LEARNING TO LEARN
The mean baseline assessment scores were 36 % for the control and 47 % for the intervention . The low scores are representative of how students had already forgotten previous material and had a poor ability to remember if not given warning of the assessment and any revision time . The mean post-intervention assessment scores were 33 % for the control and 70 % for the intervention ( results in figure 4 ). The 3 % decrease in attainment for the control shows that there is no natural maturation effect and could be representative of forgetting information as per Ebbinghaus ’ forgetting curve . However , it is interesting that there has not been a > 3 % reduction in attainment and so it could be hypothesised that the baseline assessment helped prevent more forgetting by acting as a retrieval opportunity itself . The 23 % increase in attainment between pre- and postintervention assessments for the intervention group is pleasing and suggests a positive impact on boosting topic knowledge retention . The large difference between the control and intervention ’ s scores also suggests that the impact of this intervention is above the natural maturation effect . However , it is important to note that as the intervention originally performed better than the control in the baseline assessment , it would be expected that they would perform better than the control in the post-intervention assessment . Anecdotally , comparing the baseline and post-intervention assessments , those who had been exposed to the intervention were able to answer questions in more detail and use a wider range of geographical vocabulary . This could explain why all students in the intervention group performed better in the post-intervention assessment than they did in the pre-intervention assessment .
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Pre-intervention score Post-intervention score
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A1 A2 A3 A4 A5 A6 A7 A8 A9 A10 A11 A12 A13 A14 A15 A16 A17 A18 A19 A20 A21 C1 C2 C3 C4 C5 C6 C7 C8 C9 C10 C11 C12 C13 C14 C15 C16 C17 C18 C19 C20 C21 C22
Figure 4 : Pre- and post-intervention assessment scores . A1-21 denotes students in the control class ( 10A ) and C1-21 denotes intervention class students ( 10C ).
The post-intervention focus group revealed that students were more pre-disposed to using a wider variety of revision strategies post-intervention ( figure 5 ), which suggests that students are aware of the metacognitive benefits of using a variety of retrieval-based techniques as they have experienced them over the intervention period and therefore have self-regulated to use these strategies . Notably , there is a 75 % reduction in students stating they would use re-reading notes , so information on ineffective strategies has resonated . All students who had experienced the intervention were aware of what retrieval practice is . Additionally , students were clearly aware of the benefits , stating “[ The RP starters ] have had a positive impact on memory ”, “ I liked the retrieval starters . They settled me into the lesson , and I feel they have greatly improved my long-term memory ”, and “ I think of it as a way to make information in my longterm memory store more accessible when needed . It ’ s like imprinting info into your brain .” One student mentioned “ I was more confident with material ”.
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