck for getting acquainted, gathering opinions or getting a conversation going; the new-partner step is what makes it acquaintance rather than practice.

Three things carry the structure. One: the material beforehand: one set per pair, an answer on every back, printed or self-written; there is no time to cut during the lesson. Two: the first round. Model the compliment, and have the letter A settled before the first card is picked up, otherwise the quicker one starts in every pair, every time. Three: walking around. Listen for which cards keep going back on the pile; that is the material that needs another round tomorrow, and it is the only marking this structure asks of you. The player does the rest: the step, the clock and the rules, and deliberately shows no card, because every pair is holding a different one.

One group of three on one pile: A asks, B answers, C checks the back and gives the compliment, and the roles move along after every card. It goes slightly slower than in a pair, but everyone stays at work. It is better than pairing a student with you: then you are doing the testing and you cannot see the rest of the class.

What there is to practise. Flashcards trains the short answer: words, dates, formulas. The answer is there within a second or it is not, and repetition at pace is the goal. Pair coach trains the road to an answer: one solves an exercise out loud, the other asks questions and gives nothing away. For a revision lesson they are often used one after the other: first the facts with cards, then the exercises with a coach alongside.

All three practise knowledge with short questions, but who asks differs. In the knowledge quiz you ask the question on the board, teams answer at once and there is a score: checking with pace. In movement quiz the class walks around and everyone puts their card to a different person each time: the same cards, but with movement and changing partners. In Flashcards the pair stays seated and the pile works itself off, with a compliment instead of a score. Rule of thumb: knowledge quiz when you want to see what the class knows, movement quiz when the class needs to move, flashcards when everyone should practise at their own pace.

Shuffle & Pick uses the same kind of cards (question on the front, answer on the back), but in fours with four roles: one holds the cards in a fan, one draws and reads out, one answers, one checks the back and coaches. The roles move along after every rotation. It is slower and more structured, and the checker makes it suitable for material where there is still something to say about the answer. Flashcards is the fast version for two: more cards per minute, and the pile decides the end.

Yes, as long as every pair has the same digital set: A shares their screen with the question, B answers, A turns it over, or, more simply, everyone has the set on paper at home and the shared player gives the step and the clock. Pairs in breakout rooms, the rules on screen, and the compliment out loud. The new-partner step of the conversation cards becomes a new room online.

The card with a question on the front and the answer on the back is as old as testing itself; the system in which a wrong card goes back into the pile and a right one leaves it is known as the Leitner box (Sebastian Leitner, 1972). The cooperative pair form (taking turns to test, the won card, and the compliment as a fixed part) was described by Spencer Kagan as the Flashcard Game. What makes the structure work in a classroom (the compliment, the swap after every card, no question on screen) is recorded here as the player runs it.