Case Study: Emma Smith
CPD: Generative Learning (by Zoe & Mark Enser), topic 3.1.2
The Study
The study was a trial for the Institute of Effective Education looking at the effectiveness of low-stakes quizzes in year 8 geography and history classes.
Methods
- Once a week, half of the classes sat a quick, ten-question quiz at the start of their lesson before being given the answers so that they could mark their own work.
Methods (cont.)
- At the end of the year, all pupils in year 8 sat an assessment, and we compared how they did with their first assessment of the year.
Methods (cont.)
- In doing this, we could examine how those pupils in the classes who completed the quizzes compared to those whose classes did not.
Results
- Everyone benefited to some extent from the quizzes, but the effect was greater in the geography classes than in the history classes.
- This possibly happened because the geography questions were often a little more complex than the history ones and needed the pupils to draw on a wider body of knowledge to answer them.
- Thus, the geography questions were more generative in nature, requiring pupils to go through that process of selection, organisation and integration.
Application
- This study has helped to shape how Emma & Mark's school uses self-testing, with advice to staff to think carefully about how they approach question selection in their retrieval quizzes and give thought to whether the questions require pupils to think hard about the material to be learned.
Test yourself on Case Study: Emma Smith
Why is it important to motivate students to use self-testing strategies?