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Preparing for high-stakes exams in introductory physics courses is generally a self-regulated activity. Compared to other exam reviewing strategies, doing practice exams has been shown to help students recognize gaps in their knowledge, encourage active practicing, and produce long-term retention. However, many students, particularly students who are struggling with the course material, are not guided by research-based study strategies and do not use practice exams effectively. Using data collected from a fully online course in Spring 2021, this study examines two interventions aimed at improving student selfregulated studying behaviors and enhancing student metacognition during exam preparation. We found that a modified format of online practice exams with one attempt per question and delayed feedback, increases the accuracy of feedback about student readiness for exams but does not change the accuracy of their predicted exam scores or studying behaviors. Additionally, an added mock exam one week before the actual exam impacts students’ intentions for studying but does not impact actual study behaviors or facilitate metacognition. These results suggest that interventions designed to improve exam preparation likely need to include explicit instruction on study strategies and student beliefs about learning.
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Learning is Quick: Evidence for the Impact of Learning Beliefs on Self-Regulated Learning
Exam preparation in introductory science courses is self-regulated. Practice testing has been shown to produce better learning then other strategies. However, many students do not use practice tests effectively when studying. This mixed-methods study examines two experiments aimed at improving examining student predictions about learning and studying. We found that scores on a mock exam impact students’ intentions for studying but not study habits. We also found that many underperforming students initially increase the use of ineffective study strategies rather than adopt a strategy change. Students who distribute studying throughout the semester and engage with course concepts more deeply demonstrate improvement and increased satisfaction. These results suggest that exam preparation interventions may need to include study strategy and metacognitive instruction.
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- Award ID(s):
- 2021190
- PAR ID:
- 10488173
- Publisher / Repository:
- American Educational Research Association
- Date Published:
- Format(s):
- Medium: X
- Location:
- Chicago, IL
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
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Henderson, Charles (Ed.)Preparing for high-stakes exams in introductory physics courses is generally a self-regulated activity. Compared to other exam reviewing strategies, doing practice exams has been shown to help students recognize gaps in their knowledge, encourage active practicing, and produce long-term retention. However, many students, particularly students who are struggling with the course material, are not guided by research-based study strategies and do not use practice exams effectively. Using data collected from a fully online course in Spring 2021, this study examines two interventions aimed at improving student selfregulated studying behaviors and enhancing student metacognition during exam preparation. We found that a modified format of online practice exams with one attempt per question and delayed feedback, increases the accuracy of feedback about student readiness for exams but does not change the accuracy of their predicted exam scores or studying behaviors. Additionally, an added mock exam one week before the actual exam impacts students’ intentions for studying but does not impact actual study behaviors or facilitate metacognition. These results suggest that interventions designed to improve exam preparation likely need to include explicit instruction on study strategies and student beliefs about learning.more » « less
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Well-designed instructional videos are powerful tools for helping students learn and prompting students to use generative strategies while learning from videos further bolsters their effectiveness. However, little is known about how individual differences in motivational factors, such as achievement goals, relate to how students learn within multimedia environments that include instructional videos and generative strategies. Therefore, in this study, we explored how achievement goals predicted undergraduate students’ behaviors when learning with instructional videos that required students to answer practice questions between videos, as well as how those activities predicted subsequent unit exam performance one week later. Additionally, we tested the best measurement models for modeling achievement goals between traditional confirmatory factor analysis and bifactor confirmatory factor analysis. The bifactor model fit our data best and was used for all subsequent analyses. Results indicated that stronger mastery goal endorsement predicted performance on the practice questions in the multimedia learning environment, which in turn positively predicted unit exam performance. In addition, students’ time spent watching videos positively predicted practice question performance. Taken together, this research emphasizes the availing role of adaptive motivations, like mastery goals, in learning from instructional videos that prompt the use of generative learning strategies.more » « less
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null (Ed.)Given the demonstrated prevalence of a “doer effect” showing that active practice is related to substantially larger learning gains than passive approaches, an important research goal is to investigate whether and how different active practice features promote students’ learning outcomes. We investigated these questions in the context of an online learning platform that teaches e-learning design principles. In particular, we considered two different practice modes -practice activities inserted in the text (inline practice) and review practice quizzes -and compared their contributions to students' learning outcomes, in terms of module quizzes, periodic exams, and course projects. Our results showed that the different practice modes had distinct impacts on learning outcomes. Doing inline practice activities contributed to students’ quiz performance at the first attempt and project performance while doing review practice quizzes helped students improve their periodic exam performance. We offer some instructional suggestions such as emphasizing practice activities that are more clearly linked with specific learning objectives for projects, and emphasizing review practice quizzes for exam preparation.more » « less
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Retrieval practice (i.e., recalling information from memory) and elaboration (i.e., generating meaningful explanations and examples) promote learning, but students underutilize these strategies when studying. We developed a strategy-training intervention addressing prominent barriers to students’ strategy use: lack of knowledge, lack of motivation, and poor management of study time. Undergraduates in an Introductory Biology course were randomly assigned to receive the strategy-training intervention or to a healthy life habits control group. No significant differences were found between the two groups on measures of learning behavior or achievement collected across the semester, emphasizing the challenge of changing students’ learning habits. Future research should investigate strategy training with lower performing students integrated into a course.more » « less
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