PSYCH 101 Reading #13 April 8,2019

Notes by CRV
1

What works, what doesn’t

● Cognitive and educational psychologists have developed and evaluated numerous techniques
● a technique must be useful in a range of learning conditions
● Learners should be able to use the method to master a variety of subjects, and their performance
should bene t no matter what kind of test is used to measure it.

Self-Testing: Quizzing Yourself Gets High Marks

How it works
● done by students on their own, outside of class
● flash cards (physical or digital) to test recall or answering the sample questions at the end of a
textbook chapter
● improves learning and retention
● “One theory is that practice testing triggers a mental search of long-term memory that activates related
information, forming multiple memory pathways that make the information easier to access.”
When does it work
● Anyone for all kinds of factual information (foreign languages, making spelling lists and memorizing
the parts of flowers)
● Improves retention for people with Alzheimer’s
● Frequent exams are most effective, especially when test takers receive feedback on the correct
answers
● works even when its format is different
● beneficial effects may last for months to years

Practical - requires modest amounts of time and little to no training

How can I do it? Flash cards or Cornell system: during in-class note taking, make a column on one edge of
the page where you enter key terms or questions
● Covering the notes and answering the questions

Rating - High utility

Distributed Practice: For Best Results, Spread Your Study over Time
How it works - in sessions, 30 days apart review

When does it work - as young as age three

● for learning foreign vocabulary, word de nitions, and even skills such as mathematics, music and
surgery

Is it practical - plan ahead and overcome the common student tendency to procrastinate

How can I do it - Long delays between study periods are ideal to retain fundamental concepts that form the
basis for advanced knowledge.
● 30-day delays improved performance more than lags of just one day
● To remember something for one week, learning episodes should be 12 to 24 hours apart; to remember
something for five years, they should be spaced six to 12 months apart

Rating - High utility. Easy to do and effective

PSYCH 101 Reading #13 April 8,2019
Notes by CRV
2

Elaborative Interrogation: Channel Your Inner Four-Year-Old

How it works - “Why”, learners produce Practical - minimal training, makes reasonable
explanations for facts time demands
● Study: required 32 minutes to do a task
When should I use it - factual information , already that took 28 minutes for a reading-only
know something group
● increases with prior knowledge
● “clearly improves memory for facts, but Rating - Moderate utility
whether it also might enhance ● May not be useful for material more
comprehension is less certain, and there is complex than a factual list
no conclusive information about how long ● Limited benefits for those without prior
the gains in learning persist” knowledge
● Needs more research

Self-explanation: How do I know?

How it works - generate explanations of what they learn, reviewing their mental processing with questions
● may help integrate new information with prior knowledge
When should I use it - solving math problems and logical reasoning puzzles, learning from narrative texts and
even mastering endgame strategies in chess
● Younger children : basic ideas such as learning numbers or patterns
● improves memory, comprehension and problem solving
● Study: measured effects within only a few minutes
Unclear practicality - minimal instruction and little to no practice
● students without training tended to paraphrase rather than generate explanations
● time-consuming, increasing time demands by 30 to 100 percent
Rating - moderate utility, needs further research

Interleaved Practice: Mixing Apples and Oranges

How it works - blocked-practice condition finished all the problems for one shape before moving on to the
next. In interleaved practice, the problems were intermixed.
● allows students to practice selecting the correct method and encourages them to compare different
kinds of problems
When should I use it
● Blocked practice- more effective when the examples are not very much alike because it highlights
what they have in common
● interleaved practice benefits only those who are already reasonably competent
Seems to be practical
● Once the next kind of problem is introduced, it is mixed in with examples of earlier subjects
● Takes a little more time than blocking practice, but such slowing most likely is worthwhile, reflecting
cognitive processes that boost performance
Rating - Moderate Utility
● includes enough negative results to raise concern (inconsistent)

What doesn’t work

PSYCH 101 Reading #13 April 8,2019
Notes by CRV
3
-low utility (inefficient, ineffective, or beneficial only for certain types of learning and for short periods of
retention)

Highlighting - simple and quick

● hurt performance on some higher-level tasks
● Study on education majors
○ underlining reduced their ability to draw inferences from a history textbook
○ draws attention to individual items rather than to connections across items
What you should do instead - useful if it is the beginning of a journey
Further research : effective highlighting

Rereading - requires no training, makes modest demands on time, and has shown some benefits on
recall and fill-in-the-blank-style tests
“Most of the bene t of rereading appears to accrue from the second reading, with diminishing returns from
additional repetitions”
What you should do instead -

(Less commonly used)

Imagery for text learning - create images for every paragraph they read
Summarization - identify a text’s main points
keyword mnemonic - imagery is used to enhance memory
Example : French word la dent (“tooth”) might use the similar-sounding English word “dentist”

What We Have Learned

Problems:

1. Not being taught the best strategies

None offered much guidance on the use, effectiveness or limitations of different ways of studying

2. In the educational system, the emphasis is on teaching students critical-thinking skills and content
Less time is spent on teaching them how to learn
May struggle once they are expected to regulate their own learning in high school or college