Mindful Ink

First a small update from Part I. I tried Mental Case and found it not to my liking. it is an incredibly smooth piece of software, but a little complex for my needs. Inputting flash card data would take far too long. I also tried ProVoc which I absolutely loved. It’s easily one of the most polished pieces of freeware I’ve ever used; and for learning a language it is simply amazing, I may end up using my computer more for this after all. It even works on an ipod (though not, regrettably, an iPhone. But that’s okay, we’ve other ways to do that which we’ll go into shortly!) I really cannot recommend this software enough.We’ll come back to ProVoc, let us continue on in general.Now, the key to this next part is a website by the name of flashcardexchange.com. For full functionality, and what we’re going to do, it does require you pay a lifetime membership of $20 bucks. But, if you need the content there (and they have a lot over just about everything) it is well worth it. And you can, fortunately, see what they have and get a feel of the site before joining. Essentially, joining gives you the ability to print and export. Now, if you don’t have $20 dollars to fork over, that’s okay, we’ll take care of you as well. I know you see these steps and go “Holy crap, I’m just making cards!” but it is much easier than it seems and once you’re done you’ll marvel that you ever spent an afternoon making index cards the old way.1. First off, what are you studying? I’m studying German this semester from a book called Deutsch Heute, which luckily, someone has put all the vocab into the library there already! You’ll find most common language books, but also everything else from geography to chemistry. Start with specific searches, and get more general from there.But, here it is - the vocab from the introductory chapter. 143 words and phrases! I really do need flash cards!2. Now, as you can see I have some options. Now, being on a Mac I’m going to make use of that excellent ProVoc program, so we’ll touch on that too. So first, let’s go to “Download” and take care of that. If you aren’t using this program, this step isn’t necessary. You’ll want to select “Export as Tab Separated Values” and then save the file to your desktop. We’ll come back to that.3. So, go back and we’re going to click on “Print” now. Things can get a bit wonky here, so stay with me. There are three options at the top of the screen, if you don’t see PDF Printouts in large letters below, click on PDF Printouts above it.4. At this point I suggest you have some Avery Postcards/Index Cards (Product 8577) handy. I was able to pick up a pack of 400 at the local warehouse store for about $6 - your local office supply store will certainly have them, barring that. I know index cards are cheap and easily available, but most printers cannot handle index cards well at ALL and there is nothing worse than printing out 143 cards both sides to find out that around card 4 it started screwing up and you have to do it all over again. Get the 4 in a sheet index cards, it is WELL worth it for both time and sanity.5. We’re going to walk away from this with three files, but we need to set some things up first.• Change Rows Per Page and Cols Per Page to 1.• Make sure paper size is letter (8.5 x 11)• Card Side Print Options - Question and Answer• Show Borders - Set it to No• Font Size - set to 72• Text Alignment and Vertical Alignment - set both to center• Portrait/Landscape - set to Landscape

 

6. Now, click on View PDF Printout and save the PDF it gives you. You may want to rename it whichever one you made (questions and answers.) Go back and change the Card Side Print options to one of the other options, and the Rows and Cols per page to 2, and hit View PDF again, save, and then do it one more time with the last alternative there. (PC Users - instead of a separate Questions and Answers PDF, create one more Questions and Answers PDF but with 2 columns and rows.)

 

You should now have a question and answer page that each word occupies a full page, and a question file with four words per page, and an answer file with four words per page.

 

We’re going to break this down into Mac and PC directions for a bit.Mac: • Open the Questions file up in Preview. • Go to “Page Setup” (in the menu bar, under File) and pick the landscape view. • Place your avery sheets in your printer. • Click on “Print” • Where it says “Copies and Pages” click, and select “Layout” • Then click Print.

 

Okay, after they finish double check and make sure everything looks good. Now the next part is tricky, and you may want to experiment with some normal paper first. My printer pulls paper in, and then prints on the “down side” of how it is laying in the tray. So, I simply take the stack of papers and put them in the tray without flipping or turning them around. It gets a bit tricky here, so pay attention. • Open the “Answers Page” Go to Print again, and select Paper Handling. Where it says Page Order select Normal. Then hit Print. • You should now have some cards. Seperate and use.

 

Now, again… printers are all different. You may need to tweak this part a bit to make sure things are printing properly. I suggest making some fake cards on some normal paper and test printing both sides till you figure out exactly what you need to do for your printer.

 

PC: • Open the PDF 4 per page, Questions and Answers file in Acrobat (or whatever, really). • Go to File->Print • I would do some tests first, at least two sets of pages (so at least 4) to make sure your double-sided printing will go as you think. • Now, on my printer I can go into properties when I print and then from there, Features. There I pick Two-Sided Printing (Manual) • Click OK, and go ahead and print. • Now, again.. this is my printer, yours may vary. After it prints one side completely, it will ask you to turn the paper around, place it into the print tray and then hit continue. On MY printer (I’ve an HP CS3180) it is essential NOT to turn it around with how these files are made. • You should now have some cards. Seperate and use.

 

Both, again: So, there we are.. flash cards. I know it all sounds pretty complicated but once you get the hang of it takes just a few minutes for the entire process - MUCH faster than doing it by hand (and easier to read!)

 

But wait, there’s more! You know those one-page per sheet question and answer PDF’s you made, here’s where you use them. We’re going to setup Flash Cards for your iPod/iPhone and for use on your computer (without needing special flash card software).

 

We’re in two camps now, though, so we need to organize a bit. First off, those of you who didn’t get a Flash Card Exchange account - you need to get to work in your presentation program (Keynote, Powerpoint or a free version in OpenOffice or something similar). You need to create a slide for each word, keep it plain and white with black text that takes up as much space as possible. You’ll need to alternate between question and answer, so slide 1 will be “German Word” and slide 2 will be “English Translation” for example. When you’re done, save the file. Then export the slideshow (the entire thing) into some sort of basic graphics format (JPGs or GIFs, preferably.) We’ll catch up after we get everyone else on the same page. Hold tight!

 

This is a tricky bit. Now, if you happen to have a copy of Adobe Acrobat (not reader) this is a cinch. Simply create a new folder on your desktop, and then open the PDF file with Acrobat. Go to File->Export->Image->JPEG and select the new folder. The goal here is to turn each slide into an individual image file.

 

Now, if you don’t have Acrobat I’m not quite sure what to tell you. You can use Preview if you’re on a Mac and save each page as an image, one by one. Kind of time consuming. There is a good PDF alternative for Mac called PDFPen, but I’m not sure if its up for the job. I’d check it out, though. PC users, I believe CutePDF will do the job.

 

So, now you have many, many files. Ideally, they should be named with a number at the end for easy organization. Something like “German Vocab 01,” German Vocab 02,“ etc. This is important. Now, if you’re on a Mac select all these files and drop them into iPhoto. If you’re on a PC, put the folder in your Pictures directory. In iPhoto, you want to make a new album, name it appropriately and drop the flash card images in it. Now, this is important… select them all, and then go to View->Sort By->By Title.

 

Now, open iTunes. Plug in your iPod or iPhone and go into your sync settings. Select the Photo tab, and select ”Sync Photos“ on a Mac, from iPhoto, on a PC from your pictures directory. Click ”Selected Albums“ and select your new album (or directory on a PC). Click apply and sync.

 

So, now you have your flash cards on paper and in your ipod. But, also, you have them on your computer. By simply going into your pictures directory on a PC or your iphoto album on a mac, you can use your flash cards on the desktop.

 

You didn’t think we forgot about ProVoc did you? Again, this applies to Mac users. Remember the TSV file we made earlier at FlashCardExchange? Open up ProVoc and go to File->Import, select your TSV file and click ok. You’ll see your vocab in the program instantly. Name the lesson whatever and go to town. They have excellent quizzing features!

 

Okay, well, I do believe this is the longest post I’ve ever written. Please let me know if you have any questions. Regarding the double-sided printing, the best I can offer you is experiment if you’re having problems. Printers are all different, and so I won’t be able to help with that.

 

Do you have any great flash card tips? Share them with us in the comments or by contacting us!

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