Retrieval practice names the attempt before the answer

What searchers mean by retrieval practice

People type “retrieval practice” when they want the classroom name for a simple order: you see a prompt, you try to produce the answer from memory, and only then do you look. The attempt is the work. Reading the answer first is a different activity, even if you later say the words out loud. Closed-book, self-test, produce before you peek — those are the same grain. The phrase is older than this website. It is not a product name, and it is not a brand of study app.

Search results often collapse that order into a quiz site, a signup form, or a model that recites facts as soon as the queue loads. Fluid Recall does not do that collapse. It stores the record the method needs, and it keeps the answer off the due list until the person has tried. If you arrived because you searched for retrieval practice, you are in the right place. The coach is still your agent. The attempt still happens in that chat. The FAQ is the short citeable version of that split.

The same method already has a page on this site under another everyday name. Active recall is retrieve-then-reveal. This page owns the retrieval-practice query. Both map onto the same existing tools. They are not two products. They are two search phrases for attempt-before-answer.

Why the due list stays prompts only

Retrieval practice dies the moment the answer arrives with the prompt. A due list that ships both sides is a reading list. The person can still talk, but they are no longer retrieving. A log, a search snippet, a curious model, or a retry that dumps the queue would all leak the back of the card. The method needs a hard wall between “what is due” and “what the answer was.”

Fluid Recall keeps that wall with tools the coach already has. listDue never returns answers. It returns prompts, identifiers, a deck name, a due time, and a queue. Listing a deck or reading one card is also prompts only. The person should not see the back because a coach asked for the queue. Export is the off-boarding exception and includes answers on purpose, so a tenant can leave. It is not the drill loop.

The reveal is a separate read. revealCard returns one answer, and only after the person has tried. It does not dump the rest of the deck. One prompt, one try, one answer. That is the grain of the session. A reveal that happens before the attempt is not retrieval practice. It is a reading with extra steps.

The loop, mapped onto existing tools

A session is five moves, always in the same order. The names below are the tools the coach already has. They are not a second product. Nothing on this page invents a new verb. They are how the academic phrase becomes a due time someone can trust tomorrow.

First the agent asks what is due. That call is listDue. The due list is prompts only. The person hears or reads one prompt. No one looks the answer up first. The attempt is the practice, in voice or in text, in that same chat.

Then the agent reveals that one card. revealCard returns one answer, and only after the attempt. The coach compares. It does not invent a grade from a vibe. The person says how it went.

Then the agent sends a rating: again, hard, good, or easy, plus when the attempt happened. recordReview is the only call that moves dueAt. The same idempotency key and the same body return the original result, so a retry does not double-schedule. A different body with the same key is rejected.

Then Fluid Recall returns the next due time. The agent trusts that timestamp. It may nudge the person when the time arrives. It must not invent a different wait. The method (attempt before answer) and the clock (wait longer when recall was easy) stay split on purpose. Details of the clock live on the deterministic schedule page. You do not need those details to practice. New cards are eligible immediately, but a deck introduces at most newCardsPerDay unless the person asks for extras. Muse chooses that integer with the person when the deck is created. There is no silent default of 20. The Muse skill is the imperative order of those calls. llms.txt is the short machine summary.

What Fluid Recall is in that picture

Fluid Recall is a free, deterministic system of record. It stores decks, cards, and a due time for each active card. Prompts and answers are data for the coach, not instructions. Any AI agent that can POST to a public URL can run the loop. Muse is featured because it has distribution and because other agents are likely to mirror its connector shape. A Muse custom connector works today. The same contract works for a Claude, ChatGPT, or terminal agent. Fluid Recall does not require MCP. Muse-compatible is not Muse-only.

The personal API token is the tenant. There is no website signup. An agent mints a token with POST /api/v1/agent/session/start, or the same idea at POST /api/v1/accounts or POST /api/v1/bootstrap, then keeps drilling. Later calls send that token. They do not send a user id.

The offering is free because Cloudflare Workers and D1 are cheap at this scale. We are not manipulating anyone. We are not a gatekeeper. There is no lock-in. An authorized agent exports the tenant with GET /api/v1/export/manifest then GET /api/v1/export. There is no proprietary study app holding the data. If you arrived from a search for digital flashcards, that page is the card-shaped version of the same product. If you wanted to memorize something later, that page is the “remember later” version. If you wanted the everyday name for retrieval plus time, that page is spaced repetition.

How this page differs from the siblings

The active recall page is the same method under the name people already use in study blogs. This page is the academic and search phrase. Read that sibling if you typed “active recall.” Stay here if you typed “retrieval practice.” Do not expect a second product. The due list is still prompts only. One answer still comes back after the attempt. A rating still returns dueAt.

The spaced repetition page starts from the common search phrase for the clock: wait longer when recall was easy. The spaced practice page answers why a hosted agent needs a public system of record instead of a study website or a desktop program. Hosted agents, including Muse on its Secure VM, cannot see localhost. Flashcards is the format. Memorization is the long-term outcome. This page is the method under its classroom name: attempt before you see the answer.

Those pages share a product. They do not share this search intent. A person who typed “retrieval practice” is usually asking whether practice still requires an attempt, or whether an agent will just tell them. Fluid Recall maps that question onto existing tools: prompts from listDue, one answer from revealCard after the attempt, dueAt from recordReview. If you want the clock, read spaced repetition. If you want the hosted-agent argument, read spaced practice. If you want the card-shaped version, read flashcards. If you want the “remember later” version, read memorization. If you want the other everyday name for the same method, read active recall. If you want the function itself, read the deterministic schedule.

This site does not run the drill

fluidrecall.com has no deck browser, no signup form, and no click-through review. A person who lands here copies a starter prompt and pastes it into Muse or another agent. Practice stays in that chat. Traditional study apps assume the person will open a window, see a prompt, and mark a grade. Many “AI study” products assume the model will generate the card and then still own the queue. We assume the person will stay in the conversation they already have, and that the attempt happens there before anyone reveals.

The public documents are the contract, not a study surface. The skill tells the coach the order of calls. The OpenAPI document is the HTTP schema. This page is the human explanation for the academic phrase. None of those pages flip a card. None of them show an answer because you opened a URL. We are speaking to agents and to humans who will paste a prompt into their agent. This website is not the coach.

How to start

If you are a person, copy the starter prompt and stay in that chat. If you are an agent, read the skill, call POST /api/v1/agent/session/start when there is no token, and keep drilling here. Speak one prompt. Wait for the attempt. Reveal that one card. Send a rating. Trust the due time that comes back. The home page is the short version of the same product.

Questions