Germane load
The load worth having.
Cognitive load theory counts schema construction as the only effort that pays for itself. Cue removes the busywork around it and leaves the thinking to you.
Sweller, van Merriënboer & Paas, 1998Cue · for preclinical medicine
Desirable Difficulty, Kept Desirable.
Flashcards from your lectures. You write every answer, with the slide beside you, before Cue shows you its own.
Cue reads your lecture and proposes the questions worth knowing. Then it stops. You write the answer, with the slide open beside you. Only then does Cue show you its own.
The loop
One card, start to finish.
Evidence
The effort is the point.
Cognitive load theory separates wasted effort from the work that builds understanding. Cue removes the first and protects the second.
Generation effect
Making beats reading.
You remember what you produce better than what you are handed, even when your version is worse. The gate exists so you produce first.
Slamecka & Graf, 1978Retrieval practice
Recall outlasts review.
Retrieving an answer builds longer-lasting memory than rereading it. Writing the answer is the practice.
Roediger & Karpicke, 2006 · Karpicke & Blunt, 2011Desirable difficulty
Hard, but within reach.
A difficulty only helps if you can meet it. So the slide stays open, the question arrives framed, and feedback comes the moment you commit.
Bjork & Bjork, 2011A note from the founder
AI is very good at making flashcards. That does not mean it should make all of them.
I learned this the inconvenient way. When I let AI do the work, I made cards quickly and learned them slowly. I had saved time, but only by borrowing it from later.
Making a good flashcard requires a small act of judgment. You have to decide what matters, what can be omitted, and what question is worth asking. That act is part of studying.
Cue is built around that idea. It uses AI to remove the dull work, but leaves the thinking to you.
That is slower than pressing a button.
It is also the point.
Lord Palmerston, Founder
Write the first answer yourself.
Pay as you go. No subscription.
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