Study Enhancement Based on Principles of Cognitive Science

THE FOLLOWING CONTENT DESCRIBES THE PROJECT AT THE TIME OF FUNDING

The researchers are carrying out a series of eight studies focusing on the learning of children involved in an educational study enhancement program designed to improve the academic performance of diverse inner-city sixth- and seventh-grade children at high risk for academic failure. The intervention is a flexible computer-based study program based on principles of cognitive science and designed to target and improve memory and learning of vocabulary items.

In the first two studies, the researchers are varying the students' learning experiences to investigate whether student learning is adversely affected when students make mistakes and whether those effects vary with the learners' degree of confidence in their own answers. In the third study, the researchers explore whether there are differing effects on learning when students make their own errors as compared to when they observe someone else making errors. In the fourth study, the researchers compare the role of the timing of feedback and errors on learning. The fifth and sixth studies focus on learning in instances in which students give erroneous answers that they are highly confident are correct and on the students' level of attention in these instances. In the seventh study the researchers are looking at the effects of different spacing patterns on learning. In the eighth study they are investigating how excluding items the students have already learned influences their long-term knowledge of those items.