Ask HN: what do you think of these flash cards I made for young kids? | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: what do you think of these flash cards I made for young kids?

kangadoo.com

13 pointsepi0Bauqu27 comments

Very nice. I'm guessing little kids will love it. I found some of the labels hard to read because there was too little contrast with the pic. To me the robin didn't look like a robin.

I have a 3 kids between the ages of 2 years and 11 years. My youngest would definitely enjoy these and I think it's a good start.

It's a very simple idea, so I think you'll need to add some features (pause button, music, more card sets, etc.) to encourage parents to visit often.

Also, I love the domain name and can see that this project was created while scratching your own itch (which is a great way to stay motivated).

Thanks. Yeah, I have about 20 ideas for new card sets--if you or anyone else has any I'll add them to my list.

They look really nice, good job!

Maybe it's my connection, but the cards are going by a little fast, it skips to the next card before the image has finished loading. You could add a speed option and/or a pause button.

Yeah, once they load once, they should be cached thereafter. I've seen this issue too though. A pause would certainly be good. I'll put that on the list--thanks!

What is the rationale for making flash cards at all? (This is a serious question; I've never seen a need for flash cards, in my youth or in my children's youth.)

A few reasons. First and foremost, I want to offer my children the opportunity to learn as much as possible, up to their interest and abilities. Studies show kids learn best via repetition and pick up language faster the more you talk to them (surprise surprise). Flash cards address both those learning modes by both repeating words and giving you prompts to expound about them, i.e. "a beaver swims in the water." Quite simply, by using them I find I talk to my son more and in a more directed (learning appropriate) way.

Second, as a stay-at-home dad who also works on startups, I am searching for good (educationally-oriented) ways to entertain and occupy my son. I have a two-28"-monitor setup. I found I could put these up on one and still get some casual things done, e.g. reading email, on the other monitor.

Third, I really like big full screen images, and haven't seen any flash cards to date that use them effectively.

Why don't you buy some good children’s books with images of animals in them? A story is significantly more interesting than a flash card.

I already have tons of them :). It is a completely different mode of entertainment/learning. What you think is "significantly more interesting" isn't necessarily such to a baby.

Studies show kids learn best via repetition and pick up language faster the more you talk to them (surprise surprise).

Do those studies specifically compare flash cards to the children's books (which I like a great deal) already mentioned to you in another reply? Do they use an experimental rather than correlational study design?

http://norvig.com/experiment-design.html

What are the citations for the studies you have in mind?

I see from your profile that you too take care of your kids all day long. I've found that my son doesn't want to do the same thing for very long. So we read books, we play with toys, we take walks, etc. etc. This is one of a variety of activities that is done for only a few minutes each day.

In other words, I don't understand the presumption that books and flash cards are mutually exclusive. On the contrary, I think that they are complementary. I look for things that are educational that hold my sons interest for some amount of time. This activity is one of those things. If kids don't like it, by all means they shouldn't use it. It is meant to be fun.

My concern about flashcards is that they are a very nonholistic way to present isolated facts. In my childhood experience, it was the DUMB kids in class who used flashcards a lot, while the smart kids did without them entirely. (I vividly recall an incident in fourth grade when some of my classmates were flipping through a set of geography flashcards, which was just old enough to show some African countries as still colonies of European countries, even though by that year those countries were independent. I knew the countries were independent because I read books and the daily newspaper.)

I find that when I am learning something new, memorizing some facts is an important part of the process, kind of like establishing a set of axioms before using them to prove something. As I build more expertise, I can revisit those memorized facts later with greater understanding instead of simply being able to recite them. I find flash cards to be useful for that purpose.

You definitely have a point: you can't exclusively use flash cards to develop a good understanding of any subject. However, I think that they are one of many useful techniques that you can use for studying and question whether using flash cards automatically means that you are a "DUMB" kid.

It's great that you were able to learn outside of the classroom by reading books and newspapers on your own, but I don't think that incident means that flash cards are in ineffective technique. Relying on outdated flash cards to teach the children geography means that the teachers were not up to date on current events and that the school did not update their learning materials frequently enough.

I am searching for good (educationally-oriented) ways to entertain and occupy my son.

I hear you on that, as a homeschooling father of four children with a home-based business. But my friendly suggestion would be that very young children are not best served by screen time

http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/children-and-tv/MY00522

but by their own auditory, visual, and especially tactile experience in their home environment from doing their own activities. (You mention your son--your first?--being four months old, so I suppose he is not walking yet, but he can already move and touch things.)

Yes, this is the reason they are huge, still, life-like images, i.e. less like TV and more like photographs or books. And like I said in another comment, this is just meant for a few minutes a day and as one of dozens of activities we regularly engage in.

Works best full screen (F11 on Win).

My son (4mo) and his cousin (14mo) really like these. However, I'd love to get some feedback from a wider audience before I start making a bunch more.

Nice! How about adding a spoken version of the animal name, for pre-readers?

Tiny tips for a better user experience: load the pictures in the background and display a spinner while they're loading; load the next/prev images while the user is looking at an image to minimize waiting.

The images don't need to be that big, I think. Or you could possibly have a resolution option (small/med/large). Depending on your monitor, 30" flash cards?

You can resize the window to your liking. However, the bigness was sort of the point--attracts and keeps my 4mo old's attention. Have you tried it big vs small with your young kids? I'd be very interested to know what happens.

Should be "caterpillar"? Don't want to teach kids the wrong spelling ;)

Absolutely, will switch :). It should also be 'opossum' I've realized.

I think if you can add colors, numbers, alphabets with spoken versions will be great. You should check out the apps on iPhone for kids. Some of them are just off the hook.

Things kids are forced to do (flashcards) they will hate.

Things kids are allowed to do (watch National Geographic) they will enjoy.

Do you really want your kids to hate nature?

Wow, my son and every kid I've shared these with loves them. Do you have kids? If so, please try it out and let me know.

Maybe flash cards is the wrong word to use?

The idea is not to make them memorize anything, i.e. not fun. The idea is to show them pictures of stuff they like, i.e. fun. The vocab building is just a by-product of the activity.

Who said anything about force?

Kids hate flashcards?

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