At Lumens we use flash cards to build language & general knowledge (GK).
Why Flash Cards?
It might sound different but that’s an inherent, natural way of learning for every human being.
Have you ever thought: how did you start identifying things after they were introduced to you first by your others?
For example, when you were first shown an elephant (in a picture or a real one), would you have remembered it by its trunk, tusks, enormous tummy, small tail, huge ears or formidable legs?
Well the fact is we remembered the elephant as a whole and never focussed on all those intricate details till it was pointed out by someone. Our mind at that tender age may have picked up few of the above points to enable us identify it next time but no one would know, what points they were and they would definitely not be the same for all of us.
Basically we, humans are naturally inclined to learn the whole first (& easily) and then identify the details to transform the information (whole) into knowledge (detail).
Learning Language & GK
今天
I am sure the best you can guess about above picture is that, it is some sort of Chinese letter or a word.
If you see above picture often enough and hear word “jintian”, you could see this sign anywhere outside, you would say jintian, without knowing that it means “today” in Chinese.
Have you ever wondered, why a Chinese 2 year old speaks Chinese easily, a British 2 year old speaks perfect English, a Tamil 2 year old speaks good Tamil but a 23 year old Gujarati, MA with English, still find his/her Gujarati more powerful than his/her English ?
Well, the reason is, we all, including, Chinese, British, Tamils or Gujaratis learn our native language by hearing it from people who speak that well, in proper accent and with perfect grammar. We hear it time and again, learn it as a whole, start using same sentences to begin with and gradually start using its variations as we start understanding it. A few years later if and when we come across grammar classes of that language, we understand the details of why it is used in that way.
Don’t we all learn our mother tongue in somewhat similar way? And I am yet to find a person not good at mother tongue. Learning through pictures, as a whole comes naturally to all of us; our children growing up with this would be experts at learning using this method. They would possibly learn all subjects using flash cards till grade 12 and by then they would be expert enough to make their own picture cards in medical, engineering or whatever they do. We not only build their vocabulary but also information about the world surrounding them.
Learning will come easy and naturally to them…