Harness curiosity and interest with developmentally different strategies in the classroom¶

Strategy · All strategies
Evidence · 3 claims (2 for, 1 against) · 1 study (1 associational), q3 · 1 of 1 report an effect size · 3 claims rest on one study

Description¶

The article concludes that states of pre-information curiosity and post-information interest "play a critical role in learning and can be effectively harnessed as a tool in educational settings", but that "different strategies to trigger curiosity and interest in the classroom may result in distinct memory benefits across child development". Because curiosity states are potentially more malleable than trait curiosity, understanding their effects across development can help tailor strategies and interventions to stimulate curiosity optimally across childhood and adolescence.

Design Implications¶

Context¶

Requirements¶

• Educators need ways to elicit and assess students' state curiosity and post-answer interest, e.g., by presenting questions whose answers students do not yet know

Constraints¶

• For children (10–12), high post-answer interest did not significantly improve recall, so interest-based strategies alone may not benefit younger children; the article states future studies are needed to examine if state curiosity effects interact with external constraints such as school-situation perceptions or socio-economic status

Target Learners¶

• children and adolescents aged 10–14 years in school settings

Target Learning Goals¶

• memory for factual, educationally relevant information

Claims¶

• States of high pre-answer curiosity enhance memory for trivia answers similarly in children and adolescents [+W]
• High-curiosity states did not enhance recognition memory for incidental face images in children or adolescents [-W]
• Post-answer interest enhances trivia answer memory more strongly in adolescents than in children [+W]

Related Strategies¶

Examples¶

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Key Sources¶

• Fandakova Yana, Gruber Matthias J. (2021). States of curiosity and interest enhance memory differently in adolescents and in children. Developmental Science, 24(1), e13005. https://doi.org/10.1111/desc.13005