I've written a White Paper, available here, on spaced practice that includes the theoretical basis, along with informal, formal and technological solutions. Lots of detail, wth full citations but here's some simple techniaues for implementing spaced-practice without too much effort.
Spaced practice, despite being well known since Ebbinghaus first suggested it as a solution to his forgetting curve, in 1885, remains a rarely practiced technique in learning. The reasons are obvious enough. Most education and training delivers isolated doses of learning, lectures, presentations, classroom courses and the learners walk out of the door at the end, job supposedly done. Teachers had no real way of getting to them after the event had finished.
Spaced practice, despite being well known since Ebbinghaus first suggested it as a solution to his forgetting curve, in 1885, remains a rarely practiced technique in learning. The reasons are obvious enough. Most education and training delivers isolated doses of learning, lectures, presentations, classroom courses and the learners walk out of the door at the end, job supposedly done. Teachers had no real way of getting to them after the event had finished.
Spaced practice needs to be habitual. John Locke and William
James both emphasised the key role that ‘habit’ plays in learning, lessons
we’ve ignored.
Good learners, in my experience have developed good learning habits. They
always have something
to read in their pocket or bag. They tend to be obsessive note takers, often
with a long series of filled notebooks. They habitually elaborate what they
hear and actively try to remember. They replay and recall in their own minds,
through dialogue and re-reading their notes. They also tend to kick start new
learning habits, such as blogging, using Evernote and so on.
So how can
we make spaced practice habitual?
1. Top & tail
As a teacher, if you deliver a series of lectures, classes, modules,
whatever, the simple practice of summarising what was taught in the last
lecture, period, class or event and doing the same at the end of the
lecture/class/event, gives two reinforcement events for the price of one. There’s
a double dividend in that you take advantage of primacy and recency (also
discovered by Ebbinhaus), the fact that learners tend to remember the first and
last things more than what comes in between.
2. Note taking
As a learner, get into the habit, not only of taking notes, but rereading and rewriting those notes. Wittrick and Alesandrini (1990) found that written summaries increased learning by 30% through summaries and 22% using written analogies, compared to the control group. If you take notes AND review them, you do better on assessments (Kiewra 1989, 1991). Interestingly, Peper and Mayer (1978) found that note taking increased skills transfer and problem solving in computer programming and science(1986). Shrager and Mayer (1989) found similar effects in college students, learning about cameras. It would seem that note taking allows learners to relate knowledge to experience.
As a learner, get into the habit, not only of taking notes, but rereading and rewriting those notes. Wittrick and Alesandrini (1990) found that written summaries increased learning by 30% through summaries and 22% using written analogies, compared to the control group. If you take notes AND review them, you do better on assessments (Kiewra 1989, 1991). Interestingly, Peper and Mayer (1978) found that note taking increased skills transfer and problem solving in computer programming and science(1986). Shrager and Mayer (1989) found similar effects in college students, learning about cameras. It would seem that note taking allows learners to relate knowledge to experience.
3. Places
Planes, trains and automobiles, as well as airports and any other place where you find yourself hanging around - opportuntiy for a bit of recall. There are other things in life you do regularly, like eat,
go to the toilet, leave the house and so on.
4. Email
If all of your learners use email then this is an easy and
efficient way to deliver spaced practice events. Group emails, set up and timed for release,
can get whatever reinforcement event you wish to design straight to your
audience. A simple text email, infographic, question, video, even piece of
e-learning; anything that makes them rethink, will help fix the learning in
long-term memory.
5. Blog
Bloggers regularly report the learning value of writing and crystalising teir thoughts in blog posts. This, in itself, involved deep processing, therefore better encoding, retention and recall. Blogging is, in this sense, a massively effective way to reinforce learning. It’s one of those things that, when it becomes habitual, is massively effective as an aide memoire.
6. Twitter & Facebook
Bloggers regularly report the learning value of writing and crystalising teir thoughts in blog posts. This, in itself, involved deep processing, therefore better encoding, retention and recall. Blogging is, in this sense, a massively effective way to reinforce learning. It’s one of those things that, when it becomes habitual, is massively effective as an aide memoire.
6. Twitter & Facebook
Given the fact that 1.5 billion people are on Facebook
there’s a good chance that your learners are easier to reach on Facebook than
they are in your institution, library or any other physical space. The
notifications system on Facebook is superbly efficient and that little red
circle with a number in it is a strong stimulus for attention. Simply message
your students with a series of cues from the lecture or course.
7. Sleep
One of the most effective methods of habitually delivering spaced practice is to encourage learners to get into the habit of a little practice and recall just before they go to sleep. This takes discipline but studies show that it is very effective as the brain appears to consolidate memory during sleep.
8. Exercise
If you exercise regularly, that is the chance to recall and reinforce whatever you want to retain. A podcast through your headphones in the gym? Simply record your own lists, notes, reinforcement events and replay on demand. Get into the habit and you’ll get both physical and psychological gains
9. Mobile
Systems, like ENCORE, deliver reinforcement events, spaced
between any two times to your learners’ mobiles. You can choose what to deliver
when using a variety of media. This system gets to that powerful, personal,
portable device in the pocket of every learner.
10. Adaptive spaced-practice
Sytems are emrging with personalised spaced-practice that is delivered according to your needs, paying attention to your preferred channels, intereleaving known and less well known items for practice, avoiding cognitive overload when you miss some and so on.
10. Adaptive spaced-practice
Sytems are emrging with personalised spaced-practice that is delivered according to your needs, paying attention to your preferred channels, intereleaving known and less well known items for practice, avoiding cognitive overload when you miss some and so on.
Conclusion
Spaced practice is arguably the most powerful, yet most
overlooked benefit in learning. Implemented properly and it is possible to have
huge gains in productivity, namely the retention and recall of whatever has
been learnt. I’d go further and say that if you don’t have a spaced practice
strategy, you don’t have a properly designed course.
So let’s have that list again….
To & tail
Notes
Places
Email
Blog
Blog
Twitter & Facebook
Sleep
Exercises
Mobile
More in this series...
More in this series...
10 ways to make badass INTROs in online learning
10 bloody good reasons for using much-maligned TEXT in online learning
10 essential online learning WRITING TIPS in online learning
10 stupid mistakes in design of MULTIPLE
CHOICE questions
10 essential points on use of (recall not recognition)
OPEN RESPONSE questions
10 rules on how to create great GRAPHICS in online learning
10 sound pieces of advice on use of AUDIO in onlinelearning
10 ways based on research to use VIDEO in online
learning
10 ideas on use of much maligned TALKING HEAD videos in online learning
1 comment:
Great points, Donald. Thanks so much.
Just to add, these spaced repititions should be active in that the brain has to work to get the summary/answer/idea. Just reading through would not suffice, but as you pointed out, rewriting it as a blog or answering questions, etc. would help more.
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