myLexicon app for iPhone and iPad

myLexicon is an application to help you learn and revise the words you need or want to learn:

o Add the words and phrases to the dictionary.
o Organise them by language and groups.
o Find or check the translations.
o Use the “smart trainer” to learn or revise.

I created myLexicon because I wanted to learn a new language and I wanted an easy to use application to help me efficiently learn the new vocabulary.

Collecting the words that are relevant to learn and adding them to the application is an important part of the learning process. So this application does not come with a predetermined set or words to learn. It will only contain the words that are important to you.

Organising the words is also very important to plan your learning and see your progress. A group can be anything that is relevant to you such as “Colours”, “Useful phrases” or “Lesson: 10 Dec”.

The smart trainer is what makes this application very different. It tracks your progress for each word or phrase and uses this information to optimise your learning.

The algorithms are based on the learning theory of short-, medium and long-term memory. As you become more familiar with a word, it brings it less often. If it finds that you have forgotten a word it will bring it more often again.
As you become more familiar with a word it is promoted to the next level. The idea is the same as when you learn a vocabulary using memory cards. When you have learnt a word in the first stack of cards you move it to next stack.

Level 0 and 1 are for learning new words while levels 2 and 3 are for revising words.

This is the way I use the application:
1. At the start of a lesson, create a new group in the language and give it a relevant title such as “Lesson 10 Dec”.
2 .During the lesson, add new words and check the translation if necessary
3. After the lesson use the trainer to go learn the new words in the new group. The new words are on level 0. Here the trainer asks you to translate into your language, as this is the easiest direction.
When all the words have been promoted. The go through the same words in level 1. Here the trainer asks to translate into the new language, which is harder than the other direction.
Once all the words have been promoted to level 2, you should be confident about knowing the words. The words should now be in your medium-term memory. Help the process a little more by going over any text from the lesson.
4. Finally take time to go over words in levels 2 and 3, either for a particular group or all the words in that level. This should help move the words to your long-term memory.

Searching
You can search the dictionary in either language.

Backups
The words you have entered are important to you and so it is possible to keep a backup just in case. So there is an export function in the settings to create a backup file. Use iTunes to backup the exported file to another place and restore it if necessary.