Over a century of research and practical usage by teachers in the classroom speak to the positive benefits of retrieval practice on retention of information. (1) When learners put forth quality effort at recognition or recall of material, this often leads to an improved understanding of and ability to use content. But, it can sometimes be difficult to motivate students to invest in the more cognitively demanding efforts of retrieval practice instead of the ever-popular, yet less effective, methods of rereading and/or highlighting of notes. I mean, I guess I get why students opt for these methods; they are easier to administer and they are usually more pleasant for the learner…there’s no risk of getting anything wrong. And, we humans don’t like getting stuff incorrect. But, you know what they say –> No risk, no reward.
So, to try and motivate my students to invest in the more cognitively difficult, yet more rewarding, strategy of retrieval practice, I’ve begun relating to their hobbies and the effort they give to those endeavors. For the sake of brevity, the analogy I will be using below applies to a student who plays a musical instrument. But, this can easily pertain to someone who is an athlete in a particular sport, a dancer, an actor/actress, an artist…or any other instance where our students are invested in their ability to perform well.
The conversation usually goes something like this:
“If you have a performance coming up where you will play your instrument for a judge/audience and you just received your sheet music, what are you going to do? Are you just going to cram for the performance and look at the music for an hour or so the night before the performance? Are you just going to reread and maybe annotate the sheet music and feel like you’re prepared? No. You are going to practice playing the music many, many times over a period of several days or weeks. When you practice, you are going to get some of the notes correct. You are also going to play some bad notes. Then, you’re going to practice the parts of the music that you messed up over and over again…probably until you cannot get it wrong…perhaps to the point of automaticity.”
“If that’s what you would do to feel confident in preparing for a musical performance, why would you do anything different when preparing for a cognitive performance, like a quiz or a test? Just as you wouldn’t just read the sheet music and not really do anything with it, you shouldn’t just reread your notes and not use the information in a meaningful manner and believe you know that material. Retrieval of content to prepare for the test is the equivalent of playing through the music to prepare for the performance. And just like you wouldn’t wait until the night before the musical performance to begin preparing, you shouldn’t wait and cram for the test the next day. Plan ahead and space out your practice of the to-be remembered information.”
“I know it’s a lot easier to just reread your notes and it’s not a lot of fun to find out you don’t know something you’re supposed to know for class, but you’d rather find out you don’t know something during practice than find out on the test or during the performance…at that point, it’s too late. Said another way, you’re going to find out you don’t know some material…that’s going to happen…but would you rather it be during practice when you can correct your mistakes or on the test when there’s no going back?”
I’ve found that making the analogy to some hobby students really care about can help them to better understand the importance of proper studying and motivate students to put in the effort. Conversations like this making it crystal clear why students should study using more effective and efficient methods should be happening in classroom’s everywhere.
How do you talk with your students about learning/studying properly? What anecdotes or analogies do you use? Leave a comment below to keep the conversation going. : )
If you enjoyed this article and want more practical advice about how to make your classroom more effective, I’ve written a book with Routledge Publishing and InnerDrive. To find out more about my book and read some early endorsements, please check out this link. In the US, you can preorder here. In the UK and elsewhere, preorder here.
Feature image by Manuel Nägeli on Unsplash.
Blake, I use similar analogies with my students — so good. BUT tomorrow, I’m going to use your article with my students so they can hear it from another teacher and understand why we say this sorts of things. TY for your work, sir.
RESPECT!