Improving Student Learning: Moving from the Memory Laboratory to the Classroom

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Improving Student LearningMoving from the
Memory Laboratory to the Classroom

• Mark A. McDaniel
• Washington University in St. Louis

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• Geology Students must master knowledge of
  multiple characteristics of types of rocks.
• Developmental Psychology Attributes of
  organismic, mechanistic, and dialectial theories
  of development.
• Political Science Learn thoroughly number of
  characteristics associated with each of a few
  types of political systems.

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General Memory Model
Rehearsal
STM
LTM
Total-Time Assumption The longer the
information is held in STM, the more likely it
will be stored in LTM
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Memory LaboratoryTotal-time assumption NOT
supported.

• Implication for Undergraduate Education
• Study activities that repetitively maintain
  information may not promote learning and
  retention.
• Rereading text
• Rereading lecture notes

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Roediger and Karpicke (2004)

• 20 in each group
• Give Free Recall
• Studied one or three sessions

Reread Percent Recalled
1 3.4 70 3
10.3 77

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Experimental EvidenceCallender and McDaniel
(2004)

• Sixteen students in a group.
• Students were provided with a social psychology
  chapter from an introductory psychology textbook,
  and read through it either once or twice.
• Students were given two tests-22 multiple choice
  and 4 application questions.

Multiple choice example The Fundamental
Attribution Error (an attribution bias) states
that when accounting for our own behavior we a.
Overestimate external causes b. Blame
ourselves c. Underestimate external causes d.
Complain
Application Question Example According to the
Fundamental Attribution Error, what would be your
response if your team loses a basketball game?
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Results

• Multiple Choice Application
• 1
• Times
• Read
• 2

84 83
79 80
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Amlund, Kardash, and Kulhavy (1986)

• Free Recall Cued Recall
• (Main Ideas)
• 1 18 48
• Times
• Read
• 3 24 50

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• Favored study methods of many undergraduates are
  not potent.

Maintenance Rehearsal
STM
LTM
Elaborative Rehearsal
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Memory LaboratoryElaborative rehearsal

• Relate information to prior knowledge (other
  information in LTM)
• Organize information
• Form Linkages
• Reduce arbitrary nature of the information

• Produces learning and retention (storage in LTM)
• Implications for Undergraduate Education
• Explicitly encourage study activities that
  promote elaborative processing of target material.

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• In memory laboratory, elaborations are provided
  for subject.
• In college/university settings, it is valuable
  for students to recruit elaborative learning
  processes on their own.

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Elaborative Interrogation(Pressley, McDaniel et
al., 1987)
Subjects answer why questions for set of
similar laboratory facts improved memory
performance to that of provided elaborations.
Effective for target facts that students must
learn in all introductory courses?

• Example
• Canadian Civics
• First apple orchards were in Nova Scotia.
• Answer Why?

• Create inferences to make fact less arbitrary.
• Relate to prior knowledge to make fact sensible.

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Experimental EvidencePressley et al. (1988)

• Canadian university students
• 36 facts about Canadian provinces and territories
• TEST Which province had the worst tornado?
• Read and Understand Read and answered Why?
• 48 73

• Post-experimental interviews
• All but 2 Read/Understand
• imagined information in the fact
• related to personal experience
• thought fact was surprising
• ---Not passive reading and still doesnt
  automatically result in elaborations that made
  the information less arbitrary, interrelated with
  previous knowledge.

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McDaniel and Donnelly (1996)Example
Collapsing Stars

• A body in motion has constant energy and energy
  must be conserved. It takes less energy to spin
  as an objects size gets smaller. Collapsing
  stars spin faster and faster as they fold in on
  themselves and their size decreases. This
  phenomenon of spinning faster as the stars size
  shrinks occurs because of a principle called
  conservation of angular momentum.

Why does an object speed up as its radius gets
smaller (as in conservation of angular momentum)?
Text-only Factual Questions
Inference Questions
Elaborative Interrogation
74 88 60 73
Highlighted Keyword 82 76
67 65
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General Memory Model
Rehearsal
STM
LTM
Retrieval

• Retrieval (recall recognition) enhances
  subsequent retention.

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• Implication for Undergraduate Education
• Use testing to promote learning and retention
  (TEL)
• Hodge (2002)

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• Why do tests confer learning benefits?
• Require student to engage in the material
• Sikorsky et al. (2002)
• 69 enrolled in introductory psychology did NOT
  buy the textbook
• Students who bought the book spent less than 3
  hours per week reading it
• Many did not read book at all for at least one
  introductory course
• Marsh et al. (1998)
• Almost 20 failed to study as planned for the
  upcoming week (reprioritized).

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2. Signals information to target for
study.Amlund, Kardash, and Kulhavey revisited

• After Test
• Free Recall Cued Recall
• (Times
• Read)
• 1 35 63
• 3. 34 62

Before Test

• Free Recall Cued Recall
• (Times)
• Read)
• 1 18 48
• 3 24 50

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• 3. Retrieval itself produces enhanced encoding
  (McDaniel Masson, 1986) or retrieval practice
  (Bjork)
• For application to education, with static testing
  (quizzes with no feedback) outstanding issue is
  what delay best balances retrieval effort with
  forgetting.

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Hanson McDaniel (2004)
Students were randomly assigned to treatment
groups
Time from chapter reading to quiz presentation
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Quiz Format

• Experimental Quiz
• Short answer/fill-in-the-blank style (scoring)
• 10 questions derived from material throughout
  chapter
• Control Quiz
• 10 questions
• Used 10 normative questions from Norms of 300
  General-Information Questions (Nelson Narens,
  1980)

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Final Test Questions

• 20 short answer/fill-in-the-blank questions
  covering material throughout the chapter
• Quizzed
• Identical 5 questions from initial quiz Job
  evaluation refers to a family of quantitative
  techniques that are used to determine the salary
  levels of jobs.
• alternate 5 questions questions with different
  stem
• Job evaluation refers to a family of
  quantitative techniques that are used to
  determine this about jobs salary levels.
• Not-quizzed (10 questions from chapter)

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Quiz Performance

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Final Test Performance
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McDaniel, Anderson, Morrisette (2004)

• In WEB-based Brain and Behavior course, each week
  students received either
• 10 facts from course reading to review
• All preganglionic axons, whether sympathetic or
  parasympathetic, release acetylcholine as a
  neurotransmitter.
• a. I have read the above statement.

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• Multiple choice test on 10 facts
• All preganglionic axons, whether sympathetic or
  parasympathetic, release _________ as a
  neurotransmitter.
• a. acetylcholineb. epinephrinec.
  norepinephrined. adenosine

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• Short-Answer test on 10 facts
• All preganglionic axons, whether sympathetic or
  parasympathetic, release _________ as a
  neurotransmitter.
• Correct Answera. acetylcholine

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Unit Test

• After each 3-week period, a 60 item
  multiple-choice Unit test given
• 30 facts from the preceding 3 weeks
• 30 non-exposed facts, each drawn from same
  paragraph as exposed facts
• Unit test question for fact appearing in weekly
  quiz
• All _________ axons, whether sympathetic or
  parasympathetic, release acetylcholine as a
  neurotransmitter.
• a. preganglionicb. ionotropicc.
  hypothalamicd. adenosine

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Retrieval with feedback more effective for
long-term retention than reviewing

• McDaniel, Anderson, Morrisette (2004)
• (Brain and Behavior Class)

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Testing for Assessment

• Memory Laboratory
• Transfer appropriate processing principle
  Acquisition processes will influence test
  performance to the extent similar processes
  required by the test. EXAMPLE Organization does
  not improve recognition performance (which
  focuses on memory for individual facts in
  isolation)
• Implication for Undergraduate Education
• Standard tests that focus on individual factual
  element (Mult choice fill in blank) may not be
  sensitive to more integrative learning

Hanson and McDaniel (2004) (Chapter on
Industrial/Organizational Psychology) 1 week
later short-answer fill-in-blank
test Immediate Week Delay 26
13 31
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Free Recall Einstein, et al. Hines
McDaniel (short text) (Text Chapter)
28 15 46 22
Read Outlined
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Summary

• Study processes should encourage elaboration
  rather than repetitive rehearsal
• Tests valuable for enhancing learning
• Nature of test critical for revealing what is
  learned (some tests may reinforce less powerful
  study processes).