How Crossword Battle works

Crossword Battle teaches English vocabulary through short crossword races. The race tests what you know. The review after it shows you what you missed. Then the game brings those words back until you know them.

1. The race

Press Play and you get a small crossword against the clock. Every clue is a plain English definition with an example sentence. You can answer the clues in any order, and the letters you solve help with the words that cross them.

Races are short, so one fits into a coffee break. As you get stronger, the grids get bigger.

2. The review

After each race you see the words you missed, each with its meaning. Words you only got because the crossing letters filled them in are shown too, because getting a word from its letters is not the same as knowing it. If one of them is a word you already know, you can say so and it will not come back.

3. Your spelling mistakes are tracked

Knowing a word and spelling it are two different skills. When you type a word wrong before you get it right, the game notices. After the race you see what you typed next to the correct spelling, with the wrong letters marked.

Your words page keeps a record of these slips for every word, so you can see the mistakes you repeat and the words that keep tripping you up.

4. Words come back until you know them

Crossword Battle remembers every word you meet. A word you miss comes back in your next races, and keeps coming back until you get it right without help. Once you have learned it, it still returns now and then, further apart each time, so it stays learned.

Each race is put together for you: words you are still learning, words it is time to check, and new words at your level. Words you already know well are left out, so your time goes to the words you need.

5. Your level

The game covers English from beginner to advanced, CEFR levels A1 to C1. There is no test. Your first races find your level, and it keeps adjusting quietly as you improve. If you prefer, you can choose a level yourself.

6. Your own words

You can add the words you want to learn. Type them, paste a list or a piece of text, or take a photo of a page from a book. The game picks out the words and adds them to your next races, where they come back like every other word.

The research behind it

Crossword Battle combines two things: study methods with strong research behind them, and a game that makes you want to keep using them. None of the methods are new. What is new is putting them in a form that is quick and fun enough to keep doing every day.

Recalling a word teaches more than rereading it

Pulling an answer from memory strengthens it more than studying it again. This is known as the testing effect, or retrieval practice. Every clue in a race is a small retrieval.

Roediger and Karpicke (2006), Test-enhanced learning, Psychological Science 17(3). Karpicke and Roediger (2008), The critical importance of retrieval for learning, Science 319.

Spread out practice beats cramming

Meeting a word several times with gaps in between leads to much better long-term memory than meeting it many times at once. That is why missed and learned words return across races instead of all at once.

Cepeda, Pashler, Vul, Wixted and Rohrer (2006), Distributed practice in verbal recall tasks, Psychological Bulletin 132(3).

Trying and missing helps, if you see the answer

An attempt that fails, followed by the right answer, leads to better learning than being shown the answer straight away. Missing a word in a race and then seeing it in the review is exactly that moment.

Kornell, Hays and Bjork (2009), Unsuccessful retrieval attempts enhance subsequent learning, Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition 35(4).

Mistakes teach when they get feedback

Errors that are corrected quickly are a strong source of learning, and clear feedback is one of the most powerful influences on progress. That is why the game shows your spelling slips and keeps a record of them.

Metcalfe (2017), Learning from errors, Annual Review of Psychology 68. Hattie and Timperley (2007), The power of feedback, Review of Educational Research 77(1).

The two highest-rated study methods

A large review of common study techniques rated practice testing and spaced practice as the two most useful. Crossword Battle is built around both.

Dunlosky, Rawson, Marsh, Nathan and Willingham (2013), Improving students' learning with effective learning techniques, Psychological Science in the Public Interest 14(1).

Games keep you practising

Methods only work if you keep using them. A review of dozens of studies found that gamification, such as points, levels, competition and visible progress, improves learning, motivation and behaviour. That is the half of Crossword Battle that fights putting off your practice.

Sailer and Homner (2020), The gamification of learning: a meta-analysis, Educational Psychology Review 32.

What you need

• A web browser on a phone, a tablet or a computer. Nothing to install.
• A Google account to sign in, so your progress is saved.

Crossword Battle teaches English only, for now. Other languages are not supported yet.

Still have questions? Read the FAQ, or start a race.