All About Our Flashcards

Here at Union Test Prep, we strive to use all the tools available to give you the most thorough and complete study options. We have the resources to provide flashcards for every test section and want to provide exactly what you need. We want you to know all about our flashcards and how you can benefit from accessing them, as well as our study guides and practice questions.

Unlike a practice question, a flashcard must be short and sweet: short question, no reading reference, short answer, short explanation (when needed). There are no multiple-choice answers, so questions must have only one definitive answer that you either know, or don’t know. These parameters limit flashcard content and construction, but we have found some valuable uses for the flashcard format.

Basically, we have two options when creating flashcards for you and both of them can enhance your test preparation:

Option 1: Quick Drill Flashcards

For some test sections, like math, it’s obvious. We create flashcards to review specific terms, definitions, and simple procedures. A simple example might look like this:

Front: When you find the number that, when multiplied by itself, equals a given number, you are finding the ?.
Back: square root
Explanation: The symbol for square root is \(\sqrt\) and will have the given number inside the symbol. For example: \(\sqrt{9} = 3\)

This type of flashcard may not be an example of a question you would see on the test, but it helps you to know the terms that will be used in questions. For sections like Math, finding these terms is pretty straightforward.

Option 2: Background Knowledge Flashcards

Other test sections do not provide clear-cut options for flashcards, so we have to be creative. For example, a reading comprehension test does not seem to lend itself to flashcard format. We can’t really put a reading selection on a flashcard and ask you questions about it. But, wait, what if the questions don’t really ask for definitions, but just assume you know terms and are familiar with certain ideas? We can help with that!

We analyze the test section and ask, “Is there any skill that contributes heavily to performance on this test that is not specifically practiced in our questions?” Then we devise ways help you round out the knowledge required.

Here is an example of our thought process when creating a flashcard for a Reading Comprehension section:

Our thoughts: Many of the questions are going to ask for the main idea of a passage or paragraph. Before being able to do this, you must know what a main idea is. How do you know you have found the main idea? What are the clues?

Flashcard: Front: You can be pretty sure you have found the main idea of a paragraph if:
Back: all, or most, of the sentences in the paragraph support that idea
Explanation: If they don’t, the sentence you have chosen is probably a detail and not the main idea.

While no question in the actual test may ask you this type of thing, you have to know it to answer some of the questions! We use this type of flashcard for targeted practice on a skill that will enhance performance on that section of the test—a prerequisite for doing well! So, you may find proofreading practice in writing test section flashcards and grammar drills in a language section.

So, by all means, use our flashcards and don’t be tripped up on test day by some random idea that test creators assumed you’d know!