Your Own Words: The Phrase You Need

Your own vocabulary isn’t a second library alongside the app. It’s the gap that the finished list doesn’t cover. The tool you use at work. The official phrase. The name of the medication you need to spell. Adding words is only worth it if you include an example sentence. Without a sentence, it’s just a note you won’t be able to say on Thursday.

I take the word from the moment it was missing. Not from a list of “the thousand most important ones.” The thousand most important ones have rarely saved me at the bar. That one missing sentence has.

When to add it

Right after. On the train, just before you call it “later.” “Later” isn’t a timeframe. A word, its meaning in the language you need on the cards—a short sentence you’ve said out loud or are about to say. If the sentence is too long, shorten it. “I need…” is enough. The story behind it doesn’t go on the card.

There are already over five thousand example sentences in the app. First, check if yours is already there. If so, practice that one. Your own vocabulary cards are for what’s missing, not for duplicates.

What Doesn’t Belong on the Card

Entire dialogs. Three translations. A grammar rule in parentheses. The card then becomes a document, and you’ll swipe it away because it looks overwhelming. One word, one sentence. You practice the rule by making sure the sentence is correct, not by copying it down.

Swipe options remain: “Try again” or “I know it.” “I know it” only if the sentence was on the card, not if you recognized the translation. SRS brings the card back after one, three, seven, thirty, or ninety days. A card of your own that you never say out loud clogs up the stack.

From real life, not from the chapter

Caregiving, cooking, the train, school. Take the word you’ve used twice this week and paraphrased once. Paraphrasing is a signal. The example sentence is the fix. Five such cards in a week beat fifty from a random list you don’t care about.

The AI can form the sentence in advance. Roll, five changes, hold, and let go. Then write that one word on the card, using the sentence from the roll—not a nicer one. In the language group, you say the same one. Your own vocabulary, which exists only in the app, remains a hobby.

Here’s how to create them: Add Word. How the stack comes back: SRS.

One Limit Per Day

Three new custom cards, not thirty. The due stack takes priority. If the widget shows more than twenty due cards, don’t add any new ones today. Adding words is then postponed until tomorrow—and that’s discipline, not laziness. Yesterday’s example sentence is worth more than ten new flashcards.

A Word from This Week

Write it the way you’d say it, not like a dictionary. “The shift starts at six.” Not “shift, the: working hours.” Say it out loud into the microphone, once, before the card is finished. If the sound is off, fix the pronunciation first, then the card. If you learn your own vocabulary with a flawed sentence, you’ll remember it incorrectly. The card will come back in three days. Say it before you collect the next gap from work. Two gaps per week are enough. The ready-made example sentences in the app cover the rest if you say them out loud instead of just swiping. “One more time” means saying it one more time. I know what it means—the sentence was out there. Three new cards, then the due stack. Not the other way around. In the morning, the widget only shows the number of due cards, not how many you made up yesterday.

DeutschSprechen takes the word you missed. You provide the sentence. Short. Out loud. Then the card, and again in three days before you move on to the next gap.