Aufsatz
Distributed Practice: Rarely Realized in Self-Regulated Mathematical Learning
Abstract
The purpose of the present study was to investigate the effect and use of distributed practice in the context of self-regulated mathematical learning in high school. With distributed practice, a fixed learning duration is spread over several sessions, whereas with massed practice, the same time is spent learning in one session. Distributed practice has been proven to be an effective tool for improving long-term retention of verbal material and simple procedural knowledge in mathematics, at least when the practice schedule is externally guided. In the present study, distributed practice was investigated in a context that required a higher degree of self-regulation. In total, 158 secondary school students were invited to participate. After motivational and cognitive characteristics of the students were assessed, the students were introduced to basic statistics, a topic of their regular curriculum. At the end of the introduction, the students could sign up for the study to further practice this content. Eighty-seven students did so and were randomly assigned either to the distributed or to the massed practice condition. In the distributed practice condition, they received three practice sets on three different days. In the massed practice condition, they received the same three sets, but all on one day. All exercises were worked in the context of self-regulated learning at home. Performance was tested 2 weeks after the last practice set. Only 44 students finished the study, which hampered the analysis of the effect of distributed practice. The characteristics of the students who completed the exercises were analyzed exploratory: The proportion of students who finished all exercises was significantly higher in the massed than in the distributed practice condition. Within the distributed practice condition, a significantly larger proportion of female students completed the exercises compared to male students. Additionally, among these female students, a larger proportion showed lower concentration difficulty. No such differential effects were revealed in the massed practice condition. Our results suggest that the use of distributed practice in the context of self-regulated learning might depend on learner characteristics. Accordingly, distributed practice might obtain more reliable effects in more externally guided learning contexts.
Sponsorship
Gefördert durch den Publikationsfonds der Universität KasselCitation
@article{doi:10.17170/kobra-20190204143,
author={Barzagar Nazari, Katharina and Ebersbach, Mirjam},
title={Distributed Practice: Rarely Realized in Self-Regulated Mathematical Learning},
journal={Frontiers in Psychology},
year={2018}
}
0500 Oax 0501 Text $btxt$2rdacontent 0502 Computermedien $bc$2rdacarrier 1100 2018$n2018 1500 1/eng 2050 ##0##http://hdl.handle.net/123456789/11056 3000 Barzagar Nazari, Katharina 3010 Ebersbach, Mirjam 4000 Distributed Practice: Rarely Realized in Self-Regulated Mathematical Learning / Barzagar Nazari, Katharina 4030 4060 Online-Ressource 4085 ##0##=u http://nbn-resolving.de/http://hdl.handle.net/123456789/11056=x R 4204 \$dAufsatz 4170 7136 ##0##http://hdl.handle.net/123456789/11056
<resource xsi:schemaLocation="http://datacite.org/schema/kernel-2.2 http://schema.datacite.org/meta/kernel-2.2/metadata.xsd"> 2019-02-04T14:40:08Z 2019-02-04T14:40:08Z 2018-11-20 doi:10.17170/kobra-20190204143 http://hdl.handle.net/123456789/11056 Gefördert durch den Publikationsfonds der Universität Kassel eng Urheberrechtlich geschützt https://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/ desirable difficulties distributed practice spacing effect mathematics high school students self-regulated learning individual differences 150 Distributed Practice: Rarely Realized in Self-Regulated Mathematical Learning Aufsatz The purpose of the present study was to investigate the effect and use of distributed practice in the context of self-regulated mathematical learning in high school. With distributed practice, a fixed learning duration is spread over several sessions, whereas with massed practice, the same time is spent learning in one session. Distributed practice has been proven to be an effective tool for improving long-term retention of verbal material and simple procedural knowledge in mathematics, at least when the practice schedule is externally guided. In the present study, distributed practice was investigated in a context that required a higher degree of self-regulation. In total, 158 secondary school students were invited to participate. After motivational and cognitive characteristics of the students were assessed, the students were introduced to basic statistics, a topic of their regular curriculum. At the end of the introduction, the students could sign up for the study to further practice this content. Eighty-seven students did so and were randomly assigned either to the distributed or to the massed practice condition. In the distributed practice condition, they received three practice sets on three different days. In the massed practice condition, they received the same three sets, but all on one day. All exercises were worked in the context of self-regulated learning at home. Performance was tested 2 weeks after the last practice set. Only 44 students finished the study, which hampered the analysis of the effect of distributed practice. The characteristics of the students who completed the exercises were analyzed exploratory: The proportion of students who finished all exercises was significantly higher in the massed than in the distributed practice condition. Within the distributed practice condition, a significantly larger proportion of female students completed the exercises compared to male students. Additionally, among these female students, a larger proportion showed lower concentration difficulty. No such differential effects were revealed in the massed practice condition. Our results suggest that the use of distributed practice in the context of self-regulated learning might depend on learner characteristics. Accordingly, distributed practice might obtain more reliable effects in more externally guided learning contexts. open access Barzagar Nazari, Katharina Ebersbach, Mirjam doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2018.02170 publishedVersion EISSN: 1664-1078 Frontiers in Psychology 2170 2018, 9 </resource>
The following license files are associated with this item:
:Urheberrechtlich geschützt