You've done recently an enormous meta-analysis, an analysis of analyses. You've looked at
a whole bunch of different types of learning techniques, things that students can use,
or do use, to try to improve their learning.
Right.
Could you tell us a bit about what you've done and what you've found?
Sure. With a large group of collaborators who actually worked very hard in this project
for almost three years, we just reviewed lots of literature, as you've said, about the
effectiveness of a variety of strategies. What we didn't look at were strategies that
involved technology because we wanted to focus on just those things that any student could use.
We chose the strategies for two reasons. Some of them we wanted to evaluate, we thought
they probably did work, but why not check out the evidence? A couple of other strategies,
however, we knew students used a lot. We wanted to know: are these really effective strategies,
or should they be doing something else instead? Something that all students use—I still
do it myself—is highlighter. We like to highlight things when reading. It's like a
security blanket or something for learning. But it turns out highlighting itself doesn't
really improve student learning. It doesn't increase achievement in any way. I would never
take a highlighter away from a student. Again, it's like a security blanket, but it's
just the beginning of the learning journey. It's not the end of it. After you highlight
all the important stuff—it turns out most textbooks highlight it for you anyway—you
need to go back and use effective techniques to learn that material.
At least some of the things that students do like highlighting and re-reading really
don't have a big bang for the time buck, so to speak. We'll spend time re-reading and
highlighting and really not learning a whole lot, when in fact they can replace those strategies
with other ones that really do boost their learning, which is exciting.
Sure.
Now we just have to retrain students, build a better student, use better strategies.
Interesting. So highlighting, rereading, doesn't have much of an effect?
No, it doesn't. Isn't that strange? You'd think everybody rereads right? You go back
to the material. Unfortunately, when you go back to reread, your eyes are moving across
the page, it's probably late at night, the night before an exam, and your mind is somewhere
else, so basically mind wandering as you're rereading . Students need to do things that
are more—to engage them more actively.
Yes. So in this analysis, you've looked at some things also that had a massive effect.
Yes.
What—obviously it makes sense. I mean, a lot people, when they are studying or cramming
for an exam, these are the things we do but they might not be the most effective. What
are the most effective? What are the things that actually work?
Certainly cramming is not that effective, right? Students think it's effective probably
because they can squeak by potentially in the exam and then they'll just forget everything.
I'm not suggesting students don't study the night before a test. It relieves anxiety
and all that sort of thing, but there are better things they could do. First, instead
of just cramming, begin studying two or three weeks before an exam so you're distributing
your practice out across time, which is very important. So you're studying the same material
over and over again. Now that does take a little planning, maybe a calendar to remind
yourself, "It's just two weeks before the exam. Now I really need to hit the books,"
versus just the night before, when you're panicking and trying to cram.
Distributed practice is really good, but distributed practice just tells you kind of a schedule
of how you should be studying, kind of like the "when" of studying. But there are
lots of "whats," the things you can do instead of just rereading the material passively.
One that we find that's really effective, and many others—there's about a hundred
years of research; very exciting—showing how effective this is, is just retrieval practice.
So if you mark up your book in about all the important things, and you go back, instead
of just rereading everything you've marked up, cover it up with your hand and just try
to recall from memory the content. If the student gets that answer right from memory,
that has a really potent effect on subsequent performance. You really learn it that much
better. Of course if they can't recall it from memory, then they could restudy at that
point, but then they should come back and keep trying. Just retrieval practice is a
really effective way to boost performance, especially if students use it distributed across time.
Sure. So it's kind of like flashcards, I guess.
Absolutely like flashcards. You know, most students at least say they use flash cards
for simple, associate learning, things like foreign language vocabulary, but you can use
flashcards for complex materials as well: concepts, or you write the key term on one
side, definition on the other side, and then use that to basically test yourself, and then
to restudy. Even important concepts in textbooks—how they take notes. They can take notes in better
ways to actually support this retrieval practice, which is an effective strategy that many students
don't use. They underutilize it, yes.
Retrieval practice—so then it's, I suppose, really pretty effortful by my comparison to
rereading or highlighting, so it probably takes a fair bit of desire on the part of
the student to want to learn that.
Absolutely, it does. It's very easy to sit there and reread, especially when your mind
is somewhere else thinking about how fun it's going to be after you take your exam, that
type of thing. Where it does take a little bit more effort, that's what engages you to
try to retrieve the information. The nice thing is, out of all these studies that are
done to compare rereading to retrieval practice, the time on task is always equated, so the
students who were just rereading spent the same amount of time that the students are
who were practicing retrieval. So, yes, it might be a little bit more effortful. It's
like a little bit more painful to try to retrieve stuff from memory, but even the same amount
of time used in one strategy versus the other, the students who were practicing retrieval,
using that little bit of extra effort, are getting the major, basically, increase in their performance.
Interesting. And so the other aspect to that, the distributed learning, the spaced learning,
what does that entail? Does that entail studying a little bit each day, or is it—how many
days do you need?
That's a hundred-dollar question, or maybe even 10,000-dollar question.
This is how I think about it. Let's say you're a student getting ready for an exam, and maybe
you decide, "Okay, I can give this four hours of my time." Most students, because
they think cramming is good, they'll spend that four hours the night before the exam—just
study, study, study. They're going to do lot better off if they take the same four
hours and just basically segment it into four one-hour study sessions that are spread across,
say, two weeks prior to the exam. Again, the same amount of time, but now they're just
spread across time, where you're coming back to the same material versus just kind of going
over that material over and over again during one four-hour block.
How much they need to do for long-term retention? A whole lot. Okay, this won't be a great strategy
to learn all your course content. You got to decide what's most important, what you
think you're going to be tested on, and focus on that material.
Interesting.
But the more, the better. The more often you come back and restudy, of course, and use
retrieval practice, the longer you're going to retain that material. For stuff that students
really need to know, this is an essential strategy, or else they just forget stuff.
I mean, you don't have to tell a student that after they take a test that they crammed for,
the next day they pretty much don't remember anything that they studied. Distributed practice
ensures that you're going to remember that for a much longer period of time.
Interesting.
My name is John. I think about reflection.