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Word Pioneer - GMAT/GRE Test Prep Vocabulary Builder for Advanced Student app for iPhone and iPad


4.6 ( 9296 ratings )
Reference Education
Developer: ilia chinkarev
Free
Current version: 1.4, last update: 7 years ago
First release : 16 Jul 2015
App size: 53.52 Mb

The app is a vocabulary learning system based on latest memory research combined with artificial intelligence and machine learning. It means that you will spend most of your time learning words that you dont know, not repeating those that you have learnt already. The app is adjusting to your needs as you study.

Featuring:
- 70,000+ words Dictionary so you can add a word to study directly from a dictionary
- 3,500 GRE/GMAT words separated for your convenience so you can study only those that you dont know

Learning language is difficult because a typical word has 4-7 meanings. A typical meaning in turn could be described by 3-7 synonyms. This cant be described by a single "one word - to - one meaning" flashcard.

Its when you want to be the best of the best, it is. When I tasked myself with studying 5000 words for GMAT/GRE thats when it all became apparent. Thats when I realized that I have to learn multiple synonyms of the same sense. But I had flashcards of a sense all over the place. Its better if you learn all synonyms at once. But when you learn a word many times you dont realize that you also learning a synonym for the word, just because you dont know either of the words yet.

I spent multiple years and then I gave up. Because I didnt have time to write the app. Congratulations! Now YOU HAVE the app. I finally created it. For myself, of course, but I wanted to share it with you all. Enjoy!

The best known technique for remembering the words, the spaced repetition algorithm, is based on 30 years of research of Poland Dr. Wozniak and Co. (and is widely used in his SuperMemo app) However, I dramatically modified the idea so these two cant be directly compared. Original version tries to estimate intrinsic difficulty of the word and based on that difficulty (how many times you cant remember the word when you should!) creates repetition schedule, which in turn tries to estimate the intrinsic difficulty. Its all good, but in case of the words (his system lets you repeat "anything") I would argue that if you cant recall the word at the time you supposedly should - it means that the difficulty was too high and simply needs (and can!) to be decreased. (as opposed to overload you with rote repetition of something you dont understand, that is way too often)

The dynamic difficulty decrease in the app is achieved by learning sense of the word from a different angle:
1) more and more examples are given
2) visual queues will start to appear
3) Its almost like solving a puzzle (which also called an active learning) you will be given NEW context to recall the word. So you are learning to synthesize the language, TO USE the word!

Eventually you are learning to use the word. Linguists say that at that moment you have learnt the word for good: so you dont have to repeat it anymore. At this moment you have instant recall. It cant be any easier to recall it after that. It cant be any better than that.