What does it mean to "know" a word?

Hi, I’m new to LingQ. I’m taking French, and so far I’m loving it. I have one question:

When should you move a blue/yellow word to a known word?

For example, should I be able to spell the word? Say the word? Recall the word off the top of my head when asked to translate a text into my new language?

Thanks for your advice.

Edit:
I’d also love to know your general tips on how to best use LingQ. Right now it feels like I have a very low ratio of known words to LingQs (19/150ish). I feel like I am creating too many LingQs. Also, how often do you guys review vocabulary with flash cards and the other tools they give us? Is it worth it to spend a long time reviewing, or should I move on to new lessons and hope I pick up my old words later on? Do you have any other general tips for using LingQ?

Thanks again!
Nate

The way I use LingQ, if I am confident I can understand the meaning of a word in context, I usually move it on to known. I often have to move “known words” back to status 3, though, because I sometimes forget words that I used to “know”. I don’t think it is a big deal either way. I kind of like to lighten the colour of my lesson page. Moving words along in status does that, from dark yellow to lighter yellow and eventually to white. Note that words that you once LingQed remain underlined and retrievable after you move them to "known’.

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Thanks so much! This is extremely helpful.

If you know a blue word, just leave it alone. At the end of the lesson you will be asked if you know all the ones left, and you can just say “yes”. Regarding yellow words, I think it’s a waste of time to change them to known. I see posts by people using the various difficulty levels, etc. But if you do this micro-management exercise on thousands of words, you will surely drive yourself insane.

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I completely agree with you. It’s also for me ‘a waste of time to change yellow words to known’.
At least, we are studying the languages for ourselves, not for ‘the strict teacher’.

My process is a bit more slow and conservative. If I can recognize a word, but it’s a different declension than what I’m used to, I change it to 2 or 3 and review the grammar later.

Other than that, I don’t bother changing yellow words to known very often.

Along a similar vein, I want to know does the number of LingQs created have any meaning when compared to the number of Known Words?

There is a relationship; I’ll state it and you can decide if it has “any meaning”.
LingQs + Known words = Total words