Well, here we are in 2006. It looks pretty much the same as 2005 did here in Vancouver. We're still sitting here watching the rain come down. This winter, we almost tied a record for precipitation as we received 27 straight days with at least some rain. The all time record is 28 days but on the 28th day, this past Sunday, we had a nice sunny day so we failed to tie the record. In fact, since it has rained the last two days also, we would have broken the record by at least two days. It's not often you hear people in Vancouver wishing for a rainy day but it was our chance at making history! There is not much new to report in the way of enhancements over the holiday period so I am going to spend some time instead going over our word review system. This is because people often don't seem to realize how it works and we get a lot of questions about it. First, let me start by explaining how saved words are moved to known words by our system.
When you save a word our system assigns that word a status of New or 1. A known word has a status of Known or 7. There are two ways by which you can move a word from New to Known. You can test the word in the Review section and each time you test it correctly it will move up one level in the seven step progression to Known. Therefore, if you test it correctly seven times in a row it will become Known. Every time you test it incorrectly it will move back one level. The only other way to affect the seven step progression is if you meet the saved word in a new content item. If, while reading the new item, you do not save the word again, our system will move the word three steps in the progression to known. This is because you have encountered the word again and have understood it.
Finally, if you find you would just like to move a word to known for whatever reason, you can do so by selecting it in the Words I am Learning section and clicking the “Move to Known” button. The important thing to realize is that whether you move words to known slowly or quickly it doesn't matter. If you move words to known and then you encounter the word again, you can always resave it and it will come out of your Known Words. You are probably not going to learn and remember all your new words but you will remember more and more of them and you will always be increasing your vocabulary.
